Have you ever wondered how a creative idea turns into an opera?
According to Director of THE ALBANY PROJECT Matt Reuben James Ward, it all begins with a statement, a creative provocation to spark the conversation...
Hear from Matt Reuben James Ward and become part of a journey that is unfolding in real time, before it premieres in 2026.
1. THE INSPIRATION
This new project is a flagship event within the City of Albany’s 2026 bicentenary programme, marking 200 years since white settlement. Our ambition is to create a unique opera inspired by the theme “a future where anything is possible.” In doing so, we aim to honour Albany’s rich and complex history, while also imagining the boundless possibilities of the future.
2. CREATING WITH COMMUNITY VOICES
As lead facilitator and writer, my work begins with the community itself. Whether opera, musical, or play, the process is about making a performance that reflects the voices of its makers and the wider community who contribute to it. The creative method I utilise is based on writing practices that draw on lived experiences and ‘real’ sources as their foundation (see Carol Martin’s Theatre of the Real). It is a way of asking: What do we think about a subject? What do we experience? What are we hoping for? And then turning the accumulation of responses into a theatrical production. The Albany Project is shaped by precisely these questions.
3. WORKSHOPPING THEMES
The process began earlier this year with a series of workshops involving local elders and a youth focus group, together with professional artists from West Australian Opera and Breaksea (Project artists). The sessions centred on truth-telling, story sharing, and creative devising. From these conversations, a set of shared themes emerged, reflecting lived experience, collective values, and hopes for the future. Each creative development unfolds differently, and in this instance I have enjoyed how each theme was linked to a symbol. This has deeply informed the lyrical tone and allegorical direction of the work.
4. FROM SYMBOLS TO STORY
Following sessions with the creative team and youth participants, I immersed myself in the thematic and symbolic material and began to craft an allegorical short story. I enjoy writing out a narrative concept in full, as it helps generate ideas for staging, design, and mood. It is also a more accessible artefact to share with the creative team and participants, since a script often omits much of the ‘atmospheric’ detail.
5. SHAPING THE PERFORMANCE TEXT
The current stage of development focuses on adapting that short story into a performance text. This involves drafting the script and lyrics, while also developing a storyboard that maps how the narrative will unfold scene by scene, including ideas about where songs and dialogue may fall. Shortly, the theatre designers will join the process to interpret and craft a visual world for the show. By the end of 2025, a completed script, score, and design package will be ready to move into the build, rehearsal, and performance phase, with the Albany premiere scheduled for October 2026.
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