Salad Days the contemporary opera version

Tete-a-tete is an amazing opera company who, since their founding in 1997, have been mid-wife to a remarkably number of contemporary operas. Their evenings of short 1-act operas have expanded into their remarkable opera festival at Riverside Studios in August when a wide variety of groups are able to show-case their works.

So it is with not a little puzzlement that I received a flyer through the post for the group's latest production - Julian Slade's musical Salad Days. Now, don't get me wrong, Salad Days is entirely charming but it is hardly contemporary opera. Its not opera at all and you can't really kid yourself that enticing people in to see it will persuade people to try out the group's more contemporary operatic offerings. Perhaps it is just that director Bill Bankes-Jones has a burning desire to stage Salad Days, let us hope so.