Due to the pandemic, the Belfast Children’s festival that takes place annually has been moved online, and therefore allowing me to watch ‘The Musician: A Horror Opera For Children’ performed by the Belfast Ensemble. The story tells the back story of the life of the infamous ‘Pied Piper’ and how he became what he is known for today in the storybooks. But is he the good-hearted hero we all really know?
The setting is a full view of the orchestra with a small raised stage in the centre where the actors performed the majority of the performance. At the start of the show, I was confused at first at the mixture of spoken word narration followed by the operatic sounds repeating what the narrator had told us. With this continuously happening, I found the beginning a slow burner and not very riveting. This however did change when the musician, played by Paul Carey Jones entered the stage, picking up the pace of the production.
