Future Directions: Butetown 2025/26

Presentation

Future Directions (FD) invites learning disabled and neurodiverse young people aged 16 – 25 to come together and form a Young Company to make a digital opera. This is not a programme that helps young people understand what opera is – it is their opportunity to help us discover what it could be.

FD lies at the heart of MTW’s artistic vision, which asks: What is opera? Who is it for? Who is making it? It takes as its inspiration the key challenges facing opera today: a lack of diversity and representation both in the stories being told and the storytellers.

In 2025/26 FD will be based in Butetown, the historic area around Cardiff docks. This ethnically diverse community includes a high proportion of residents born outside the UK (34% compared with 6.9% in Wales as a whole, 2021 Census), and is one of the most deprived in the nation’s capital.

Overview:
Young Company Recruitment Workshops, Autumn 2025 (target 100 young people)
Participants will be invited to find out about the project and take part in creative activities exploring the integration of story, movement and music. The sessions will nurture confidence and enable young people to get to know lead facilitator and dramaturg Jain Boon. They will address barriers to access, ensuring potential participants are reassured they will receive the support they need throughout the project.

Traineeships
This new strand to the project sees the recruitment of 3 trainees (drama, music creation, film-making), offering a structured progression route for neurodiverse young people to develop their skills.

Young Company (10 – 15 members): January – June 2026
The young people create their new digital opera supported by Jain and a music creator, vocal facilitator and filmmaker. Two three-day residencies are interspersed with monthly sessions. The final piece will be premiered in Butetown, shared online as a MTW production, and disseminated widely via our partners, festivals and national/international networks.

Artistic Team

The artistic director for Future Directions is Michael McCarthy, Director of Music Theatre Wales. As noted above, the young people are the primary creators, whose ideas and creativity will be facilitated and partnered by a professional team led by Jain Boon as lead creative/drama facilitator. She will be joined by a music creator, filmmaker and opera singer/vocal animateur. We aim to recruit three emerging artists to fill these roles, targeting recruitment locally to maximise the positive impact of the project in the Butetown community, providing local employment opportunities, offering diverse and relatable role-models for our participants, and strengthening community engagement.