So, after watching “Dinner for One” about fifty times (at least) and deciding to use it for inspiration for something new, I started trying to find a singer to play James and a pianist for the accompaniment.
If you’ve ever been looking for musicians, you know it can be very tiresome. Some never answer, some don’t pick up their phones, some call back after two weeks, some can’t decide whether they’re interested or not, or whether they have time or not, etc. Actually, it would be a good subject for a sketch 😉
Luckily, a pianist I had worked with before, answered very quickly.
However, finding a singer was not as easy. After asking almost all tenors and baritones I know, I decided to widen the horizon a bit - geographically, but also in terms of when I met or worked with them - I was so glad to get a really great baritone with Hongyu Chen!
Hongyu, http://hongyu-chen.com, is great to work with. He answered quickly and delivered perfectly, plus he performes Figaro just wonderfully:
Don't you think?
I really love listening to this!
So after finding my musicians I was ready for work. I just had to find the right way of changing "Dinner for One" into something else, namely a kind of opera-theatre.