School opera heals souls

The sound of melodic voices harmonising wafts from the hall.

"No shuffling!" shouts a stage director at the performers. "Posture!" she commands.

The singers stare intensely, holding their pose as they rehearse the new opera Comfort Ye.

The singers are Bloekombos Secondary School pupils from an impoverished community in Kraaifontein.

Comfort Ye is the result of the stories they wrote in 2013.

The opera, according to its programme, is about "love, loss, a chase, a murder, rumours of abuse, families divided, and an ultimate message of hope".

It will be performed at Artscape on March 6, 7 and 8.

The school's previous production, The Fairy Queen, was staged in Johannesburg and Cape Town in 2012, and again in Cape Town in 2013 through the Umculo festival.

"We felt our young chorus members were bringing so much of themselves to their stage roles that it was time to hand the creative process over to them," said Shirley Apthorp, the festival founder and director.

"So we began creative writing workshops with them in 2013.

They ended up with a pile of notebooks "absolutely full of extraordinary material, which Robert [Lehmeier] then turned into one coherent libretto".

Besides librettist Lehmeier, the production involves composer Cathy Milliken, Fatima Dike, who assisted with the writing, and Mimi Makapela, who translated Xhosa to English.

Mali Kwatsha, a young tenor, performs the song What It Is Like To Grow Up Without a Mother, about his alcoholic mother who dumped him when he was a baby.

"It was very hard for me to write because I have never told anyone before. But when I wrote it, I felt a big relief," he said.

"If others see my story, mothers who are addicted to alcohol will know how much they hurt children who grow up without them."

His father raised him. "My father couldn't afford nappies. He had to wash towel nappies," he said.

Teacher Siyabulela Sulelo, who leads the 30-member choir , said: " They're so positive now. So much so that some of them have shown an interest in studying opera ."