ETO to launch Digital Season with Easter Sunday broadcast of St John Passion

  • ETO at HomeETO launching its new streaming platform on the company’s website.
  • St John Passion: ETO will launch its 2021 Digital Season on the platform with St John Passion on Easter Sunday
  • A new documentary accompanies the broadcast, with the production’s artists discussing their lives as freelance musicians in the year since live performance was cancelled. 
  • ETO’s Digital Season: new specially produced films will be available on new platform featuring music by Josquinde MarchautShostakovich and Elena Langer.
  • Free virtual singing lessons for choral singers: lessons from ETO artists the latest ETO project to build engagement with opera amongst amateur musicians.

Easter Sunday: ETO Launch ‘ETO at Home’ with St John Passion and a New Documentary Interviewing Freelance Opera Artists During Pandemic

On Easter Sunday, ETO will launch its 2021 Digital Season on ETO at Home, the company’s new streaming platform.

The platform will be launched with the Spring 2020 production of Bach’s St John Passion. The passion will be accompanied by a 10-minute documentary exploring the lives of the production’s singers and musicians in the year since the performance.Both films will be free to access. 

The documentary sees the singers discussing how it felt to have had their careers put on hold, the uncertainty they have faced as freelance opera artists, and what is missing from a world without live performance. Artists discuss issues from the impact Brexit threatens to have on their lives and why many are choosing to move abroad, to how they have found ways to survive financially over the past year. 

The season will then continue with all-new productions of music by such composers as Josquinde MarchautShostakovich and Elena Langer, specially produced and filmed for ETO at Home.   Powered by Vimeo, ETO at Home will allow audiences across the country to access ETO’s filmed productions, documentaries, and innovative children’s programming during the pandemic and beyond.

Free Virtual Singing Lessons for Amateur Choral Singers:

ETO will also launch a new series of virtual singing lessons for amateur choral singers led by ETO artists. The lessons are designed to increase engagement with opera amongst choral singers, and to reach people who have had little access to music-making over the past year. Working with choral singers is a priority for ETO in order to build relationships with members of ETO’s thriving amateur classical music scene. 

ETO’s St John Passion is the latest example of ETO’s collaborations with amateur choral musicians up and down the country. The film creatively weaves together footage of the live performance at Hackney Empire with 90 individual video contributions made by choir members in isolation from Cumbria to Cornwall who were due to participate in performances across the country. 

ABOVE: ETO St John Passion (c) Andreas Grieger