Sirena – The Glitch, London

Contemporary opera Sirena purports to retell the myth of the sirens from a contemporary feminist perspective. Whether or not that aim is fully realised, this is a suitably enchanting work.

Sirena

It’s not just in Edinburgh that you can find experimental and interesting fringe performances this time of year. In fact, now that VAULT Festival lives on in part as The Glitch, London has a good selection all year round.  Last time we were here we saw Hamstrung: loved that.  Today’s performance is very different, but that’s after all the brilliance of the fringe.

Sirena, by Kirsty Ferguson-Lewis, is billed as a mini opera. And so it probably is.  Watching it also brought to mind the performance of a concept album in a way I quite liked.  It involves three singers against pre-recorded electronic audio: Ferguson-Lewis, Ilenia Cipollari and Franziska Böhm.  They are sirens: mermaid-adjacent mythical beings who lure men in with their voices.  These sirens are not tempting Odysseus and his men, however.  They are contemporary, reimagined from a feminist perspective. What is it like to enchant men in an age of technology and online dating?

A Breath of Fresh Air

Such are the questions Sirena addresses, at least after a slightly more watery and mythical opening scene. The sirens wrap themselves in cables, and dance for the camera.  The precise intent behind the cables was a little lost on me but they were a nice visual counterbalance for the flowing fabric and thalassic colours.  It seems perhaps that a siren’s powers are less potent when rendered digitally, as a much-coveted ‘man in finance’ is won and lost.  Does it not seem better, on the whole, to stick with wrecking ships on dastardly rocks?

It’s entirely possible that is the point.  Sirena ran a little shorter than the advertised time on the night I saw it (about 45 minutes in total), and so I wasn’t quite expecting the ending when it arrived and didn’t manage to tie all the threads together, so to speak.  That didn’t dull my enjoyment of an innovative work with a good idea behind it.  Musically Sirena is also interesting: mostly modern and fresh electronica but with hints of earlier folk songs, and even a bit of religious choral music. 

Ferguson-Lewis’s voice is well-suited to the lead role, being effortlessly light and soaring.  She’s ably supported by Cipollari and Böhm, and the three of them together weave melodies that could well draw in a lonely sailor. The staging is also very effective, making clever use of technology as well as lighting (design by James Denny) and costume to make a visually engaging production.  Kudos to director Selwin Hulme-Teague for creating a cohesive whole from the various elements and drawing out the light and shade.

There’s a lot of promise here. It’s always a breath of fresh air to see something unique and original, and I count Sirena within that class.

Salterton Arts Review’s rating: 3.5/5

Sirena’s run at The Glitch has now ended. Check out more information on Kirsty Ferguson-Lewis’s website here.