Two Operas about Women

Conductor:  Ryan Murray (new opera theater director)
Stage Director:  Gia Battista
Piano:  Renee Harris

California State University Sacramento performed two operas last night. 

Game of Chance by Seymour Barab

First knitter:  Taylor Graham
Second knitter:  Katie Thorpe
Third knitter:  Valerie Loera
The representative:  Justin Ramm-Damron

This is the second time for this opera at Sac State.  So what is the attraction?  Three women are knitting their lives away and wish for something else.  The attraction is that each of them gets a nice solo scene.  A man comes to take them away to their dream.  At the end they are discontented and wish they had asked for more.  As a person who became a systems analyst in her 40s, this seems absurd.  Why settle?  There's not a lot that can be done with this opera.

fichu

Amelia Goes to the Ball by Gian-Carlo Menotti

Amelia:  Angela Yam
The Friend:  Valerie Loera
The Husband:  Michael Carey
The Lover:  Aaron Gallington
The Chief of Police:  Justin Ramm-Damron
First Maid:  Taylor Graham
Second Maid:  Monica Serrano

This is fun.  There is nothing in this opera that is actually about a ball.  It's all about getting there.  At the start the maids are helping Amelia dress while her friend urges her to hurry.  I have included the above so that all may see what a fichu looks like.  Amelia searches for hers without success, thus causing the delay.

Before she finds it husband arrives home.  He accuses her of having a lover, which she admits on the condition that he will take her to the ball.  He lives upstairs.  Husband goes looking and lover enters.  The Lover was played very much for laughs.  Aaron Gallington was an amusing physical comic with lots of odd looking gestures.  The opera ends with husband knocked out and taken to the hospital, lover accused of theft and taken off by the police, and finally with Amelia going off to the ball with the Chief of Police.  We have to assume that all is well.

This opera is a vehicle for the woman who sings Amelia, in our case Angela Yam who was impressive.

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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Impressions of Savages

The Santa Fe Opera's production of Menotti's The Last Savage leaves behind a series of images.

The most powerful image is the troop of skinny men in their turbans, long black beards, Ghandi loin cloths and pervasive tattoos who strut around the stage with their toes pointing out.  They told us we were in a comedy.  This in turn led to speculation:  how could you possibly tattoo that many men?  Body suits?  There was no evidence of wrinkling.  Stenciling?  Maybe.  Fake tattoos?  Maybe.  Mysteries are very attractive.

Then there is the unforgettable image of the heroine Kitty in her pink safari suit, complete with pink kepi.  She is sung by the dainty and adorable coloratura soprano Anna Christy.  I didn't expect so much coloratura from Menotti.  Anna was surely perfectly cast, very much like a character from Legally Blonde.

Then there is the image of the savage himself who started out in a loin cloth and huge ugly turban.  Daniel Okulitch, a Canadian baritone who looks marvelous in all possible stages of dress and undress, is also a fine lyric baritone.  I almost said we could hope to see more of him, but how could we possibly, if you know what I mean?

We wander from India to Chicago and back.  Menotti wrote his own libretti, and his skill can best be seen in the party for Chicago society.  The savage meets a cross section of religious figures, artists, debutantes, scientists, etc.  There is even a brief bit of modern sounding chamber music, which is supposed to be the only part Stravinsky liked.

Hearing Menotti from the view of the 21st century, I realize it is in the style of the classic American musical and could easily play on Broadway--particularly in this production.

Our schedule of the five operas was in exactly the right order, especially Faust at the beginning and Savage at the end.  We wondered why Marguerite climbed into the stand of organ pipes on her way to heaven.  The answer came when the savage attempts to escape civilization by climbing into the panorama of Chicago skyscrapers at the back.  We have achieved symmetry.

This was the hit of the summer.

Der Konsul

On Friday night I went to see Der Konsul in the Zurich Opera studio. The Consul, by Giancarlo Menotti, started life as a Broadway show and went on to be a mainstay of opera studios everywhere. The Consul is verismo in every sense: the sordid reality of the story line, the not quite modern music and the soaring, dramatic vocal lines.

It is great for opera studios because it has a number of not very difficult parts for all kinds of voices. It sinks or swims on the quality of the singer performing Magda Sorel, a dramatic soprano part.

Magda's husband John has become involved in clandestine political activities and is being hunted by the police. She has turned to the consul of a friendly nation to help her and her family, including John's mother and her sick child, to flee to freedom.

This opera plays in my head in English. The German translation seemed to lack Menotti's love for words, to play with them and feel them in his mouth. The lullaby seemed to be translated literally instead of searching for something similarly poetic. "I shall find for you shells and stars," could be translated as anything.

The staging was excellent. Bareness exactly expresses the feeling here. I fault them only for not bothering to find any real magician's props for the magic scene.

All of the characters were double, sometimes triple cast, so I can't actually tell you who they were. Best were the Magda, Mother, secretary, John, magician. I wish them all well.