Clara Sanabras has had an eventful year. Not only has she elicited emotions from thousands of film music fans through her work as a soloist on Titanic Live, and the Titanic Suite in Stavanger, Norway, she has also been busy on an ambitious project of her own, having written a folk opera based on William Shakespeare's The Tempest.
Courtesy of Stavanger Symphony Orchestra
© Sony/ATV Music Publishing
Commisioned by The Chorus of Dissent, A Hum About Mine Ears combines newly composed music with Shakespeare's own texts as well as new lyrics written by Clara Sanabras based on the play. It was recorded in the summer of 2015, with the Britten Sinfonia, The Chorus of Dissent and London Voices.
Earlier in the day prior to the concert in Stavanger, Clara, James Horner and others went on a rib speed boat trip to the Pulpit Rock. The experience inspired Clara to make a music video for A Hum About Mine Ears, featuring the deep fjords and raging mountains found in the Stavanger area. In August she came back with a small crew to shoot the video. Locations were an old wooden ship, the Pulpit Rock and the Stavanger Concert Hall to name a few.
During the first evening we shot some great footage on an old ship, with Clara and the captain from our speed boat trip in May in character as Miranda and a boatswain.
Right as the sun set, we did a small tribute to James Horner, depositing two copies of the score from Titanic Live into the sea, watching them drift away and sink while the sun went down.
The rest of the shoot was cut short however. We were at sea in the same rib speedboat as in May, in the very early morning hours to start hiking up to the Pulpit Rock, hoping to catch the sunrise. Suddenly, the boat crashed! No one was seriously injured, but Clara broke her nose.
Clara has written a great piece published by The Guardian, elaborating more on the set of coincidences and events from the last year, connecting James Horner to Shakespeare and The Tempest to Titanic.
The album with the fantastic music she has written is released this Sunday, March 6, the same day she will perform the music along with choir and orchestra, at the Barbican in London.
Official website: Clarasanabras.co.uk
What a wonderful article you have written on Clara. I loved my visit to Stavanger last year, if only it had been on the concert date. However, I did meet Clara in London last November, as she performed where my parents married in 1936, and she told me of her date at The Barbican. Both myself and my husband are looking forward to tomorrow, especially as she has dedicated the cd to James, and what a day for the launch…Mother’s Day and our 51st wedding anniversary. So looking forward to it, thank you for making everyone aware of her launch. Pamela.
I can’t wait to hear Clara’s new album. After everything we, as fans, have gone through, it’s nice to see things are being dedicated to him. I think some people believe he should be remembered, not only for the scores he wrote, but also for the kind of man he was. My only regret is that I never took good opportunities to meet him. Zoe.