In 2028 East London Music Group will present the biggest, most ambitious, and most inspirational project in its ten year history.
A community chorus and band will join with a professional orchestra and cast to tell the story of the Poplar Rates Rebellion. This exhilarating episode in East London’s history saw Poplar Council rebel against unfair government policy, and thirty of its councillors jailed for contempt of court.
In protest of the way money was distributed in the capital, the councillors refused to pay the rates due to London County Council, instead investing the money in their community and supporting their poor people. Their subsequent imprisonment and release in the face of enormous public support, is a perfect operatic narrative.
The hero of our new work, Nellie Cressall, was a councillor, suffragette, and lifelong political activist who was pregnant with her sixth child at the time of her incarceration. Following huge public outcry, the government attempted to discharge Cressall from prison on health grounds, but she selflessly refused to be released unless her fellow councillors were also set free.
On Wednesday 25 March, at Oxford House Theatre in Bethnal Green, an event was held to formally launch this project to the public. In attendance were local people, partner organisations, and funders who heard from a range of speakers including Nellie Cressall’s great-granddaughter; the creative team behind the new work; Janine Booth, author of Guilty and Proud Of It! Poplars Rebel Councillors and Guardians 1919-1925; and Andy Green, co-founder of the Modern Cockney Festival. They also heard the first public performance of a song from the opera, Recipe for Change, performed by Olivia Bell, soprano, and Ben Smith, piano.
East London music group has a track record of commissioning works that explore significant episodes of local political history, with past works telling the stories of the Battle of Cable Street and the 1888 Bow Matchgirls’ Strike. The latter project was an example of the public participation work that the group has excelled at in recent years: professional musicians joined together with five community choirs and a community wind orchestra to perform a brand new fifty-minute work.
Nellie Cressall will incorporate these elements, using what we have learned from these projects to bring together local choirs, an all-comers choir, and a community band, in a full opera production with professional orchestra and lead cast. In 2015, when ELMG was established, a set goal was to produce a new community opera in East London in our tenth year. We haven’t quite made the time frame we had back then, but we are well on the way to fulfilling that ambition!
The idea for this project was born in 2024, when Andy Green, co-founder of the Modern Cockney Festival brought the story of the Poplar Rates Rebellion to Matthew Hardy, ELMG Artistic Director. Since then, our team has gradually been working away on the idea, laying plans, developing partnerships, and securing funding.
To date, we have raised £45,000, which has enabled us to commission the new work from Lucy Armstrong, composer, and Olivia Bell, librettist, produce the above film, and do much of the essential research and preparatory work for performances, which will take place in early 2028. In order to complete the project, we need to raise over £100,000 more - if you think you could help us achieve this, please get in touch or donate here!