Only stars show mercy when you’re lost among the waves
Coming soon: A Distant Shore. A new musical by Andrew Wyke and Chris Perera
Set in the gangland docks of Victorian era Boston, A Distant Shore is a life affirming historical romance – with a twist.
The year is 1847
Forced to leave Ireland, two brothers disembark on a distant American shore. But Daniel and Niall Kavanagh’s hopes for a new life are soon dashed when they are set upon and fleeced of their belongings. Despite their attempts to forge an honest living, they slowly sink into the underworld of Boston’s gangland.
Back home, a famine of Biblical proportions ravages the land. Faced with eviction, Megan defends her family in a stand-off that leaves a bailiff dead. Fleeing for her life, she finds passage on a ship bound for America, hoping to find her lost love Daniel.
Daniel, too, believes that he may one day be reunited with Megan and is intent on sending for her as soon as he has the means. Duped into working for a charismatic merchant, he is unaware that the seemingly benign Stone has made his fortune trading in misery – by selling opium to the Chinese. It is a trade he has now brought to America…
The story then takes a number of unexpected twists as a gripping drama unfolds.
Do expect an uplifting ending. Don’t expect the ending to be the one you think you’ve just predicted.
© Chris Perera and Andrew Wyke
Brief history of A Distant Shore the musical.
A few years ago, composer Andrew Wyke came up with a great concept for a musical and set about looking for a lyricist. Having trawled through a pile of submissions following an advert in the Stage, his eyes fell on some song lyrics that didn’t feel like a pale imitation of a million show tunes you’ve heard before. I’m happy to say those lyrics were written by me. And we were off. What struck me most, as a lyricist, were the melodies that Andrew wrote. This man had an ear for a damn good tune and our songwriting partnership flourished. We wrote some fantastic songs together but our biggest challenge was that we were writing an original story. Had we based this on an existing 19th Century novel (you know, like some famous musicals we could mention) we would have had a template to work from and writing it would, in theory, have been more straightforward. As it was, no novel existed that fitted the story we wanted to tell. Despite those amazing songs, this project was getting BIGGER. We tried drafting in external help but rather than providing focus, the addition of a third person had the opposite effect and the project began to dissipate. Hell, we needed a break – we both had other important things to get on with in life!
There’s an old maxim (call it an old cliché if you must) that a change is as good as a rest. We reconvened and began talking about how good the songs were; and soon set about reviving the project – with relish, I might add.
It’s amazing how the scales fall from your eyes on returning to a project after a break. I began rewriting, and despite the gravity of the subject matter, was practically laughing as I typed. The faults were obvious. The solutions simple! It was as if the project had been simmering away in the back of my mind. All I needed to do was apply some gentle heat, add a few delicious herbs and voila!
By now, Andrew was a producer at TBI Media https://tbimedia.co.uk/ with a roster of amazing contacts. My writing had diversified hugely since our initial time writing together and the musical theatre landscape had changed a little, with many more original stories being told (as opposed to the jukebox musicals that were prevalent at the time of our initial writing). Revisiting the script, I had a number of Eureka moments which galvanised me into writing a much more human story based on characters rather than grand concepts. I went back to year zero, stripped away everything, and turned the story on its head so it only bore a passing resemblance to the original work. The great thing was: the songs still fitted the story – I made sure of that as most were too good to get rid of.
by Maurice Prendergast (public domain)
Andrew then brought in world-class musical arranger Tim Maple https://www.timmaple.com/gallery and thanks to a bit of unexpected time provided by Lockdown, we soon had a number of superb quality demos ready to knock you off your feet. We have recorded several songs with contributions by an excellent cast of popular West End singers (including BBCs The Voice finalist, Ricardo Alfonso).
We are now ready to go.
If you want to know more, please use the contact form on this website to get in touch or email me: chris @ chrisperera [dot] co [dot] uk
Was Boston really built on profits from the opium trade? Further reading >>>HERE<<<
For educators, here is a useful link to an educational resource about migration: https://reimaginingmigration.org
Or return to my homepage www.chrisperera.co.uk