[Gayle]

Yes, I was the culprit! What I basically said was that kids and light opera were not a good combination. Teenagers are too self conscious to play love scenes and they don't have the range that adults would for that style of music. I criticised the committee for selecting the show not the performances because on all accounts I said that the kids did very well with the material. They took offence because I dared to suggest that the committee could possibly have made the wrong choice.

In the past I had given them brilliant reviews, in fact, the year before the 'bad' one was a fantastic show - Oklahoma and the performers were really really good. In my defence I have to say that you can not give a fair review if you are only allowed to give good ones because how would you know if it really was good. Reviews have to be trustworthy and truthful and unfortunately they took offence because of that. I stand by every word I said about it!