Wolf Trap Opera

Part Two of Anne Midgette’s survey of new American opera ran in the Post yesterday, and we got some nice ink for our recent and future commissioning activity.  (Do click through – it’s a good read.)

Part One ran last Sunday, on the day of our WTOC Artist Welcome Reception, and quite a few donors made a point of telling us how disappointed they were about the fact that we received no mention in an article about new opera.  We advised patience, and indeed, in Part Two, there is prominent mention of both Volpone and The Inspector.

My only displeasure came from what must have been a serious lapse in use of the English language during my interview.   I resorted to the one thing about which I spent years haranguing my own children: the “L” word.  Says I about working in a thrifty organization that isn’t too dependent on big money and lavish gifts from outside funding sources, “…when you see things go south, you’re like, ‘I’m glad I wasn’t relying on it.”

“You’re like…”  Really, Kim?  Blrgh.  You get the gist, though.

Hurrah for new music theatre that retains the best of the bountiful opera tradition that precedes it, that entertains and intrigues the audience, and that doesn’t require so much money that it collapses in on itself.

July 3, 2010

New Opera: Good Things Come in Small Packages

Hot off the presses today at the Wolf Trap Opera Company is an interview with WTOC Director Kim Pensinger Witman, which features prominently in the second of Anne Midgette’s two-part analysis of the future of American Opera in the Washington Post.  The article includes an early mention of Wolf Trap’s 2011 premiere of The Inspector - a new opera by John Musto, with libretto by Mark Campbell, the team behind Wolf Trap’s GRAMMY-nominated Volpone.

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!”