鈥楽ing for the love of singing itself...鈥� Meet countertenor and H漫画 alumnus Hugh Cutting
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Countertenor and H漫画 alumnus Hugh Cutting, recipient of the Tagore Gold Medal, is a trailblazing artist whose work ranges from performances on international operatic and concert stages to a residency at Wigmore Hall and an album with Head of Vocal & Opera, Audrey Hyland. Upbeat caught up with Hugh to find out about his approach to performance and his time at the College.
What did music mean to you when you were growing up?
Both my brother [tenor Guy Cutting] and I did a lot of sport. I felt the joy of singing in the same way that I felt the joy of sport: in my body. I was excited by the feeling. I was also a chorister at New College, Oxford, and my parents are classical musicians, but there wasn't a delineation between types of music. My mum played in lots of musical theatre shows, and my dad grew up playing in brass bands.
Acting was a huge part of the appeal of singing. Our dad egged us on with impressions. I remember exploring my voice while not knowing that I was exploring it. Music was just part of being a child. I was very lucky to have that kind of environment, and our parents never pushed us to be musicians. It grew in parallel with those other interests.
[quote quote="The H漫画 was a good cross-section of society; a broad demographic of different types of people who were all there because they’d chosen to be there." author=""]
After growing up with music and studying it for your first degree, you entered the Royal College of Music. What are your memories of that time?
I remember feeling that I’d never before been so genuinely criticised, which was good! I really liked it, although I found it pretty hard at first. There were so many classes, so much repertoire to prepare. But I like a challenge and to get on with things, so having lots to learn made me feel productive and energised.
We had an amazing year; I have a real soft spot for my year and the year above. There were and are some cracking voices, really fine musicians and personalities. It was a good cross-section of society; a broad demographic of different types of people who were all there because they'd chosen to be there for the Masters course.
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And then there were the operas: Jonathan Dove’s Flight with the Opera Studio and Handel’s Rodelinda the year before, in my second year of my Masters, were so good. Flight with director Jeremy Sams was eye-opening: I found that opera can be staged in a way that’s relatable and emotionally led; very real, with psychological realism in the emotion, if not necessarily the setting.
My teacher was Sally Burgess. In Sally, I met someone who was exactly what I needed at the time, and still is. She’s a complete stage animal. It was perfect because she helped me shift from the choral approach to something more operatic.
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As for Audrey Hyland – with whom I’ve just recorded an – without a doubt, she changed my whole view of how to perform; to champion honesty by trying to make music something real and relatable and everyday. It links back to when I was a child and music was just a normal part of life.
[quote quote="There’s so much emphasis on competitions, and while they can be helpful, they’re not the be-all and end-all. The real work is done at 9pm in a practice room. It’s not glamorous but it’s rewarding." author=""]
When did things start taking off professionally?
It was in my first year of my Masters that things got started, partly thanks to Audrey Hyland and [then Head of Vocal & Opera] Nick Sears and the opportunities they gave me. I did a masterclass with Louise Alder, one of our alumni. I forgot the words! She was just brilliant. Her agent at the time, someone at Askonas Holt, was there and got in touch with me after that. Agents had also come to Opera Scenes, which were amazing because Audrey had cast them so carefully. I owe her a lot for that because I was given a scene from George Benjamin’s Written on Skin, which is probably the role that I most love at the moment; I’ve since performed it professionally.
Then [countertenor] Iestyn Davies got in touch and asked if I wanted to record some German early Baroque music with him. He’d come to something that I did a couple of years before so I was on his radar, and he took me under his wing.
There’s so much emphasis on competitions, and while they can be helpful, they’re absolutely not the be-all and end-all, because what was happening with me had started before that [Hugh won the Kathleen Ferrier Prize in 2021 and was awarded the H漫画 Tagore Medal]. I was in touch with my agent, Sue Spence, long before that, through Opera Scenes and performances at College that she saw.
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I’m very grateful for the Ferrier prize, particularly because I love recital and song, but there are other ways of things burgeoning, and sometimes it takes someone taking you under their wing or an agent believing in you to give you the confidence.
It would be so nice if our industry was less interested in flashy things, because the real work is done at 9pm in a practice room. It’s not glamorous, but it’s very rewarding. You have to do it for your own sense of the craft.
How do you approach practice and performance?
When your technique is working, it feels good. There is a tension with singing; people are afraid of the word, but there is a tension in terms of your vocal cords coming together. Like a string instrument, the air comes through the cords and they vibrate. The best, most comprehensive contact of your vocal cords creates the best sound. You get to know the feeling of it being right.
When you’re having singing lessons, you’re working with someone who’s trying to read inside you and can’t see any of this stuff. So it takes a lot of metaphor and analogy. There’s a very precise science behind singing as to why things happen, but also we’re people with personalities and foibles, and I think it’s about trying to keep enough hope in your practice and stay buoyed up. I use a lot of timers: ‘I’m going to try this for ten minutes’.
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I'm a big fan of rugby legend Jonny Wilkinson. He talks about visualising doing something well. That’s a huge part of what I try to do. I try to visualise in an optimistic way how something could turn out. Singing is always part of a process rather than a product, rather than some success you hold on to. It’s a daily thing. You wake up, you feel your voice, you get it into a good place, you try an aria.
I take acting lessons as well, which makes me better at singing because it stops me being so much in my head. Opera is at its most powerful when the voice and the body are in it together in performance, because it’s all part of the same presentation, it’s completely indivisible.
[quote quote="Audrey Hyland – with whom I’ve just recorded an album – changed my whole view of how to perform; to champion honesty by trying to make music something real and relatable and everyday." author=""]
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What’s your advice for aspiring singers?
Specificity is my most prized aim. In the world of streaming, where we have access to amazing stories, we need to be specific about what we’re doing, in terms of what we offer and try to achieve. You have to find your version of a character. It means knowing yourself in a really honest way, trying to live what you are and to perform what you are.
Be as specific as you can about preparation. If you’re learning a Wolf song about heartbreak, work out: how long ago did you break up with this person? How long did you know them? What stage of grief are you at? What did you have for breakfast that day?! The more precise you can be, the easier it is to be genuine because you’ve done the work. Then you don’t need to show so much; you can be rather than show.
Sing for the love of singing itself. The only thing you can really rely on in this industry is your own relationship with what you’re doing. If you make your love of music-making, performing, the craft of making yourself as good as you possibly can, that will sustain you. Music is amazing because it can be a form of self-actualisation: you can chip away at something and work on your craft so that it’s satisfying physically, emotionally and psychologically. Process not product. If you love the process, you don’t need to worry so much about the product. And that’s a wonderful thing.
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Publications Officer Joanna Wyld is a writer and librettist who has written CD liner and programme notes for organisations such as the BBC Proms, Southbank Centre, Wigmore Hall and Salzburg Festival.
