How to Build a Billy

Abstract

This opera responds to the question of how chamber opera can involve aspects of the cabaret aesthetic. The opera is a dark satire of many character and narrative opera tropes and mediates them through the cabaret aesthetic mixed with humour, slight-of-hand, physical comedy and burlesque. The opera has been performed in bars, cabaret venues and small theatres which contribute to its cabaret aesthetic. The show challenges traditional female relationships in opera and centres on the body of a dead man instead of a dead woman as so many canonic operas do.