Over the years, Cambridge Youth Opera has built up a network of partners in and around Cambridge.

Chesterton Community College – Home of CYO

Multi-faceted partnership

Since 2011, CYO has been supported by Chesterton Community College, while providing special opportunities for Chesterton students to take part in our activities. The College is the home of Cambridge Youth Opera and our base for rehearsals.

We work closely with both the Music and Art and DT departments on projects. The Music Department has worked iwth us on many of our productions, including  eg Hansel and Gretel and The Little Sweep and the ETO production of Towards an Unknown Port. Meanwhile Art and DT students have been involved in costume and set workshops with industry professionals, including the creation of the Monster for The Hiding Tree and a large scale set piece, the forest floor, for Hansel and Gretel.

Anglian Learning MAT

Bottisham Village College and Sawston Village College

Stage Management and Technical Theatre

For Hansel and Gretel we cemented a longstanding informal relationship with Bottisham and Sawston Village Colleges, training students in stage management and offering the opportunity to work with the Storey’s Field technical team, training to use the state of the art lighting rig and run the show. Both teams had a great opportunity to train and work in a professional venue and take their skills back to their Colleges. We are very grateful to our performance venue partner, Storey’s Field, for supporting this initiative. Although we were not able to complete the planned work because of the COVID outbreak, we hope to continue with this work on future productions.

The Netherhall School

Writing

We are looking forward to working with the English Department on our next creative project.

Anglian Learning MAT Primary Schools

Pupils from Bottisham and Fen Ditton Primary Schools (both Anglian Learning) joined us as Gingerbread Children for Hansel and Gretel. We worked with Key Stage 2 teachers to train and rehearse these young singers and hoped to give them an outstanding experience performing with us.

Again, the pandemic brought a halt to these activities however, we were able to offer a Digital Workshop to four MAT schools as part of our primary schools lockdown project.

We look forward to working with the MAT primary schools in future.

Cambridge Youth Dance Company

Choreography and dance

Our production of Hansel and Gretel included a large dance element and we were joined for this by choreographer Kate Durrant of Cambridge Youth Dance Company. Kate wokred with a group of young dancers and CYO singers to develop the dance elements of the show. For CYO members, this provided the opportunity to develop a new skill and contribute to this important dimension to the production.

We worked closely with Kate on the movement element of our Digital Opera Making Workshops and look forward to further collaborations on future projects.

Storey’s Field Centre

Performance Venue Partnership

As well as being a supportive performance venue, the Storey’s Field Centre provides us with substantial technical support, including training for young lighting technicians, who gain invaluable experience working with professionals using the Centre’s state of the art theatre lighting system.

Cambridgeshire Music Hub

We are a partner in the Cambridgeshire Music Hub and a member of their opera strategy group.

Norfolk and Norwich Festival Bridge

The ongoing support of the NNF Bridge is an important element in the success of CYO.

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