We all have those musical discoveries where a switch is flicked, a light bulb comes on and we are in love with music again. With stark clarity I remember the quiet afternoon in 1992 when I retreated to the library of the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and picked a box set off the shelf in the name of broadening my knowledge of opera. I placed the headphones over my ears, braced myself for a dissonant ear bashing that if nothing else would strengthen my musical constitution, and hit the play button. “BAM, tagataga-dah” — a brassy C-major fanfare of taut, crisp rhythm sprang into my ears, heralding the beginning of a revelatory afternoon to be spent in that library, and the beginning of a life journey that would be haunted by the opera’s central protagonist. That journey would culminate in the realisation of a dream, but not before it had led me through some dark times.
The opera was Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress, written in 1951 in California. To call it Stravinsky’s seems unfair to W. H. Auden and Chester Kallman whose libretto, to my mind, stands as the greatest literary achievement in opera. The central character is Tom Rakewell who, after hearing from the mysterious Nick Shadow that a dead uncle has left him a fortune, gives his wholesome sweetheart Anne the brush-off and heads for the fleshpots of London where he gets lost in debauchery and ends up in Bedlam.
The story is based on Hogarth’s series of paintings that go by almost the same name. As everyone knows, Hogarth was the great satirist of the 18th century, whose portrayal of human nature, society and politics in knowing and often comically cruel detail pulls the observer towards the canvas to enjoy each furtive reference. So alluring is his detail that one can miss his universal message. In the case of A Rake’s Progress, the message that there is a high price to be paid for squandering love and wealth, living on debt and lauding celebrity for celebrity’s sake is as resonant today as it was in 1735. Stravinsky clearly took note of the morality within the tale, and through the use of a device in the form of Nick Shadow, the Mephistopheles to Tom’s Faust, sends the poor lazy Rake to his inevitable fate.
Back in 1992 there were uncanny parallels between my life and that of the Rake at the beginning Hogarth’s series. Like him I had recently left Oxford having lost a parent to cancer just before my final exams. Unable to face up to my despair, I did everything I could to hide from my feelings. I had been bequeathed a flat in London and a small private income that enabled me to live in relative comfort while continuing my studies as a postgrad at the GSMD. After winning a few scholarships I was, by the standards of any other student, sitting in clover and living the life of Riley.
In 1995 I married my Oxford sweetheart whom I had already transformed into my surrogate mother, and soon after embarked on my career as a professional tenor. Immediately, I found myself treading the boards of medium-sized, well-established opera companies in Britain and Europe, and the occasional concert in America gave me a taste of the high life.
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They were heady times, and as my early ambitions became realised so the contact with reality and my sense of responsibility subsided. Before I knew it I had sprayed the love in my marriage all over Europe and squandered the goodwill of a great partner.
I felt hollow and ashamed, and pushed my wife out of my life in much the same way that Tom rejects Anne when she confronts him in London during the second act. The scene forms the centrepiece of the opera. By marrying Baba the Turk, a bearded lady famous for her bloodcurdling ugliness, Tom had attained his coveted notoriety but was several steps farther along the path to self-destruction. Tom and I were being brought down by the Achilles’ heel of anyone who courts publicity — vanity.
I was alone with only my career to invest with everything I had. At this point in The Rake, the ruined Tom continues his decline by murdering the nagging Baba and auctioning off her body along with his chattels. I should make it clear here that neither have I married anyone with a beard nor have I ever murdered anyone. However, it was at this juncture in the early Noughties that my life hit rock bottom.
The turning point was in 2003. I had been unfaithful to my latest French girlfriend with a ballerina from Paris Opera Ballet, and been found out. This time I decided not to push her away but to stick around and try to fix things. I couldn’t, and the more I tried the more her fears that I was as hollow as I was shallow were confirmed. I had gone this far in the company of Tom Rakewell; I hadn’t the stomach to accompany him all the way to ignominy and through the gates of Bedlam. It was time for a rethink before I condemned myself by hurting someone else.
I tried everything — repentence, self-castigation, distraction and many other ways — to reduce my shame and bolster my self-belief. Nothing worked. I was locked inside a person I didn’t like and I couldn’t escape. The only way to make things better was to change. I had to start being the person I wanted to be.
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I took control of my life, and slowly but surely restored my self-esteem. I started exercising more and partying less. Preparation, a key factor in the success of a new role, became as important a part of work as performance. I started talking about my feelings. There was one last key factor in my rehabilitation. Until I faced up to the fact that my mother was gone and that I had never stopped to consider the effect her demise had on me I wouldn’t be able to move forwards.
Suddenly, I was in a better place and a magical thing happened: G?rard Mortier, the chief executive of Op?ra de La Bastille, asked me what role I would like to do. Normally I would have asked for a day or two to think about it, but for some reason I blurted The Rake’s Progress straight back at him. He met the board the next day, and they agreed.
Tom and I had parted company and gone our own ways. On our journey together I had learnt about him, about myself and about life. At last, I was ready to confront the reflection of my former self. In 2008, when I sang the role for the first time in Paris, I had a strong sense of coming full circle. And now, as the curtain goes up on the final scene in Bedlam, I always feel the chill of what might have been. [Back in 1992, if that student in the library had foreseen the voyage on which he was about to embark, would he have hit the play button? Well, if he had known that 18 years later he would realise his dream and play his beloved antihero on the stage of Covent Garden, you bet he would.
Toby Spence sings Tom Rakewell in The Rake’s Progress, the Royal Opera House (020-7304 4000, roh.org.uk), from Jan 22