Wolf Trap Opera

Google alerts are part of my professional lifeblood.  This month,there’s one set to notify me daily of any news with the word “Zaide” in it.  This is what I have learned in the last few days:

“zaide” or “zayde” is Yiddish for Grandfather.

Over at “180 Days with Mozart and Me“, Bill is working his way through the Philips Complete Mozart Edition recordings.  This weekend, he spent some time with Zaide and writes about it here.  He closes with “I don’t really know why I liked Zaide. It just didn’t sound like a typical Mozart opera. It felt more somehow. More heartfelt. Like real people (not actors) talking and singing. I know that may sound odd. But that’s how it felt to me.”

And, as we prepare to bring this rare Mozart opera to the stage, I learn that Opera Nova Scotia just mounted Zaide’s Canadian stage premiere this past weekend.

Today, the kick-off of our free lunchtime mini-concerts for staff members of the Wolf Trap Foundation.  Wow, it feels good to have music back in the building!

Hana Park, "O mio babbino caro"

Daniel Billings, "The Impossible Dream"

Nathaniel Peake, "New York Lights"

Paul Appleby, "Un aura amorosa"

Two highly enjoyable performances from WTOC alumni at The Barns – streaming on the internet to a computer near you!  Go to www.wolftrap.org/discovery or www.livestream.com/discoverygoesdigital.

Never let it be said...

A couple of months ago, Rahree and I managed to produce two semi-staged one-act operas without the benefit of our usual summertime complement of amazing colleagues.  We survived to tell the tale, and tomorrow night (Monday 5/24) you’ll have a chance to check in on the fruits of our labors. Bastianello (Musto/Campbell) and Lucrezia (Bolcom/Campbell) are gems.  Each opera clocks in under an hour, and in between the operas I have the privilege of moderating a question-and-answer period with our marvelous cast.

Last fall when I was out of the country on a brief vacation, Rahree scored big with a grant proposal.  We now have the means to stream five concerts on the internet over the next year, and this Bastianello/Lucrezia performance kicks off the series.  Over the last couple of weeks I’ve been cheering from the sidelines as Rahree went from booting up Final Cut Pro for the first time to uploading these edited performances to Livestream.  (Complete with subtitles!  The audience at The Barns didn’t need supertitles to understand these singers, but due to the unpredictability of computer speakers, we felt the addition of titles for the broadcast would add a lot.)

Dress rehearsal photos are here, my post-perf ramblings are here, and Anne Midgette’s review is here.  The stream includes a live text chat component, and several of the singers will be online to answer your questions.

See you there!

Today we enjoyed a lovely lunchtime picnic at the warehouse with the staff of the scenic and costume shops.  We noted tons of girl power at play this summer across the intern and seasonal staff positions.  Technical Director Tim McCormick says “I just hired the best people, that’s all.”  ‘Nuff said.

This afternoon, the Zaide team dove into the first big brainstorming session about the way(s) this piece will end.  Lots of questions:  Will the Sultan pardon the man who saved his life?  Will it be revealed that that man is Zaide and Gomatz’s father?  How significantly does the timing of the revelation affect the outcome?  How will the audience make its desire known?  Will there be a Eurotrash ending with dancing bears, rubber chickens and silly string? (Well, no.  We know the answer to that one.  The shop staff has already conceived of a Clifford the Big Red Dog ending, and it would take precedence over rubber chickens anyway.)

And, since there are always dozens of things happening at a time around here, Rahree and Artee spent the morning masquerading as visiting VIPs at the Phillips Collection, picking out art for this summer’s Vocal Colors recital series.  “Every Friday morning should be spent shopping for Van Goghs and Rothkos,” says Rahree.  This year’s music & art programs will include Stieglitz, O’Keeffe, Van Gogh, Mondrian, Klee, Tayo Heuser, Mark Rothko, and William Christenberry.

LISTEN UP!  Big doings coming up on this Monday (May 24) at 7:30 EDT.  Come back here Monday evening to link to a special internet streaming event – the kickoff for our new Discovery Goes Digital. We’re sending this spring’s performance of Musto’s Bastianello and Bolcom’s Lucrezia out over the web in a special one-time-only event.  Performers will be online to text chat with viewers, and you’ll get a chance to experience these two touching and witty operas, both with libretto by the inimitable Mark Campbell.

Have a great weekend!

The Inspector workshop lasted just six days -intense, full of laughter, and infused by the good will and hard work of our cast and staff.  Any just description deserves more time and space than I can afford here, already engulfed as I am by the beginning of our summer season.

Let it be said that the integrity of the piece is astonishing for an opera still in development.  We sang it beginning-to-end for an invited audience on Saturday, and the response was enthusiastically positive.  John and Mark are in the process of rolling out tweaks to the libretto and the music; they are tightening up a few of the moments that we felt sagged for one reason or another, filling out the exposition of one of the characters, tweaking or deleting a few of the comic bits that didn’t land, and clarifying some musical moments that were a little too rushed or busy.  All in all, detail work.  Critical detail work, especially for a comedy, but fine tuning nonetheless.

These adjustments will be made within the next month, then John will start orchestrating, and directors and designers will give the piece a visual shape.  Look for the launch of The Inspector website next fall – with video trailers, audio samples, design sketches and more!

A sincere and hearty thank you to the wonderful people of The Inspector Workshop 2010:

Composer: John Musto
Librettist: Mark Campbell
Conductor: Glen Cortese
Director: Leon Major
Mayor Fazzobaldi: Michael Anthony McGee
Bernadetta: Heather Johnson
Beatrice: Anne-Carolyn Bird
Tancredi: Andrew Bidlack
Cosimo: Chad Sloan
Board of Directors: Amanda Opuszynski, Sarah Larsen, Patrick Cook & Eugene Galvin
Bobachina & Bobachino: CarrieAnne Winter & Madelyn Wanner
Sister Anjelica: Gabriele DeMers
Pianist: Michael Baitzer
Stage Manager: Laura Krause

There’s a great opera parlor game that involves naming characters who have a great bearing on an opera plot and are referred to in the libretto but who never actually appear.  We’ve gone one better – in The Inspector, it’s the title character who never shows up.

Andrew Bidlack (left) as Tancredi, Chad Sloan as Cosimo

No matter, for everyone onstage spends the whole night believing that someone else actually is the inspector, and that’s what matters.  The gentleman who benefits from this case of mistaken identity is Tancredi, and he’s accompanied by his teacher and friend Cosimo.

Tancredi. Tenor. Late 20s, early 30s. Tall, blonde, handsome, elegant, but a little gawky. His slightly affected demeanor suggests someone important.

Cosimo. Baritone. 40s–50s or beyond. Tancredi’s teacher and friend, posing as his servant. Exceedingly smart, acerbic, more pragmatic than Tancredi.

Overheard in Rehearsal

“We were trying to make art.”

“That was your first mistake.”

“This is entertainment.”

Meet the ladies of Mayor Fazzobaldi’s family, descriptions courtesy of Mark Campbell’s libretto:

Mama Bernadetta (Heather Johnson, left) and daughter Beatrice (Anne-Carolyn Bird)

Bernadetta: Mezzo-soprano. 40s–50s. Physically akin to her husband the Mayor, but taller. Pretentious,
vain, and not above having a lust for power—and material gain—that is stronger than her husband’s.

Beatrice:  Soprano. Late 20s. Their daughter. As thin and delicate in physique as her parents are not. She is attractive, though looks somewhat bookish. She attended a university for one year, but was withdrawn by her mother who thought her daughter was learning the “wrong” ideas.

“Make it Land”

The phrase of the day.  Comedy is hard, and comic timing in opera feels like microsurgery.  Work grinds to a halt in search of the right combination of sixteenth notes and eighth note rests.  But when you make the joke land, the laugh is worth the compulsion.

Composer John Musto

This week we’re workshopping the next Musto/Campbell opera.  The Inspector will premiere next spring at The Barns, and we’re taking it apart and putting it back together stem-to-stern.

Today, meet Mayor Fazzobaldi [pronounced Fatso Baldy for those of you who don't speak Italian:))

Baritone. 40s–50s. Short, corpulent, bombastic, bellicose, and bumbling, a man driven by his immense ego. He is a small town dictator, a role he has enjoyed for several decades.  (description by librettist Mark Campbell)

Michael McGee workshops the Mayor (with "Directress of the Hospital and Cemetary" Sarah Larsen at left)

“Graft! Graft! It”s not graft! It’s not graft!
I have never committed graft!
And whoever made that charge
Is biased, evil and daft.
Those were honest gifts.
The villas and cars and such.
Given to me by my friends
Because I am loved so much!
Now see here, my good man,
What public servant doesn’t engage in
A bribe, some fraud, even a little graft?
We are grossly underpaid and understaffed!
I beg of you to have mercy on me!
I have a wife and daughter!
But as I am a man of God!
I did it
For the good of our people!”

We’re furiously working out the details of our open-ended approach to Zaide.  We will offer anywhere from two to four possible endings, and the details will emerge during our rehearsal period.  The desire to lock in the details now is tempting, but to do so would be to fly in the face of the whole motivation for this approach.

Mozart didn’t finish the opera, and we want to include the audience in one of the decision-making process inherent in producing Zaide.  So, as the team and the artists explore this piece in rehearsal (starting May 17), they’ll decide which options for ending the performance feel solid and organic.  We’ll figure out how to describe the options to the audience, and they will make their preferences known at intermission. How?  Well, that’s part of the fun of it.

Meanwhile, we know a bit more about what the opera will look like than how it will end. Here’s a look at a few Zaide costume sketches from designer Mattie Ullrich, who created the fabulous clothes for our Ariadne auf Naxos (2008) and Cosi fan tutte (2009).

Next week I’ll be pretty much consumed by our workshop for Musto/Campbell’s The Inspector – I’ll file a few reports from the exciting frontier of 21st-century comic opera!

Soliman, the Sultan

Zaide, a prisoner, in love with Gomatz

Gomatz, a prisoner
in love with Zaide

Allazim, the Sultan's favored slave

Yes, I’m still here, having fallen prey to the dreaded blog equation.  The faster life rolls at you, the more there is to write about, and the fewer hours you have to do it with…

2009 FYA Carlos Monzón, Kimberly Monzón, and their housing hosts

I couldn’t let today pass without pointing you toward columnist John Kelly’s “Appreciating the Tenor of Opera Company Life,” in this morning’s Washington Post! None of our artists would have a Wolf Trap experience without a place to live for the summer, and our housing hosts rise to the challenge by opening up their homes to these fabulous young adults.  20 of our hosts showed up at my place last night for a preseason thank-you reception.  We shared stories and snacks, and we gave them the news that the housing host program (personified by the gracious Bill & Sheila Woessner) would be featured in Thursday’s paper.

Back tomorrow with some brand new costume sketches for Zaide!