Sent all the forms off for the company bank account yesterday. What a palaver! Getting the documentation together was a pain – Deb had to send hers to me, and a copy of appropriate page of the application form signed and dated, then I had to send the whole thing off to the accountant so he could put in some other bits and pieces. The scary thing was watching Pete write the cheque for 10 grand. Are we really going to spend all that money on making this show happen? Probably…and then some.

Deb couldn’t make it today, so I did the rest of the music cues on my own, including all the chant. I have no idea what I’m doing, of course, having only sung chant periodically in my college days, filling in at City churches. My regular gig at Holy Trinity Brompton didn’t do chant. But I soldiered on. My Latin vowels sound dreadful. I also had to sing all the soprano parts in the Monteverdi contrafactum, and in the last of the Grandi pieces. Madonna! I am not a soprano anymore, and my throat hurts now. Luckily Pete is a terrific producer, and he made it sound almost bearable. But he did have to tune the top G at the beginning of the Monteverdi. Thank god for Logic Sound Factory. The buknuks for the nuns’ costumes have arrived – eighteen white veils that look like wimples, ordered from a website in Kuwait.

Up to Angels the Costumiers today to find a costume for Sue. Lots of lovely gowns, including a black-and-gold-thread one that Sue pronounced “Disco-tastic.” In the end we opt for a number with a gold beaded bodice and sleeves, and a brown and black stripey skirt. It’s dark, and I’m worried that maybe it won’t project too well on the scrim, but I hope in fact she will look slightly ghostly, merging a bit with the background below the waist. I took pictures for the directors, but noticed later that I had my phone switched to black and white. What it is to be old – yet another senior moment. Hideous journey, but it provide the opportunity for more reading and commenting. I find hauling my brain from century to century particularly hard at the moment.

So yesterday and today we auditioned the actors. I had no idea what to expect, and was probably as nervous as the actors themselves. It was useful, though, to try and describe the project to people who know nothing about it. Perrin had devised this short screen test for the Camillas that asked them to flip through a set of imaginary photos and, at some point, to pretend to come across one of the child that had been taken from them. I made a complete fool of myself several times over, as every time I watched one of them go through the exercise, I burst into tears. Clearly designed to push the buttons of every mother… I felt an utter twit. Anyway, just about everyone we saw was terrific and it was painful to have to narrow it down to three, but we did it. Sue Maund is our Lucrezia – was completely knocked out by her gravity and her bearing. She looks perfect, too, with uniquely arresting eyes and beautiful Renaissance features, exactly as one might imagine Lucrezia to have looked at the end of her life. Eugenia Caruso, a Italian actress, is our Camilla. Again, she is spookily similar to the portrait of Camilla, but what struck me about her was the way she became this young woman, her gestures and attitude completely natural. Maybe it’s her background, and a lifelong proximity to the Catholic church. Anyway, she’s terrific. And our Man is Jamie McDonald, an Australian actor with a kind of Orlando Bloom-like quality (will appeal to mothers and daughters!) – not fey, but capable of being mysterious. Job done.

On the train there and back I read through the drafts from two of the last three of the contributors to She’s So Fine. In a way, it’s good these pieces are only coming in in dribs and drabs, so I have time to read and comment – what else are train journeys for? That being said, I’m so looking forward to having the project behind me – and I will think very carefully before agreeing to edit a collection again.

Off to Southampton City Art Gallery today to have a look at Sophonisba Anguissola’s 1555 portrait of her sister Elena in her Benedictine habit. It’s not on display, and the curator has to lead me down into the vaults. Spooky. It’s not a perfect match – Corpus Christi was a Clarissan house – but at least it will give me ideas for the chorus’s costumes. But the portrait is beautiful, and so is Elena, with her sad, peaceful face. She has this neat little peak in her veil that might, or might not, be difficult to reproduce, and huge, wide turnbacks on her sleeves. That will look nice, but I hope they won’t interfere with harp and/or lute playing.