Majella Cullagh does the Masochism Tango at Cork Arts Theatre

Majella Cullagh interprets Tom Lehrer and so much more in her new show, says Jo Kerrigan

SOPRANO Majella Cullagh is best known for opera. Her exquisite voice has graced many stages, both here and abroad, and she has a substantial catalogue of recordings.

But this week, she reveals an unexpected side at Cork Arts Theatre in the musical, Love Really.

We are busy getting ready for Majella Cullagh and Joe Corbett perform their favorite musical scores in Love Really. 26th - 29th March

— Cork Arts Theatre (@Corkartstheatre) March 24, 2014

Joined by fellow Corkonian and acclaimed baritone, Joe Corbett, and guitarist Herring (Pat Ahern), from Four Star Trio, Cullagh will explore the pains and pitfalls of love in all its guises.

She is making the crossover with a vengeance “I’ve been singing opera for 20 years now,” she says. “I appear in huge productions. I have lots of concerts and oratorio, and that’s what people know me for.

“At the back of my mind, though, I have longed to sing other things, too, create a show which would bring in all kinds of different music and give my voice a chance to show itself in a range of styles: folk, musical theatre, pop, comic songs.

“My ambition was do something that I myself had control over. Nobody was going to give me a vehicle to sing this kind of music. All I would ever get was opera, operetta and concerts. Nobody would come up and ask me to do this. I had to make it happen.”

The last thing Cullagh wanted was a predictable concert in which she sang one well-known aria after another.

“I wanted to have lots of layers, unexpected stuff. I would normally sing with either a piano or an orchestra, so to sing with someone of Herring’s ability on the guitar — it’s amazing. One of the numbers is a ten-minute song that is almost like a movie — it’s about a love affair in a chip shop. People don’t expect me to be singing that kind of thing and that’s great,” she says.

The theme is love: young love, searching for love, being in love, the difficulties and pains of love, looking back on love. But it’s definitely not all serious.

Majella dissolves into laughter as she remembers the previous night’s rehearsal. “You should have seen Philip McTeggart Walsh, choreographing myself and Joe in ‘Masochism Tango’,” she says. If they’re doing that legendary Tom Lehrer noir classic, then it’s likely to bring the house down.

And Irish music, accompanied by Herring, from the Sliabh Luachra tradition? Surely, that’s out of character for our operatic heroine?

“But I love traditional music. I used to go set-dancing in my youth. My idea of heaven is to sit in the corner of an old-fashioned pub with a pint in my hand, listening to the music,” Majella says.

In fact, she used to sing in a band, she says, long before opera called.

This new venture is terrifying, she says. “Up to now, I’ve only ever been handed a tried-and-tested operatic piece, so to have a blank page and try to create a show — I couldn’t have done it without Joe Corbett, whose musical knowledge is encyclopaedic, Pat Talbot, who kept pushing me, and saying I could do it, Eleanor Malone, who knows my voice so well, and Herring, who is a treasure house of the traditional.”

Love Really, Cork Arts Theatre, Wed, Mar 26 to Sat, Mar 29, 8pm. 021-450 5624, www.corkartstheatre.com.