There have, over the years, been several groups attached to Edinburgh University that have staged opera performances with a nucleus of student singers and players. Where the EUOC gains a clear distinction is in its practice of mounting performances of very unusual repertoire - not just Scottish but British premieres. Three new pieces have been launched (and Harper's Fanny Robin was quickly taken up by Scottish Opera). And if Dido and Aeneas is an unusual example of a standard repertoire work appearing, that was because Harper had intended Fanny as a companion piece for the Purcell.
There are perhaps two identifiable repertoire strands that the Club concentrated on - the (then) little-known baroque sector, and more modern, light French operas and operettas. Early music also featured, as did some unusual twentieth century works.
Works performed are as follows:
1968 Monteverdi: Orfeo.
1969 Handel: Agrippina.
1970 Banchieri: La Pazzia Senile.
Poulenc: Les Mamelles de Tirésias.
1971 Lully: Alceste.
1972 Purcell: The Fairy Queen.
1973 Handel: Semele.
1974 Chabrier: L'étoile.
1975 Purcell: Dido and Aeneas.
Harper: Fanny Robin.
1976 A Renaissance Entertainment.
1977 Rameau: Les Indes Galantes.
1978 Bizet: Don Procopio.
1979 Monteverdi: Il Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda.
Anon: Ludus Danielis.
1980 Granados: Goyescas.
Falla: El Retablo del Maese Pedro.
1981 Gluck: Alceste.
1982 Vaughan Williams: Sir John in Love.
1983 Weill: The Lindberg Flight.
Weill: The Seven Deadly Sins.
Weill: The Yea-Sayer.
1984 Weber: Oberon.
1985 Boieldieu: La Dame Blanche.
1986 Stravinsky: The Rake's Progress.
1987 Offenbach: Orpheus in the Underworld.
1988 Harper: The Mellstock Quire.
Nicolson: The Vision of Hildegard.
1989/1 Bernstein: Mass.
1989/2 Cavalli: Erismena.
Details of productions provided by Dr Roger Savage. Known casts shown in bold:
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