EIF: Rebecca Anderson: ‘I Dreamed a Dream’

Cabaret - 7.20, Zoo Playground – Old High School Yards – 16-18 August

Recital – St Michael’s Church – EH11 1NX – 7.30 August 24th

This is a review and a preview. First a tiny disclaimer - Rebecca was one of my students when I was Honorary Professor of Singing at St Andrews University, starring as Mrs Grose in ‘The Turn of the Screw’ in the Byre Theatre. She has gone on to study at the Royal Northern College in Manchester, where she became President of the Students’ Union, and will complete her studies next session. She is immensely talented, and a lot of fun.

This week until Thursday night (18th August), she is playing a one woman show at Zoo Playground (aka Old High School Yards) at the bottom of Infirmary Street, down from Blackwells Bookshop. I went to her show and loved it. It’s just Rebecca and an electric piano in a tiny space, but she takes us on a journey to find love, which involves, among other things, long place names and a discourse on Pi to 52 decimal points. Her writing is witty and clever, and she uses her excellent voice to good effect. Highly recommended!

Next week, on 24th August at 7.30pm, she will be giving a recital of songs by Britten, Boulanger and Alma Mahler in St Michael’s Church in Slateford Road. Although uninvolved myself with Rebecca’s show, this is the same venue as my concert on Sunday August 21st at 4pm, ‘An Afternoon at the Opera’, with another of her contemporaries at St Andrews, Caroline Taylor. I would encourage our readers to go along to either of these ventures by Rebecca – she is a Scottish talent to be cherished!