Battle of the Sexes: Marin Alsop Conducts Balls
Conductor Marin Alsop and the Philharmonia Orchestra team up for Laura Karpman’s opera Balls, telling the story of the ‘Battle of the Sexes’ tennis match of 1973.
Composer Laura Karpman, conductor Marin Alsop and actor Emma Kennedy are the perfect team to bring this story – a decisive victory for Billie Jean King and a turning point in the struggle for women’s rights – to a 21st-century audience. Karpman, composer of many acclaimed film and game soundtracks including American Fiction, The Marvels and Kung Fu Panda 2, is a fierce advocate for equality in the film industry.
Emma Kennedy is a multi-talented writer-performer who has won awards for her books, radio shows, TV series and films.
Balls is directed by Emma Doherty and designed by Ruth Paton, with Ben Parry as the assistant conductor.
Opening this evening’s event is Façade, a setting of Edith Sitwell’s poems by her protege William Walton. Some listeners at the 1923 premiere were shocked by this meeting of nonsense and nostalgia, modernism and music hall, with its poems transformed by Walton’s music into satirical hornpipes, polkas and foxtrots. But Sitwell herself declared it ‘a work for the most part of gaiety… the audience is meant to laugh.’
Performers
Philharmonia Orchestra
Marin Alsop conductor
Nikola Printz narrator, Billie Jean King
Nicky Spence narrator, Bobby Riggs
Lotte Betts-Dean narrator, Marilyn Barnett
Emma Kennedy Howard Cosell
Eve Pearson Maxwell Susan B. Anthony, ensemble
Oliver Barker Larry King, ensemble
Mia Serracino-Inglott Rosie Casals, ensemble
Ariana Ricci ensemble
Lucile Guedj ensemble
Tim Burton ensemble
Archie Inns ensemble
Gyaan Bhuyan ensemble
Singers from London Voices
Repertoire
Walton: Façade
Interval
Laura Karpman: Balls - opera in 1 act (World premiere of orchestral version)
Need to know
For your visit
This event is held at the Royal Festival Hall Southbank Centre
The Royal Festival Hall is open six days a week.
Tuesday – Sunday, 10am – 11pm
Monday, closed.
Plan your visit
The Royal Festival Hall is home to our largest auditorium as well as The Clore Ballroom, National Poetry Library, Members’ Lounge, Festival Bar & Kitchen, Ballroom Cafe and Skylon restaurant.
Getting here
Our address is Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road, London, SE1 8XX.
The nearest tube stations to us are Waterloo and Embankment; Waterloo is also the nearest train station. And more than 20 different London bus routes pass within 500 metres of our venues. More information on getting here by rail, road or river is available on our Getting here page.
We’re cash-free
Please note that we’re unable to accept cash payments across our venues.
Access
We’re working hard to remove barriers, so that our facilities and events can be accessible to as many people as possible.
All help points, toilets, performance and exhibition spaces at the Southbank Centre are accessible to all, as are the cafes, bars and restaurants. We also have excellent public transport links with step-free access.
All information about booking wheelchair spaces, step-free access, blue badge parking, access maps and guides and other help available whilst you’re here, including details about our Access Scheme, can be found on our Access page.
Food & drink
On Level 2 of our Royal Festival Hall you can grab a slice of life by the Thames with drinks and freshly made pizza at our Festival Bar & Kitchen which opens out onto our Riverside Terrace. You can grab a coffee and a slice of freshly made cake from our Ballroom Cafe. Or alternatively enjoy destination dining in the restaurant at Skylon.
From coffee to cocktails, filling favourites to fine dining, plus some of London’s best street food – it’s all here at the Southbank Centre.