St Mary’s Creative Space Chester is to get the premiere performance of a new music drama on Queen Mary I.
The first performance of Mary’s Hand, about King Henry VIII’s daughter – and hard-done-by sister of Queen Elizabeth I – will be given in Chester, as the music is written by local composer Martin Bussey.
It’s a little-known fact that Queen Mary loved games of chance, such as dice and cards.
In Mary’s Hand, the Queen shares a game of cards with the audience who get to choose the next card to be turned.
Their choices prompt Mary’s reflection upon the influences and events in her life: her father Henry VIII, her mother Katherine of Aragon, her Catholic faith, her half-sister Elizabeth I, and her desperate desire for a child.
Above all, Mary was driven by the wish to be a good monarch and her deep conviction that she needed to restore England to the Church of Rome.
Her marriage to the Catholic Philip of Spain promised to resolve many of these issues at a stroke, but Mary had played her cards badly and paid a high public and personal price.
With words by Di Sherlock and music by Martin Bussey, Mary’s Hand is a dramatic, involving re-telling of Mary’s story, performed by solo mezzo-soprano Clare McCaldin and chamber ensemble.
Mary’s Hand runs for approximately one hour without interval.
It will be performed on June 21 2018 at 7.30pm at St. Mary’s Creative Space, St Mary’s Hill, Chester.
