Cooking up a conversation with Stephanie Wake-Edwards, by Tricia Ninian
I wanted to ask Stephanie Wake-Edwards, one of the rising stars in our forthcoming fundraising Gala (March 24th), a few questions but I must admit I was a little nervous about pinning her down, knowing a little of her hectic schedule. But it’s true what they say, if you want something done, ask a busy person. Having sent Steph a few taster questions by email, she pinged one back to let me know she was due a break (from rehearsals at the Royal Opera House) at 5pm that day when we could do a Facetime chat.
The first attempt didn’t go to plan, but a quick ring back, and a change in her location from the bowels of the Opera House up to the open-air Terrace gave us a perfect connection.
I’ve known Steph for a few years, first coming across her as girlfriend of Jack Lawrence Jones – SPO’s Count in the 2019 production of Le Nozze di Figaro. And SPO fans will remember when Steph and Jack sang for us in our Open-Air Picnic Gala back in the dark days of socially distanced September 2020. Getting to know her during this time, it most definitely was a good old chat that I was expecting, and what I got!
I wanted to pursue the idea of ‘nurturing’ with Steph and was curious to know where her passion for opera began and how it was nurtured. “I have to thank my parents and particularly my dad for my initial interest. He’s a real music lover and when I was very young, he’d find out what was going on at the music colleges and take me along to see those opera scene concerts. I grew up in Palmers Green, North London, which was a great advantage because there was obviously loads of music right on the door step.
“I also had a really brilliant music teacher at school – Julian Hinton – who got me singing just anything. In those days I was more into jazz, rock and pop, but importantly I was singing and I was good. And I was also doing Music GCSE, which meant I got free singing lessons – my ‘instrument of choice’ - funded by the local council. Sadly, they don’t do this nowadays.”
It wasn’t all jazz, rock and pop, though. It seems opera was bubbling under.
Steph’s higher education initially took her off to York University to read Sociology and Social Psychology, but she was singing throughout her undergraduate years and had her first taste of performing opera. “Oh, this is really mad; I was in a production of Don Giovanni at Uni and I sang the role of Leporello. As a girl. An octave up. It was insane! It was the most attended student production with over a thousand in the audience. But I just loved performing, and acting,” Steph tells me with her characteristic joie-de-vivre laugh.
It really sounds as if Steph was one to decide on what she wanted and then set a plan to do that. But she admits that it wasn’t quite like that all the way.
“Whilst at Uni I thought, I really want to do this singing thing, so applied to the London colleges to do a Masters and got rejected by all of them!” Enough to put any aspiring singer off for ever. But not Steph. “It just put a fire in my belly, and I thought, I’m not having someone tell me I can’t do something! If it had been easy maybe I wouldn’t be here today. Even now, if I’m told I’m not good it just makes me want to sing more and prove them wrong. Anyway, I kept the opera singing going and after Uni I came back home and got some performing experience singing with North London opera companies – Southgate Opera and Hampstead Garden Opera.”
I’m curious to know if Steph has other demons sitting on her shoulder and how she deals with them. For instance, how did she cope with Lockdown?
“Initially it was very worrying and, I must admit, I did wonder if singing was going to be my life and what I might do instead. I did a lot of cooking in that time – loads of bread, and I got really into Korean cuisine. But I was unbelievably lucky to be in the Jette Parker programme because very quickly there were loads of opportunities presented, like the gala we did for a live stream with Antonio Pappano – just amazing!”
“But the emotions associated with the pandemic were there right from the start and I guess singing was a bonus as you can express emotion where sometimes it can’t be put into words. There’s a similar feeling now with this terrible situation in Ukraine.”
So what has Steph planned for the forthcoming Gala, being hosted by our new patron David Butt Philip. “One of the numbers I’m singing is ‘Va! Laisser couler mes larmes’, Charlotte’s aria from Werther. It’s the aria I sang when I first auditioned for the Opera House. You know, it’s one of the only auditions where I just felt really good from start to finish. I guess it was meant to be!”
We’ve been chatting for a while now and Steph needs to get back to rehearsals. What is she rehearsing? “Oh, it’s Peter Grimes. I’m covering Auntie. I have to say, I just love Britten’s operas. I’ve sung in LOADS. I never tire of them. They are just such brilliant stories and the music is nothing less than sublime.”
Just a couple of things before she’s off. I want to know what she might be doing for the opera world in terms of nurturing. “Well, I still get a thrill when my old school friends come and see me in a production and they think I’m really cool – maybe I make a small impact on introducing a new fan to opera. Maybe.”
And what of that second passion – cooking (because I’ve tasted her food: it’s seriously good)?
“Well, if I can see a decent break in the schedule I’d like to do a chef’s course. If I wasn’t a singer, then I think I’d be a chef.” Perhaps I should introduce her to my friend ‘Chez Bruce’ Poole – see the previous blog post!
Enjoy a ROH 2020 Lockdown performance by Stephanie of ‘Where shall I fly’ from Handel’s Hercules here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PA55hlBlkvE