Akhnaten in HD

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Conductor.................Karen Kamensek
Production................Phelim McDermott

Akhnaten................Anthony Roth Costanzo (countertenor)
Nefertiti, his wife.....J'Nai Bridges (contralto)
Queen Tye, his mother...Dísella Lárusdóttir (soprano)
Amenhotep III, ghost of his father....Zachary James (speaking)
Aye, Nefertiti's father............Richard Bernstein (bass)
High Priest of Amon............Aaron Blake (tenor)
General Horemhab........Will Liverman (baritone)

This performance of Akhnaten from the Metropolitan Opera is my seventh opera by Philip Glass, the others being Einstein on the Beach (live), Satyagraha (live), Appomattox (live), The Perfect American, Orphée (live), and Hydrogen Jukebox (live).  Surely this must make me something of an expert.  All around me were experiencing a Glass opera for the first time.

The story is told on three levels.

1. Captions appear on the screen describing what is going on in this scene.  "Coronation of Akhnaten" for example.  
2. There is an English speaking narrator who represents the spirit of Amenhotep III and quotes characters from the opera.  
3. Action by the singers and actors on the stage show the actions.

The narrative method of most operas is missing.  People in conversation telling their own emotions does not happen.  What does happen that I haven't seen before is juggling.  Everyone juggles.  Sometimes a juggler would drop his ball, and at the end they all do.  I was especially pleased to see an Egyptian tomb painting shown in the intermission of women juggling.  So does juggling belong in the list above?

Akhnaten was an idealist, obsessed with the sun, in love with his wife and wishing to separate himself from the politics of his era.  I felt that this music and theatrical presentation represented his life in a profound way that could not have been imagined, at least by me.

There was only one real aria for which text was provided:  The Hymn to the Sun by Akhnaten.  The singing was beautiful if completely abstract.  The costumes were gorgeous and represented the exalted nature of their status in Egypt.

As a Glass expert, I declare this to be his masterpiece.  Here is an excerpt from the "Hymn to the Sun."


 

Ten Operas

This is a list, and you know I love lists.  These 10 operas are all operas which I had never heard before I began blogging and have never seen a second time.  All stand out in my mind as outstanding memories.  None of them came to me by way of the Met and none are even close to the top 100.  I have listed them in order of their premier dates.  They cover the entire history of opera, and all of them deserve to be revived IMHO.

Francesco Cavalli's La Calisto (1651) in Italiian.  The musical style is late Monteverdi.  I acquired this from a pirated source in a production that involved René Jacobs.  I understand there is a legitimate DVD of this production that with some effort might be acquired.  This opera production seems to try to show us a true Venetian opera production with gods who descend through stage machinery and transform from baritones to sopranos.  I loved it for its sense of  fun.  Venice is the land of carnival so entertainment is the order of the day.  To present this opera you would need a baritone with a fabulous falsetto.

Jean-Philippe Rameau's Comédies lyriques Platée (1745) in French.  The musical style is French Baroque.  I saw this live at the Santa Fe Opera and thought it was great fun.  Since we are in France, the title character cross dresses from a male tenor to a female, instead the usual Italian arrangement at that time which involved mainly sopranos.  Maybe comedy is a theme for me.  I think perhaps operatic comedy was more significant in times gone by.  This plot is also about gods and magic beings. The title character is written for a French type of tenor called a haute-contre.  To present this opera you might need one.  He isn't falsetto.

Gioachino Antonio Rossini's Maometto Secondo (1820) in Italian. The musical style is early bel canto.  This was also seen live at the Santa Fe Opera with marvelous performances by Luca Pisaroni, Leah Crocetto and the rest of the cast.  It's a serious opera of great significance and an important political plot.  It's one of the operas composed for Isabella Colbran.  This needs to return, but to present it you might need someone who can be Isabella Colbran.

Heinrich Marschner's Der Vampyr (The Vampire) (1828) in German.  The musical style is German romantic.  I saw this live at the Komische Oper Berlin.  Is it a comedy, a tragedy, a soap opera, a horror movie?  What?  So Germans aren't as serious as we thought.  Who knew vampires were popular in the 1820s?  Our heroine is also a modern girl who dares all and triumphs in the end.  There's no cross-dressing.  There are no vocal oddities here or particularly difficult roles.  Present this in your local company.

Hector Berlioz's Benvenuto Cellini (1838) in French.  The musical style is French romantic.  This is from a DVD from Salzburg that just happened to be in the opera shop in San Francisco when I was there.  The story takes place in Rome during carnival, creating many opportunities for frivolity. The title character is an actual historical figure, an artist from Florence who wrote a famous autobiography.  His bust is on the Ponte Vecchio in Florence. The Pope is a character. Cellini gets into lots of trouble but always finds his way out.  I see no severe difficulties with presenting this opera and don't think it has to be comedy.  Of this set of operas this is the only one that appears in the Met On Demand.

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's The Maid of Orleans(1881) in Russian.  The musical style is Russian post-romantic.  Perhaps the reason this opera is not popular is because it is in Russian.  The Verdi Joan of Arc is more popular, but I think this one is a better opera.  For one thing this plot is a lot less ridiculous than Verdi's.  I saw it live at the San Francisco Opera and loved it.  Joan is a mezzo.  Is that the problem?  The difficulty with presenting this opera would be finding a singer to be Joan.  Dolora Zajick might not be available.



Erich Wolfgang Korngold's Die Tote Stadt (1920) in German.   In this list I think it is the closest to standard repertoire and would be classified as post-romantic or what I have called post-Wagnerian.  I saw it live at the San Francisco Opera.  I sat next to someone at the Cosi HD who thought this was the opera she hated most.  The more repulsive parts of the story suit the world view of the early twentieth century.  Maybe you shouldn't revive this for your local company.

Gian Carlo Menotti's The Last Savage (1963) in English.  Menotti's musical style is closest to American musical, but here he approaches bel canto. Modernism makes an appearance.  I saw this live at the Santa Fe Opera.  The plot most resembles a Tarzan movie.  I don't know if you would want this without the production.  The voice parts are not unusual, but you need a baritone who can pass for Tarzan.  Try it.

Philip Glass's Orphée (1993) in French after the Cocteau film of the same name.  In fact the dialog comes from the movie.  The musical style is modified minimalism.  I saw this live at Glimmerglass where they advised that you first see the movie.  I did not.  It seems the most like a real opera of Glass's operas.  It is an angel of death plot, except the angel falls in love with a mortal and tries to cheat fate. I see no barrier to producing this opera.

Oswaldo Golijov's Ainadamar (2005) in Spanish.  The musical style is South American modernism.  I saw this live in San Francisco presented by Opera Parallèle.  It jumps the time frame a couple of times, a problem that was easily solved in this production by displaying the year in the super-titles.  It is a biography of the playwright Federico García Lorca.   The music is exciting and fun and incorporates dance genres.  You will need dancers.
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Philip Glass

Philip Glass had his 80th birthday earlier this year.  I had no idea he had written so many operas.  Here is a list.

• 1975–1976--Einstein on the Beach for the Philip Glass Ensemble (with Robert Wilson).  I saw this at Zellerbach in Berkeley when it toured in 2012.

• 1978–1979--Satyagraha (premiered in 1980, libretto by Constance DeJong).  I first saw this in 1989 at the San Francisco Opera.  This was my first experience of a Glass opera.  I saw it again live at the Metropolitan Opera in 2008 and again in HD in 2011.

Festival of New American Music

Every year for 37 years my alma mater Sac State hosts the Festival of New American Music.  I attended all or part of 3 concerts.

November 10

Michael Norsworthy, clarinet
David Gompper, piano

I attended performances of:

SchiZm (1993-94) in two movements for piano and clarinet by Derek Bermel
It goes without Saying for recording and clarinet by Nico Muhly
Traceur for piano and clarinet by David Gompper, the pianist here.

Nico Muhly is famous by now since his opera Two Boys played at the Metropolitan Opera last season.  The important thing about his piece is that the recorded sounds were all made in his kitchen.  I assume that means his synthesizer was in the kitchen.

It's nice to hear what's going on, but for me the loud, harsh sounds produced on the clarinet were just a bit too ugly for me.

November 12

Fidelio Trio
Darragh Morgan, violin
Deirdre Cooper, cello
Mary Dullea, piano

This is an Irish piano trio with their own web page who play a wide variety of repertoire.  I stayed for the entire concert.

Piano Trio (1985) by Charles Wuorinen
Trio II (2003) in four movements by John Harbison
Blackberries (2007) by Elena Ruehr
Typical Music (2000) by Evan Ziporyn

Harbison is the composer of the opera The Great Gatsby. Wuorinen composed the recently streamed Brokeback Mountain. 

The last two composers were at the concert.  I felt that only Elena Ruehr achieved the sonority associated with a piano trio.  Many of the composers didn't seem to understand that all three players should play at once most of the time.  Why call it a piano trio if it's just three people playing solos in turn?

Evan Ziporyn has composed for gamelan and only recently returned to western music.  The Asian influence was apparent.

November 16

Glass & Blood
Chase Spruill, violin
Michael Riesman, piano

Michael Riesman is a Philip Glass enthusiast who has arranged this music from movie sound tracks for violin and piano.

I stayed for

Suite from The Hours for violin and piano (2002/2014)
Suite from Candyman for violin and piano (1992/2014)

The Hours is not a horror movie, and the music was standard serene Glass noodle music.  You know what I mean--noodle noodle noodle noodle....

Candyman is serious horror, and the music expresses it.

I discussed briefly with a friend at intermission.  It is always surprising to me that the music of Glass expresses so much more than the actual notes would lead you to believe.  I remember that he studied with Nadia Boulanger and cannot at all imagine what the conversations would have consisted of.

I should have stayed for Suite from Dracula.

I sometimes ask myself what this music is for, and then I remember the requirement for sound tracks.  Glass does a great deal of this kind of work.

There was no singing in any of these concerts.

West Edge Summer Festival

Hydrogen Jukebox  

The Cast

Soprano 1:  Sara Duchovnay
Soprano 2:  Molly Mahoney
Mezzo:  Nicole Takesono
Tenor:  Jonathan Blalock
Baritone:  Efrain Solis
Bass:  Kenneth Kellogg
Narrator:  Howard Swain

Conductor:  David Möschler

Where to begin?  This "opera," Hydrogen Jukebox, by Philip Glass on words by Allen Ginsberg was presented by West Edge Opera at the Ed Roberts Campus in Berkeley.  When I used to visit this part of Berkeley, this was a BART parking lot.  They have replaced about half of it with this building, a center for people with disabilities.  They can go directly from the Ashby BART station into the basement of the building. 

The picture above shows the entire cast.  The Narrator, an actor who does not sing, is the guy in the center.  The stage for this production was on the south end of the large space and was quite tiny, with ladders going to the next floor.  At one point the invisible conductor climbed down one of these ladders and played the piano.

I was interested in these words by Glass:

"For me there are two considerations in setting text to music. There are the words themselves, which need to be set in the most natural way. With Allen's poetry I was most intent on respecting the music that was already in the words. Then there is the musical environment into which the words are set. In the poem Aunt Rose, for example, I used a 5/8 rhythm — a kind of lopsided rhythm — 1-2, 1-2-3. I heard the rhythm from the description of her toot: it's a picture of someone who walks with a limp. That's the only specific relation of the music to the words."

The result of this approach for my ears was a piece where the words dominated the music.  It also made for a very repetitive rhythmic feeling because Ginsberg's poetry tends to use a stagnant rhythmic pattern.  (Ok.  Pile on.)  I know.  Glass is always repetitive--he calls it "repetitive structures"--, but this is the only time it has actually seemed monotonous to me.  Maybe he's simply too respectful of the honored poet.

The opera uses 20 poems or fragments of poems on virtually any subject.  In one Jaweh and Allah are warring, a concept I loved.  Another deals with Aunt Rose.  Another is about smoking grass--very timely, don't you think?  There were homosexual and heterosexual couples.  Uncle Sam makes an appearance.  A flag is held up but carefully refolded and placed in a box.  It reminds you that there were once liberals in America.  I was astounded by how timely it all was even though the opera was from 1990 and many of the poems from much earlier.  I expected to be more shocked by this.  The world has changed a lot.

There was no real plot or characters.  The words were so dense and complicated that ones eyes were preoccupied with reading them with little time left for watching the action.

It's wonderful how Glass will make an opera out of anything.  Appomattox is still the most boring.

The End of the Affair 

The Cast

Sarah Miles:  Carrie Hennessey
Maurice Bendrix, her boyfriend:  Keith Phares
Henry Miles, her husband:  Philip Skinner
Mrs. Bertram, her mother:  Donna Olson
Mr. Parkis, detective:  Mark Hernandez
Lance, his son:  Ben Miller
Richard Smythe:  Michael Jankosky

Conductor:  Jonathan Khuner

The End of the Affair by Jake Heggie (2007 version) was staged at the north end of the large space.  This work is far more of a conventional opera with characters and a story, and takes place near the end of WWII in London.  It is based on a story by Graham Greene.

The plot is about an event and how it affects everyone involved.  Maurice and Sarah are in bed making love when a bomb strikes.  Maurice gets up to warn people about the bomb when another bomb causes a building to fall on him.   It's a bit like the movie Little Dorrit where the same story is told from two different perspectives.

At the beginning we see the story from Maurice's perspective.  The bomb strikes, he gets up, and Sarah leaves him with no explanation.  He spends the next 18 months trying to understand this, and ultimately hires a detective.  At the end of act 1 we see the incident portrayed from Maurice's point of view, and we fade to black.

The detective has stolen Sarah's diary, and Maurice reads the story from Sarah's side for the first time.  The building falls, Sarah sees Maurice and assumes he is dead.  She prays, "God, I will give him up if you will only let him live."  To her he is dead and then comes back to life.  She has summoned and received a miracle.  How can she not do what she has promised?

There is very much of a Catholic overlay to this story.  Mother makes a point of telling us that she had Sarah baptized Catholic when she was 2.  In the Catholic world miracles continue on to today.  God has chosen to bless Sarah with a miracle, and then when she dies others are also blessed.  Lance is cured of his disease, and Smythe loses his birth mark.  Parts of this sound pretty dubious to me from a religious perspective, but Pope Paul VI approved, so who am I to complain?

West Edge successfully invoked the mysterious mysticism of the plot.  Scenes of WWII bombed London are projected on the back.  Throughout the first act Sarah appears as a sexual fantasy object whom Maurice meets when he is thinking of her.  Her mysterious, haunting presence permeates every scene even when she has no lines.  She walks like a benign ghost over the stage.  For me the staging was marvelously effective.

Sarah gives herself to God.

All of the singing and acting was marvelous, especially Carrie Hennessey, Keith Phares, Philip Skinner, and Donna Olson.

Well done.  The music is 21st century romanticism.

I apologize for not making it to La Boheme.

The Perfect American

The premier of a new opera by Philip Glass called The Perfect American streamed over the internet from Madrid today.  It concerns the death of Walt Disney, and it turned out to be much more truly biographical than I had imagined it would be.  Walt may have wished to be cryogenically preserved, but they make it clear that he was actually cremated.  So no urban legends.

The Glass opera is based on a book with the same name by Peter Stephan Jungk.  The book is narrated by Wilhelm Dantine, an animator for Disney in the 40s and 50s, who also appears as a character in the opera. Dantine stalks Disney who pretends he doesn't exist.

Walt died at 65 of lung cancer while still full of dreams and plans.  He wanted to come back again in 500 years.  

Important things to notice about this opera are:

• While there is quite a lot of computer animation in the stage design, none of it at all resembles the actual cartoon characters of Walt Disney.  So no lawsuits.  Everything Disney is still covered by copyright because they just keep extending the dates.

• Curiously, the musical work that it most resembles from a sound perspective is John Adams' Nixon in China.  Who was imitating Glass, of course.  Has nothing happened in 25 years?

•  Disney was a conservative American who said things like "I'm more famous than Santa Claus" and "The New York Times is undermining everything."  Nothing much has changed.

• Andy Warhol appears as an admirer of Disney.  He did a lot of Mickey Mouse images, but we don't see any of them.

• The singing is completely uninteresting.  Despite that, I enjoyed it.

Walt Disney was an iconic American figure, someone who believed in capitalism and the ownership of ideas.  Now he has his own opera.

Einstein

The west coast premier of the opera Einstein on the Beach by Philip Glass opens with this photograph.  You can see some water in the background.  Otherwise the relationship to Einstein is rather tenuous.  Three dot journalism:

Converse Allstars...Conch shell and woman who holds it up to her ear...British jurists...Woman reading the New york Times...Paper airplanes...Ding dong...

There is a violinist in Converse Allstars that we decided must be Albert himself who is known to have played the violin..."Court is now in session"...One judge pours a beaker of glitter...Woman who walked for half an hour at the beginning is the defendant.  Styrofoam cups, illegal in Berkeley, appear.

They discuss:  Mister Bojangles...This is about the things on the table...John Lennon...Baggy pants...Gun gun gun....

A girl scratches her butt.  I can't help thinking of Gertrude Stein.

For over two hours we hear typical noodling music such as only Philip Glass can manage.  It is apparently enraging because about three hours in, after a woman on the stage waved a machine gun at us and made noises like shooting, everyone became nasty and started complaining to everyone else.

You remember when I posted this a few days ago:

Share Your Thoughts
Connect with others attending the performance and let the world know your thoughts about Einstein on the Beach either by tweeting @CalPerformances or using the hashtag #einstein2012.

I tried to post things, but people around me were too annoyed.

Mist floating down into pit...Big chorus...Could all be a loop but isn't...Conch shell girl is back. Holds to ear. We don't hear ocean...Chorus chants "Onedy onedy onedy..." Back in court. Defendant is wearing a dress. Men in striped suits. Bars..."I have been avoiding the beach." Scream!  "Prematurely airconditioned", my favorite line of the play...Suddenly she is in a gray pantsuit with a large lollipop....

After noodling for at least 3 hours, there is a completely unexpected saxophone riff that went on for about a half hour while people stood around a building and waved.  There is talking, singing, chorus, two synthesizers, two saxophones and a piccolo, but absolutely no operatic singing.

I went out and had a beer and watched the rest on the monitor by the bar.

Jennifer Koh was Einstein playing the violin.
Kate Moran spoke "Prematurely air-conditioned."
Helga Davis spoke "Mr. Bojangles."
Andrew Sternman played the tenor saxophone solo.

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Satyagraha in HD

The picture shows Richard Croft, Alfred Walker, Rachelle Durkin, the Metropolitan Opera chorus, their shoes lined up along the apron and their coats flying in the air.

I went to the theater and sat in the chair for one act of the rerun of Satyagraha from the Metropolitan Opera.  I was very tired and struggling with falling asleep, so I went home.  I am reminded again that it is the most spiritual of all operas.  A film showing the real Ghandi ran in the intermission.  Eric Owens was the host.

I saw this production live in New York in 2008, so you should read my full review there.  Other comments on Glass can be found here, here and here.

People in the audience.

 
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Einstein

I begin to feel deprived that I have never seen Philip Glass's Einstein on the Beach.  There are a number of audio versions, but clearly the visuals are essential.  This is THE modern opera.  The no intermission part would be a problem.

I've always pictured something more like this:

Tirade

I bought a New York Times this morning and was annoyed to read Tommasini’s article on new operas. I couldn’t disagree more.

I thought that Doctor Atomic had not one minute of interesting vocal writing and even less of theatrical viability. Musically it was quite nice, though I might hear it differently today. I notice increasingly Adams’ minimalist tendencies, something I have no problem with. It’s the lack of a real libretto that I don’t like.

So why has Satyagraha not the same effect on me? It has a similar lack of theatrical viability and yet does not bother me at all. With Glass there is the expectation of boredom. One anticipates being numbed into submission. Adams has not created the same expectation. He began his operatic career with a highly viable theatrical vehicle--Nixon in China—with real dramatic tension and at least one real opera aria. Expectation undoubtedly plays a role. I was glad when he made a symphony of Doctor Atomic. Much more suitable.

So now Tommasini wants to attack my favorite thing about Bonesetter—the writing for female trio. He does this by pointing out how critical the trio in Rosenkavalier is to the plot. No it isn’t. It’s critical to the need for a big vocal moment. Strauss understood precisely what an opera was, how one worked dramatically, and most important of all how one worked musically. He understood the purpose of singing in the drama, where the arias went and why. The climax of Rosenkavalier involves 3 people, so all three have to sing.

I didn’t read Tam’s novel and am not sorry. I came to Bonesetter with no preconceived ideas. Do I think it’s as good as Rosenkavalier? Hell, no. Do I think anything is as good as Rosenkavalier? Hell, no. I thought the trios made the story about three characters, and that it needed that. I bought the theatrical solutions to the staging of the novel. For me it worked.

I don’t think Wallace is as good a composer as Adams. Tommasini was right in pointing out the flaw in Wallace not being able to imagine the sound for Bonesetter. Verdi didn’t sit around thinking of a sound. Wagner didn’t either—or if he did, he seems to have done it only once for his whole career. Strauss didn’t either. Mozart didn’t either. Any composer worth shit looks to their own sound for the musical materials, and they know what that sound is. The problem with most modern composers is that they have technique to burn but absolutely no characteristic sound. This is one of the reasons for the popularity of Philip Glass. He makes you crazy on occasion—though I seem to be getting over this reaction—but you always know who he is.

I think all three have to sing together in Bonesetter. It doesn’t work without it. For me it was vastly superior theatrically to Atomic, an opera about a bomb hanging in the air. Maybe the new production will help me change my mind, but for me Atomic lacked theatrical viability. At no time do any two characters actually talk to each other. The countdown that lasts through the whole last act completely did not work. I could go on and on.

Mrs Atomic asks over and over “Am I in your light?” Could he just turn around and say, “No, for god’s sake. The light is coming from the other side, as anyone can plainly see.”

Einstein

I am told that I was perverse to recommend Einstein on the Beach. I confess I don't own it myself. How many CDs is an 8 hour opera?

I am currently reading a biography of Einstein. I always read books about physics, books about black holes and string theory, stuff like that. I didn't realize he was trying to explain why gravity and acceleration feel the same.

What I want to know is: if I have 10 suns arranged in a row and each is moving away from the ones next to it at 1/10th of the speed of light, why aren't the two end ones separating at the speed of light? And if I have 11, what then?

Never mind.

Recommendations

Gramophone recommends a list of instrumental CDs you should buy so you can get familiar with the new composers. I would like to make some different recommendations.


Rent the movie Koyaanisqatsi to hear Philip Glass's score.


Or try Dawn Upshaw's recording of Ayre by Golijov.


Jump into Arvo Pärt's Passio.


Get deeper into Golijov with his St. Mark Passion.


Mr. and Mrs. Lieberson are both excellent together in the Neruda Songs.

Do modern operas.

Start with John Adams' Nixon in China.


Then move on to L'Amour de Loin.


And for the definitive Philip Glass experience what better than Einstein on the Beach? Don't keep any sharp objects in the vicinity.

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Blogging

I sat next to a man at Satyagraha who had seen Einstein on the Beach three times, "All eight hours of it." He pointed out that Glass is over in Brooklyn, so this was not a great feat. In Glass' career Einstein comes first. After my experience at Satyagraha, I would say it would be best to hear Einstein first, before you have been to any other Glass operas.

Satyagraha

Conductor.................Dante Anzolini [Debut] 
Production................Phelim McDermott [Debut] 

M. K. Gandhi............Richard Croft 
Prince Arjuna...........Bradley Garvin 
Lord Krishna............Richard Bernstein 
Miss Schlesen...........Rachelle Durkin 
Mrs. Naidoo.............Ellie Dehn [Debut] 
Kasturbai...............Maria Zifchak 
Mr. Kallenbach..........Earle Patriarco 
Parsi Rustomji..........Alfred Walker 
Mrs. Alexander..........Mary Phillips

Philip Glass' opera Satyagraha, premiering last night at the Metropolitan Opera, is about Mahatma Gandhi's peaceful political trasformation method, called satyagraha, and the development of the method during his years in South Africa.

The work is an opera where themes and elements converge rather than exactly unite.

I. There is a printed synopsis that explains the events of Gandhi's life in South Africa that make up the six scenes plus prologue of the opera. The three acts are grouped around three figures: Leo Tolstoy, Rabindranath Tagore and Martin Luther King, Jr.

II. There are words from the Bhagavad Gita, an ancient religious text, that are sung in Sanskrit and projected in translation on the walls of the set. I was well situated in the center where I could read everything. These words express the philosophy behind Gandhi's work rather than the events portrayed.

III. There is the monotonous, hypnotic and not precisely repetitious music of Philip Glass, a composer whose minimalist musical language his reached popular mythology.

IV. And finally there is the action depicted in the production.

The goal of a production will be to achieve a true spiritual experience. I feel that Glass' musical idiom is precisely suited to this story which turns out to be about the inner path of the soul of Gandhi while his outer life passes through these specific events. And perhaps it is about the spiritual path of the onlookers as well.

The approach of the production was to take each scene and attempt to express at once the earthly events and the spiritual journey through actions. Each image moved at the pace of Glass' music. We are shown the path to truth and goodness by Gandhi's actions and by the words of Krishna.

There were giant puppets and stilt walkers, people who flew into the air, choruses and soloists, and Martin Luther King preaching to crowds. If I were to criticize the production, it would only be for failing to achieve stylistic consistency from scene to scene.

I've seen Satyagraha before in San Francisco. I was a neophyte Philip Glass listener and had fairly violent reactions to it. Some of the scenes made me want to get up and scream. I resisted. Now I'm just used to him. You can't put your brain back to the place where it never heard Philip Glass for three solid hours before. You can't erase Koyanaquatsi from your experience. It didn't even seem so repetitious to me this time.

The main thing I remember from the San Francisco production is the last scene. It was staged as a picnic. They put down the blanket, laid out the plates, sat in the chairs, ate the food and put it all away. Then they repeated the whole thing twice, the second time without any props. They sat on air. What did any of that have to do with political marching and the life of King? At the Met it all seemed to be about what the story line said it was about.

At the end someone in the upper balcony shouted "Bapu." The audience was not the typical one for an opera, and included a lot of young people. Why regular patrons of the Metropolitan Opera would want to see this remains a mystery, but I'm glad I went. I felt I should stop all this larking about and get a serious job.

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Appomattox

Appomattox Court House in Virginia is the site of the surrender on April 9, 1865, of General Robert E. Lee, shown right, to General Ulysses S. Grant to begin the end of the American Civil War. Philip Glass has written an opera about it called Appomattox.

Rhoslyn Jones--Julia Dent Grant
Elza van den Heever--Mary Custis Lee
Ji Young Yang--Julia Agnes Lee
Heidi Melton--Mary Todd Lincoln
Kendall Gladen--Elizabeth Keckley
Jeremy Galyon--Abraham Lincoln
Andrew Shore--Ulysses S. Grant
Jere Torkelsen--Brigadier General John A. Rawlins
Richard Walker--Colonel Eli Parker
Dwayne Croft--Robert E. Lee
John Minágro--General Howell Cobb
Chad Shelton--Brigadier General Edward Alexander
Noah Stewart--T. Morris Chester

Presented at the San Francisco Opera, there are moments in this opera of great effectiveness. The opera begins and ends with scenes by the wives of the great male participants. At the beginning they are sure this war will be the last, while at the end they are sure that there will be more wars. People want to think that if a war is vastly horrible, as was our Civil War where more Americans died than in all of our other wars combined, then surely no others will follow. These ensembles were well done.

There was another moment when the Confederates decide to abandon Richmond, Virginia, the Confederate capitol, by blowing up most of the assets. The scene shows crowds of refugees and huge explosions where the actors stare in amazement and sing "aah."

In the battle scenes the Civil War song "Tenting on the old campground" is heard in its entirety.

There is another moment where Robert E. Lee is shown dressing for the occasion of his surrender. He was a southern gentleman whose house in Arlington, Virginia, is now the site of a national cemetery, the one where John Kennedy is buried. Early in the opera Mrs. Lee complains that she can no longer walk in the gardens of her house. Grant was no gentleman, and the contrast between the two men is itself an illustration of the culture clash the war was based on.

There is a famous picture of the room where the signing took place. More vivid in memory will be the scene that takes place in the opera after the signing: all the furniture is stolen and the building is completely demolished.

Into this simple story political events outside the time line are inserted in a kind of random way, especially in the second act. The assassination of Lincoln is anticipated and shown.

The civil rights movement of the fifties and sixties is shown. The war ended but didn't end in the hearts of southerners. If they couldn't own blacks, they would make sure their lives were miserable and degrading. Edgar Ray Killen appears in a wheel chair and describes the murder of three civil rights workers. I remembered that this referred to the murders of two white jews, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner, and one black man, James Chaney, but in the context of the opera it was just a morbid illustration of southern cruelty that couldn't be precisely identified.

And how was it as an opera? It was theatrically effective, at least for an American audience, and never became tedious. It was my second Glass opera in 6 weeks, so I couldn't help comparing them. Orphée achieved moments of great lyricism, moments of beautiful singing, indeed moments that seemed to require singing to make their proper effect. There were no such moments in Appomattox. I retain my prejudice: opera is about singing. I am there to hear people singing. I felt sorry for Dwayne Croft, a fine baritone who looked wonderful in his dignified portrayal of Robert E. Lee, but croaked miserably through the ugly vocal part composed for him. Every note seemed completely thankless. Perhaps Lee should have been a bass. Or perhaps it should have been written with the idea that someone would be singing it.

The best work came from Adler fellows. The picture on the left is Noah Stewart, excellent in the role of T. Morris Chester, a black journalist during the Civil War. I have been following him since I saw his performance of Don Jose in Davis. He is a lovely tall tenor that I have wanted to add to my sexiest list. I lack only an appropriate picture. I was previously worried that his voice might be too light, but I see from his work here that he has plenty of power.











This picture is of Kendall Gladen, formerly seen as Carmen and playing Elizabeth Keckley here, and Heidi Melton as Mrs. Lincoln. Heidi is a dramatic soprano of very great potential. In San Francisco people already know her name. Rhoslyn Jones as Mrs. Grant and Elza van den Heever as Mrs. Lee were also fine.

Whenever Glass loses interest in his material, he fills in with the noodle noodle music he is famous for. It's a complete cop out. The writing for voice was bad to ghastly.

Is this a relevant comment? You tell me. I am pondering the fact that all the white characters were portrayed by white singers, and all the black characters were played by black singers. Perhaps this is a coincidence, but perhaps not. Is that really necessary? I think the Civil War still lives.

Orphée

Orphée and La Princesse

I have saved Orphée by Philip Glass for last because it is the most complex to describe and came last. The most important thing to know about this opera is that the libretto is taken directly from the movie by Jean Cocteau and was performed in the original French. I think it makes a wonderful opera. It was advised that one see the movie before seeing the opera, but I have not.

I went to the lecture before the opera. Philip Glass is a classical modernist who has entered into the popular culture. He is joked about on shows like The Simpsons and Saturday Night Live. He is the only composer that one naturally feels one could do that, too. I could write noodle noodle noodle phrases at least that well, couldn't I?

The lecturer played an annoying section from Einstein on the Beach. Then he stopped the recording and said, "Wait, it gets better," and played some more. "No it doesn't. I just said that."

Einstein and Satyagraha are much more repetitious and annoying than Orphée, a piece that plays like common theater. I found it theatrically effective, relatively singable, and even beautiful at times. It is still unquestionably Glass but occasionally rises to expressive lyricism.

The set is a pair of rooms in a simple art deco style. There is a large mirror on the left. Or is it? In the first act the actors pretend that it is a mirror by acting in mirror against it, though it isn't comical like Lucille Ball. [Do you remember Lucille Ball doing this with Harpo Marx?] In the second act it is actually a mirror. Or is it?

The plot involves the interaction of the poet Orphée, played by Philip Cutlip, and the death figure called La Princesse, sung by Lisa Saffer. Euridice, sung by Caroline Worra, and Heurtebise, sung by Jeffrey Lentz, are the co-stars. La Princesse has been sent to retrieve a young poet named Cegeste and arranges for him to be killed in a hit and run accident.

She becomes interested in the older, more famous Orphée and stays on earth to be with him. He becomes obsessed with listening to enigmatic voices being transmitted on the radio, words which are being created by the dead Cegeste. La Princesse wants Orphée for herself and arranges for his wife Euridice to be killed in another hit and run accident.

Each time the dead are carried off by two men wearing motorcycle suits and helmets that hide their faces. The dead person and the escorting Heurtebise become duplicated and walk around the rooms in mirror, an effect that is enhanced by the imaginary mirror.

La Princesse and the others appear before a heavenly tribunal because she has killed without instructions. Euridice is sent back, but Orphée must never look at her again while continuing to live with her, an absurd impossible condition that does not work. She dies and returns to hell, leaving Orphée to La Princesse.

There follows an extraordinarily beautiful scene where she explains where the instructions come from--the wind--and they pledge their love. The most beautiful singing of the week came here. He promises to do whatever she says, and she sends him back into the past with Euridice.

I found the effect profound and the expressiveness of the simple music surprising. The small audience cheered loudly.

Glass

I am reading the chapter on minimalist opera from The Cambridge Companion to Twentieth-century Opera. I thought perhaps I should find out what they are trying to do before I began criticizing minimalist opera. Oops. Too late.

Any discussion of minimalist opera must begin with Philip Glass. My exposure to Glass opera is limited to Satyagraha, a work I considered extremely successful. It had a narrative structure, something Glass is not supposed to want, which consisted of events in the life of Ghandi during his time in South Africa. Events were staged in a traditional way, except there was a great deal of repetition. In one scene the action was repeated three times, the third time with the furniture removed. Instead of sitting on chairs, they sat on air.

The text was in Sanskrit and had nothing to do with the dramatized action. Perhaps this is what is meant by the destruction of narrative structure that Glass likes to talk about.

Glass is trying to alter your perception of time through the use of simplicity and repetition. In Satyagraha I thought it enhanced the spiritual content and induced a trance-like state. If you allowed yourself to let go and enter the trance state, it was a wonderful experience. Sometimes this worked for me, and sometimes it didn't. Sometimes I just wanted to run screaming from the room. It altered my perception of time by making everything seem to take a very long time. Sometimes it was just painfully boring.

So how can something be extremely successful and excruciatingly, painfully boring at the same time? I think I assumed that was the intention.

Koyaanisqatsi

A couple of things came together for me--my interest in the minimalists and Alex Ross' article on Philip Glass' score--that made me think it was finally time for me to see Koyaanisqatsi, or Life out of Balance.

There's a little joke at the beginning: the DVD has a screen offering subtitles in Francais and Espagnol. The joke is that there is no dialog, just film and music. I am imagining words running across the bottom of the screen.

We begin with empty deserts and oceans and move gradually into human life. There is beautiful footage of a cave with bats flying in and out. The music and the film become gradually more and more frenzied, with film of explosions, buildings falling down and time lapse photography of cars going by. The musical score and the pictures complement each other. Glass' style consists of simple 2-4 note figures that are repeated in simple harmonic contexts. With these tools he is able to create large musical landscapes, larger than should actually be possible.

I wonder if this would make a good exercise video. I used to like to exercise to the video of the Joffrey doing Rite of Spring. I generally think exercise videos are too unimaginative. Why not exercise to Philip Glass and rockets taking off?

There is film of my beloved Bay Area with people riding BART and driving on the freeway that collapsed in the earthquake.

How can we judge that it is life out of balance? It is the only life we know.
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