Last year, Australian soprano Cheryl Barker watched her husband, baritone Peter Coleman-Wright, sing in Voices in the Forest. This year, it will be Barker on stage at the National Arboretum – her first time in the annual event that's been supplying Canberra with beautiful music outdoors since 2011.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
"I jumped at the opportunity," Barker says.
"I'm thrilled to be doing it."
This year's Voices in the Forest will be hosted by Alex Sloan. It begins with soprano Louise Page and mezzo soprano Christina Wilson performing baroque arias accompanied by the Voices in the Forest orchestra conducted by Christopher Latham. Among these pieces will be Gluck's Che faro senza Euridice, Purcell's Sound the Trumpet, Monteverdi's Pur ti miro and Handel's Ombra ma fu.
Then Barker and the other guest artists, tenor Diego Torre and baritone Jose Carbo, will be introduced and perform solo numbers – Barker's numbers will include Puccini's O mio babbino caro from the opera Gianni Schicci.
Barker has worked with both Torre and Carbo before and is looking forward to doing so again: "It'll be fun."
After the first interval comes a bigger chunk of Puccini, extended excerpts from La Boheme featuring all of the above singers as well as baritone Rowan Thatcher. It's one of the operas with which Barker started her career.
"I first first sang Mimi in 1987," she says – she did a country tour of Victoria and went on to perform in the opera in Baz Luhrmann's production in Sydney as well as Bohemes in Belgium and London – and she will return to the role of the doomed seamstress again for this performance.
"It features all of the highlights of the opera, which is wonderful – it's one of the greatest operas ever written."
The final act of Voices in the Forest features a selection of solo and ensemble highlights from opera, operetta and musical theatre. Barker's numbers will include the Song to the Moon from Dvorak's Rusalka, Ebben n'andro lontana from Catalani's La Wally and So In Love from Cole Porter's Kiss Me Kate.
Among the many other numbers to be performed will be Largo al Factotum from The Barber of Seville by Rossini, the Toreador Song from Bizet's Carmen and Nessun Dorma from Puccini's Turandot.
"People will get their money's worth."
This will be Barker's first Canberra performance since a Musica Viva tour about nine years ago with Coleman-Wright and pianist Piers Lane – though not her first visit to the nation's capital this year, even apart from publicity for Voices.
"I did a masterclass at the Australian National University for the 50th anniversary of the School of Music – it's nice to be back in Canberra, it's an interesting place. I went to Floriade, it was lovely; very pretty."
And she maintains a busy and varied schedule both in Australia and overseas. Recently she performed in the La Triviata section of the Nagambie Lakes Opera Festival in Victoria – "I love competition and games" – and she will soon be performing Richard Strauss' Four Last Songs in Tasmania before heading to London with her husband where he will be performing in The Magic Flute with the English National Opera – "He'll be a very old Papageno" – while she prepares for a Warsaw production of a very different work to Puccini, Thomas Ades' 1995 chamber opera Powder Her Face.
Next year she will sing in a Welsh National Opera world premiere production of Iain Bell's In Parenthesis, based on the poem by David Jones.
Sustaining a a long performance, whether in a single opera or a lengthy concert like Voices in the Forest – isn't easy.
"You have to pace yourself," Barker says. It's important to rehearse and to maintain stamina throughout the performance. And it's helped by the fact that there are works that are easier on her voice towards the end in the upcoming Canberra concert.
Barker studied at the Victorian College of the Arts when she left school and since then has built up a repertoire of 50 different roles.
"Madama Butterfly was a big highlight, and I love Salome and Janacek's Káťa Kabanová, though I don't get to do it very often, I just adore it."
Barker and Coleman-Wright met when she was 14 and in a school production of the musical The Boy Friend – "I went in to get out of schoolwork". They eventually became a couple and have been married for 31 years.
Given their busy separate careers, how do they keep their relationship alive and healthy?
"Communication," she says. They spend a lot of time on the phone to each other and make an effort to see each other when they can.
"We're always part of each other's lives."
They have a teenage son, Gabriel. who is in year 11 – "the pressure's on now" – and who is also a musician, albeit of a different kind.
"He recently started a rock band, The Coots, and they're recording two songs. He didn't get the classical gene."
Voices in the Forest is on at the National Arboretum Canberra on Saturday, November 21 at 5.30pm. Gates open at 2.30pm. More information and bookings: voicesintheforest.com.au.
