A singer deemed “Superb” by the Los Angeles Times, praised by Opera Canada for her “vivacious stage presence” and “soprano that charms and brightens a room”, the grateful recipient of Opera Hamilton’s Sheila Zack Scholarship for Emerging Artists, Mireille Asselin is a young singer at the onset of an exciting career.

Mireille Asselin with Warren Christie: Magic Flute Diaries

Having taken the title role in Handel’s Theodora with the Bach Collegium San Diego under the baton of Maestro Richard Egarr; Susanna (Le Nozze di Figaro) and Rossignol (Stravinsky’s Le Rossignol) with Yale Opera; and Adele (Die Fledermaus) with Opera Hamilton, last year Opera Atelier introduced Asselin to Toronto audiences as Galatea (Acis and Galatea) and Servilia (La Clemenza di Tito).  Asselin made her feature film debut as Pamina in Sullivan Entertainment’s Magic Flute Diaries, released in 2007 when she was only twenty-one.  In April 2011 she made her Carnegie Hall debut singing Vaughan Williams’ Dona Nobis Pacem with the Yale Symphony, and returned to Carnegie this January in recital with the Song Continues series.

This year Asselin will sing Beethoven’s 9^th Symphony with the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra; Proserpine & La déesse Flore with Boston Early Music in their double bill of Charpentier’s La Descente d’Orfée aux enfers & La Couronne de Fleurs; Popera with Opera Hamilton; and Phénice & Lucinde in Lully’s Armide at Glimmerglass this summer.

I ask Asselin ten questions: five about herself and five about her upcoming work with the COC ensemble in Semele.

1) Which of your parents do you resemble (what’s your nationality / ethnic background)?

Mireille Asselin and proud father, at her Yale graduation.

I would say that I most resemble my father.  Ever since I was born, people would remark on our identical wavy and unruly dark hair, dark eyes and round french face.  He’s french canadian through and through, with the first of the Asselin family coming over to New France in the mid-17th century.  However, my maternal family would probably make a case for some of the features that I inherited from them as well.  My mother is American, with links back to Sweden, Ireland and Wales.  In fact, we went to Wales to meet some of our family there in 2002 and they swore I was the template of a dark haired, fair skinned “little Welsh girl”.

My physical features aside, I take after my father in a lot of other ways too:  we both are hopeless at remembering names, we learn in similar fashions and he certainly knew how to take advantage of my competitive nature as a child – making a race out of eating my brussels sprouts and doing my multiplication tables.  My mother was, and is, the perfect counterbalance to my “Papa” – with her serene strength which gets us through any tough time.  She is still my rock.

2) What is the best thing / worst thing about being an opera singer?

The irony of this job, is that all of the things that can be considered the best parts of what we do can also be the worst things on certain days.  For example, travel is an amazing perk!  We get to travel all over the world for work, for auditions, and for training.  I marvel at how much of the world I’ve already been able to see in my relatively short time as a singer, and as someone with a love for discovery and new experiences and learning, this is hands down a “plus”.  However, it also means being away from home and loved ones for long stretches of time, often living out of a suitcase, and missing a lot of important normal life events such as weddings, funerals, birthdays or just being able to babysit for a friend when she needs a night off.  So some days, travel is a downside.

Another double edged sword is the constant learning and growth.  One of the most wonderful and rewarding things about being an opera singer is that we are confronted on a daily basis with the need for self evaluation and improvement.  The voice is never “done”.  Technique is never “perfect”.  There is constant questioning of our artistic ideas, and continuous learning of new repertoire.  This is incredible!  It is endlessly challenging and stimulating and engaging.  But on the other hand, how does one deal emotionally with never feeling that the work is finished?  How do you cope with the daily humbling process of auditioning and of fending off self-doubt?  I firmly believe that opera singers will always manage to avoid a mid-life crisis, because we have smaller scale ones every day.  This is both a blessing and a curse!

3) Who do you like to listen to or watch?

I love listening to Edith Piaf and Ella Fitzgerald.  Even though neither of them sang opera, listening to their recordings teaches me about great artistry and great singing.  Piaf, a woman of incredible vocal abilities,  has the courage to throw beauty of sound and accuracy to the wind.  Her singing is heart wrenching because she allows real emotion to creep in.  Fitzgerald on the other hand fascinates me with the constant perfection of every note – and that achieved in the innocent days before autotune!  She is endlessly witty and when she sings I know I would have loved to have known her as a friend.  I think that’s what draws me to these two women – they are uniquely their own artists, and you can hear who they are in how they sing.

4) What ability or skill do you wish you had, that you don’t have?

I wish I were handy.  I am always so impressed with people who instinctually know how to fix or build things.  I am woefully lacking in this area!

5) When you’re just relaxing and not working what is your favourite thing to do?

I love food, and when I have free time I usually indulge in some sort of food-related activity – either a lazy brunch at my favourite neighbourhood place, baking some sort of extravagant treat or preparing a meal with friends.  However, if I can manage some time away from the city my favourite thing to do is to go on a good hike (stocked with a good picnic to enjoy at the end of the trek, of course).

Five more about appearing in the COC production of Semele:

1) How does singing the role of Semele challenge you?

I have found the role of Semele challenging because it contains such a variety of singing styles and requires great versatility.  It’s high, it’s low, it’s fast, it’s slow, it’s tender, it’s petty, it’s angry, it’s beautiful.  Basically, it asks that every bit of my vocal and dramatic toolboxes be used at some point or another and so it is an incredibly rewarding challenge.

2) What do you love about Semele: both the role & your part in this production?

I love that this opera tells such a modern, relevant story.  I think that the reason Greek mythology has endured throughout the ages is because each tale centres around timeless human foibles or behaviours – in this case, jealousy and ambition.  And for one of the oldest operas in the standard repertoire, I find it fascinating to see how overtly sexual the characters and the story are.  In fact, it embraces what we like to think of as a “modern” attitude to sexuality, which just goes to show that we are not so different from the people who lived centuries before us.  On top of all of this, Handel is one of my favourite composers, and he wrote some of his best music for this score.  The choruses are grand and moving, and there is such variety in the writing of the arias for each character that when they’re strung along one after another, the listener is really taken by the magnitude of Handel’s genius.

The part of Semele, being central to the whole story, is therefore a wonderful character to play.  I’ve really gotten to know the piece inside and out, and the vocal and dramatic challenges of the part, which I spoke about previously, truly make it one of the most fulfilling projects I’ve taken on to date.

3) Do you have a favourite moment in Semele?

My favourite part musically in the opera is a series of arias in Act 2.  Juno, Jupiter’s jealous wife, sings “Iris Hence Away!” – a revenge aria which is raucous and electrifying and full of rhythmic spunk… 

…and immediately after she leaves the stage we see Semele, all alone, singing “O Sleep, why dost thou leave me?” – a calm, floating aria with the most heartbreaking melody about how she wishes she could just sleep a little bit to soothe her troubled thoughts.

The juxtaposition of these two moments is the perfect example of Handel’s genius.  There is such dramatic contrast between the arias that we really understand how different the two women are, and it draws the listener along on a real emotional journey.

4) How do you relate to Semele as a modern woman?

As I mentioned before, this opera really is shockingly modern at times, and so I feel like there isn’t a great divide between myself and Semele. Compared to many operatic heroines, she is not weak and under male rule.  Yes, she is set up for an arranged marriage in the first act, but she runs away from the ceremony and goes against her father’s wishes in order to follow her heart.  Then, once she is with Jupiter, she again speaks out when she wants something.  She talks about how his absence makes her feel, and in the end demands that he give her the one thing that she truly desires – immortality.  She is a woman who makes her own decisions, for better or for worse.

5) Is there a teacher or an influential recording you’d care to name whose work you especially admire?

Soprano Monica Whicher

My teacher and mentor is the wonderful Toronto-based soprano Monica Whicher.  In the past 5 years, she’s been my trusted pair of ears, my friend, my inspiration and my therapist.  I remember her singing Dido (in Dido and Aeneas) on stage with Opera Atelier and thinking:  ”now there is a true artist”.  I’ve been very lucky to have been able to learn from her and hope that she’ll keep putting up with me as I embark on this crazy career!

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This week Mireille Asselin will appear in the Canadian Opera Company production of Semele: Wednesday May 23^rd at 7:30 pm at the Four Seasons Centre.

Later Asselin goes on to the following projects:

• Beethoven’s 9th Symphony with the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra, May 26th @ 7:30PM (Hamilton Place)
• This summer in the roles of Phénice & Lucinde in Lully’s Armide, Glimmerglass Festival, Cooperstown.
• Next season with the Canadian Opera Company, in the roles of Adele in Die Fledermaus and Servilia in La Clemenza di Tito

I’ve been thinking about Jean Cox.

Jean Cox, heldentenor (click picture for details of Cox’s extensive work at the Bayreuth Festival)

Cox was a great American heldentenor, who died on Sunday.  By coincidence it’s the same day that Franz Crass passed, and not many weeks after the death of Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau.

I am pondering the workings of the culture machine, a bit mystified that whereas DFD is universally known and loved, and FC also well-known, Cox never made the same deep impression, at least in North America (but then again Cox is likely remembered far more in Europe than in America)

Of course nobody –certainly not me–can know objective truth. Maybe the way these male artists are remembered is the proper reflection of their ability.

Maybe.  Yet I suspect that in fact other factors are involved.

Timing seems to be a big factor in fame.  Singers have a window of opportunity to make an impression.  For some that window is very brief indeed.  If you listen to this sampling of tenors –all singing the same brief passage in the last act of Götterdämmerung –you get a sense of the brevity of careers.  New cohorts of singers replace the older ones, and the changing recording technology may distort the singers’ actual voices. 

If you come along at the right time for a key project you will be remembered.

• Wolfgang Windgassen came along at the right time to be the Siegfried on that first seminal Ring cycle conducted by Georg Solti.  
• Manfred Jung was the Siegfried on Chereau’s Ring conducted by Pierre Boulez
• Helge Brilioth and Jess Thomas share the Siegfried duties on the von Karajan Ring

That’s where timing comes in.

I saw Jean Cox sing the Siegfried from Götterdämmerung at least a couple of times in 1973 (with the Canadian Opera Company, in the unfriendly confines of the O’Keefe Centre).  His portrayal was riveting, a confident physical presence at ease moving, acting and singing.  His voice combined power, lovely tone & nuanced expression in this difficult role.

I also heard him on CBC radio broadcasts from Bayreuth conducted by Horst Stein (another talent who somehow fell through the cracks).  To my ear Cox sounded much better than Windgassen or Jung.  While I adore the quirky interpretations of the von Karajan Ring (Brilioth for example), Cox never had a recording whereby he could stake his claim as one of the great heldentenors of the century.

Recently I saw a discussion online about tenors where some put forward the notion that  Jay Hunter Morris –admittedly a reasonable performer in the Met’s Ring—was one of the great tenors of the century.  Why?  Again, it’s a matter of timing, being in the right place at the right time.

Here’s a little sample of Cox’s death scene from Götterdämmerung, beginning at 3:20 in a clip that also includes the unique voice of Franz Mazura. 

I am grateful to have seen Cox.

Toronto is belatedly getting to know one of its own.  Opera Director Robert Carsen, who’s made a name for himself worldwide has only recently directed productions in Toronto.

And how romantic is it that—as if to make up for lost time—we’re seeing his work every year?

• In 2010-2011 (in the spring of 2011) the Canadian Opera Company’s Orfeo ed Euridice was one of the highlights at the end of a stellar season.
• In 2011-2012 (autumn of 2011) COC followed with Iphigenia in Tauris to inaugurate the following season.
• In 2012-2013, the third in the series is Dialogues des Carmelites coming next season.

click on image for more info on obtaining the DVD from Amazon

How could I then resist picking up a DVD of Tosca directed by our favourite son?

Carsen’s style is wonderfully distinctive even while working from the text.

The two Gluck operas were at times astonishing, even as they hewed closely to the text. Orfeo ed Euridice gave us a world as if perpetually mourning, ashes and precious fire, making the spare enactment of the story stunningly powerful.  In Iphigenia Carsen showed us the nasty implications of a story that’s too often glossed over in the emphasis some directors place on a friendship between two men with homoerotic undertones; like it or not (and I am not sure I did like it), he told the story that’s in the text.

That’s more or less the reality of his Tosca, originally produced for the Opernhaus Zürich, in a sparkling television production with excellent sound & precise camerawork.

This time the organizing principle is found in Tosca’s life in the theatre.  Without giving anything away –and I believe very strongly in spoiler-free reviews—this story is told in a meta-theatrical way, emphasizing the idea that for Tosca, life is one big performance.

If Tosca is going to work on you it requires some kind of chemistry among its principals.  Emily Magee?  I’d never encountered before, but find her singing more than adequate.  Her take on the complex artist that is Tosca is at least sufficiently deep to stay afloat in some heady company.  I believe the two male leads are –in addition to the fascinating mise en scène— the chief reasons to obtain this DVD.

Count me among those who has been holding his breath throughout Jonas Kaufmann’s career, a bit amazed that the voice works so well.  He sounds too dark for this Fach although this sound is right for roles such as Siegmund (in which he starred at the Met in their High Definition broadcast, although he had to bow out of last season’s Ring Cycle) or Parsifal (to which I look forward eagerly in the coming Met High Def season).  Kaufmann was absent from the stage for much of 2012, although he’s eased back in recently in a concert where he was reportedly in good voice.  I hope he’s okay.

Kaufmann brings an interesting combination of skills, combining an uncommon voice, good looks, and genuine acting ability.  He never seems to be out of character; he never lets the audience down when the camera is upon him. Carsen brings out the artist in Cavaradossi as no director I’ve ever seen.  It helps that Kaufmann can pull this off.

His rival for Tosca and the audience’s admiration is Thomas Hampson, cast against type as Scarpia.  This is a subtler Scarpia than many I’ve seen, commanding without needing to overwhelm, vocally gorgeous throughout.  Need I add, he problematizes the triangle by making Scarpia something of an attractive option for Tosca.  Only in his last scene do we see his true colours, which emerge in their full fury.

My Canadian Opera Company ticket subscription arrived in the mail today.  I was never in doubt about renewing the tickets, still starry eyed by the new building and the overall quality of what we’ve been getting.

Even so—I tell myself—it’s worth remembering that a subscription is like a contract with the open-ended possibility of renewal.  I pay the COC.  This buys seats for each show on a particular night, and also preserve those seats for my renewal in the years to come.  If I’m feeling particularly positive at renewal time I can also throw in an extra contribution to the COC.

Richard Bradshaw (Michael Cooper/COC)

In exchange?  The minimum is that I get a series of operas.  On those nights I will get to watch the company that I’ve come to know, including members of the orchestra, ensemble and soloists.

But speaking of contracts, the COC have another contract to add to the list.  Yes, they have the contract with each of us, that unspoken promise to be better every year.   We renew our tickets, and we wait, not just because we read the brochure starry-eyed and eager.  I think of Richard Bradshaw’s wonderful ambition  that he once expressed –sorry I don’t know where—to make the COC the best theatre in Toronto.  It’s compelling because it’s such a simple idea, and particularly marvellous coming from a conductor.

One reason so many of us are devoted to the COC is because we’ve watched the company aim for that target –being not just a good opera company but the best theatrical experience in the city—and sometimes succeed.

And so the footnote announced a few weeks ago, is just another in the series of contracts, promises that have been made and hopefully shall be kept.

In the wake of Richard Bradshaw’s untimely death in 2007, Alexander Neef became general director the next year.  August 15th is a little over a week from now, the fifth anniversary of Bradshaw’s passing.  I am amazed at how fast the time has flown.  I remember chatting briefly with him in the lobby a couple of times, memories I treasure.

COC general director Alexander Neef (Michael Cooper/Canadian Opera Company)

Neef? While Bradshaw died five years ago,  Neef was only able to show his true colours in the last few years, given that the COC stayed on Bradshaw’s creative trajectory for at least two years (for example, the COC’s splendid production of Prokofiev’s War & Peace in 2008 was still really a product of Bradshaw’s company, not Neef’s).  We’ve seen better casting, fascinating productions from famous directors, and yes, controversy.

I say bring it on.

The announcement I am speaking of is the extension of Neef’s contract through the 2020-21 season.  It’s far enough in the future that I can sleep a little better.

There are, broadly speaking, two separate pathways to appreciate opera, and since I am suggesting there are only two paths of course this will oversimplify even more outrageously than, say, Boito adapting Shakespeare.  But here goes.

One is based on individual virtuosity, and the awareness of those heroic individuals.   Opera to them is an assemblage of talent ascending to high notes, to say nothing of the many skills in several disciplines, so many shining moments.  On this side you might find the folks who brava, bravo and bravi, and I believe this is where fans come for specific arias, a favourite singer, and a tune they will even hum in the washroom.

The other road is more dramaturgical, bookish and scholarly, a series of stories set by great composers, adaptations, seasons to commemorate the Wagner & Verdi bicentennials, perhaps more a matter for those who woot for what they like.   Once upon a time I felt that if it wasn’t a bravo it was disrespectful, but I’ve come to believe that all enthusiasm is sacred.

So in other words I probably sound like a conservative twit no matter which side of the fence I might sit on.  But that’s just it.  Opera is a form constructed of two things:

• our devotion to stardom and our love of a story
• our favourite aria and the scene it appears in
• a series of moments, that may or may not cohere into a wonderful evening

I feel Neef is taking care of both groups, speaking as someone who is appropriately schizophrenic, unable to decide whether I prefer to say I love stars or star vehicles.  How about both?  Neef has been getting us better and better singers, showcased in a fascinating array of operas.

And I feel happy that Neef’s contract was extended, as the evidence of my own extended contract arrived in the mail, namely my tickets.  It’s not sacred like a marriage, but even so, this is another contract based on love.  I don’t see the romance cooling anytime soon.

The conversation about the arts is as much about the audience as it is about the art.  If you’re marketing the question can be one of identification (who’s coming to see/hear) as much as how to find, connect with and retain that audience.

While it’s been said before, this is a time of transition, a new world being born from the old.  We have new works co-existing with the old, and new ways of presenting & packaging those creations.

New platforms are coming into play for all of the arts, and opera isn’t being left behind, whether we’re speaking of opera in your movie theatre or your telephone.  While the music you hear from your tiny device may not offer the faithful audio reproduction that a high-end system can in your home, that’s not relevant when you’re jogging, cycling or driving.

Nikitin and his controversial tatt

And the communications can be very political.  The Metropolitan Opera saw a scandal erupt online earlier this year when their General Director Peter Gelb seemed to be censoring Opera News, the Metropolitan Opera Guild’s own publication.  I believe Gelb’s approach was short-sighted, in failing to see the value in the vibrant –if sometimes dissenting–discourse around his own company & their productions.  In similar fashion, The Bayreuth Festival –an opera house that has seen more than its share of controversy –was again in the spotlight for many of the wrong reasons, with the departure of Yevgeny Nikitin from their production of Der Fliegende Holländer over tattoos that may or may not have included a swastika.  Like the tattoo itself, the story was a jumbled mess, and a case study in how not to handle a situation.

Wayne Gooding, Editor of Opera Canada

Speaking of conversations, new media and controversy, I was happy to participate in The Big COC Podcast Episode 1 with Wayne Gooding of Opera Canada, John Gilks of operaramblings and hosted by the COC’s Gianmarco Segato.  Episode one includes  round table discussions about the controversy at Bayreuth, thoughts on marketing classical music in Toronto and the question of operetta in an opera house, especially considering the upcoming production of Die Fledermaus by the COC.

Soprano Tamara Wilson

Tamara Wilson is a soprano who’s going places, a major talent with the voice to be a star.

An alumna of the Houston Grand Opera Studio, Wilson’s awards include the George London Award from the George London Foundation, as well as both a career grant in 2011 and study grant in 2008 from the Richard Tucker Music Foundation.  Wilson had the honor of being Washington National Opera’s 2011 Singer of the Year.

We’ve been fortunate to hear Wilson at the Canadian Opera Company in Toronto, first as Amelia Grimaldi in Simon Boccanegra in 2009, and as Elettra in Idomeneo in 2010.  I reviewed Elettra this way in 2010:

Tamara Wilson, on the other hand, injected a campy levity into every moment she was on stage as Elettra.  Wilson easily stole the show, whether chewing the scenery in over-the-top displays of jealousy suitable for an old-fashioned diva, or channelling the 18^th century version of the Material Girl in her fantasies of a happy future complete with matching luggage.  But perhaps that’s inevitable when everyone else is serious, and poor rejected Elettra is so much fun, especially in her raging coloratura. 

In the meantime, Wilson has been busy (and I won’t even mention concert appearances).

Last season?

• Miss Jessel in Britten’s The Turn of the Screw at Los Angeles Opera
• Her German debut at Oper Frankfurt in concert performances of Wagner’s early opera ‘Die Feen’ as Ada, to be commercially released by Oehms Classics.

The 2011 – 2012 season?

• Aida at Teatro Municipal de Santiago in Chile
• Elisabeth de Valois in the five-act French version of  Don Carlos at Houston Grand Opera 
• debut at Théâtre du Capitole in Toulouse as Leonora in a new production of Il trovatore

And needless to say, I’ve been eagerly awaiting her return to Toronto in the new COC production of Die Fledermaus, which is now happily upon us. Fledermaus opens October 4^th at the Four Seasons Centre.

I ask Wilson 10 questions: five about her, and fivemore about her portrayal as Rosalinde in Die Fledermaus.  

1) Which of your parents do you resemble (what’s your nationality / ethnic background)?

Soprano Tamara Wilson

I am a pretty even mix of the two. I definitely have my father’s face and hair color. I have my mother’s ears and eyes. My eyes change from green to blue to grey.

We’ve been working on our family history so I can tell you that I am mostly French, Irish, Scottish (Wilson from my Dad), English, and German (Miller or Müller from my Mom). You know, the countries with all the super pale people. My nickname at home is Casper. Fun fact, I have played Miss Jessel in Turn of the Screw in two different productions. Both times they had to give me makeup darker than my actual skin, to play a GHOST. Sad.

In doing our family history we found that we are related to Martha Washington, George Washington’s wife. We are also related to Napoleon through marriage. There are some pretty powerful women in my bloodline. We’ve traced our family lines all the way back to Charlemagne.

2) What is the best thing / worst thing about being an opera singer?

The best thing I would have to say is the travel but it’s a double-edged sword. It can be both awesome and tiresome. Singers basically get paid vacations in cities all over the world. We get the chance to see all walks of life from many varied cultures, which fascinates me. The problem with that is we are away from home most of the time. I think from August of this year till next June I’m away for around 224 days. I have started feeling more at home living out of suitcases. If I’m anywhere longer than three months I start to get antsy. It can be lonely at times but on the bright side our opera community is so small that we work with the same people a lot of the time. They then become a sort of quasi-family. Let me tell you, Skype is the best technological advancement for stabilizing the sanity of the travelling opera singer.

Worst thing is that if we get sick we don’t get paid. It’s not like a day job where you get a paycheck every week or month. Opera singers aren’t afforded the luxury of sick days. If you’re sick on a performance night you forfeit that paycheck. If you only have five performances that’s 20% of your fee gone. Only in very rare cases will a singer receive their fee. This is why some singers are constantly wearing scarves, drinking tea and acting crazy. We have to work wisely and be smart enough with our budget that we can afford those times when one just can’t sing.

3) Who do you like to listen to or watch?

I will give you two categories for this. Classical and What I actually listen to everyday.

My first ever classical cd was Cecilia Bartoli’s Chants d’amour. That sort of hooked me on classical vocal music. I love how unique and expressive her voice is. My other favorite singers are Montserrat Caballé, Anita Cerquetti, Anna Tomowa-Sintow, Anna Di Stasio, Serena Farnocchia, Alexandrina Pendatchanska, and the lovely Joyce DiDonato. All of these ladies have a technique that is amazing and musicality beyond compare.

My ipod is awash in various artists and genres. I love bluegrass, indie, 80’s pop, jazz, acid rock, heavy metal, R&B, rap, orchestral. My all time favorite band is the Foo Fighters and anything that Dave Grohl is involved in like, Them Crooked Vultures. This band has Josh Homme from Queens of the Stone Age, Dave Grohl and John Paul Jones from Led Zeppelin. This is essentially a recipe for awesomeness. Their live show from Roskilde 2010 is simply amazing. I highly recommend it.  Here’s the youtube link.

Other favorites include Grizzly Bear, Muse, Band of Skulls, The Staves, St. Vincent, and Local Natives. There’s so much good popular music out there right now you just have to sift through the stuff they play on the radio.

There is one thing you’ll never see on my ipod and that’s reggae. I can’t stand it. I think it’s because it all sounds the same to me.

4) What ability or skill do you wish you had, that you don’t have?

I wish I had the ability to download languages into my head. The day they invent that computer chip I will be the first one in line. I have a basic understanding of French, German and Italian but it would be nice to be fluent in all languages.

Oh and not being a klutz. I FALL DOWN. A. LOT.

5) When you’re just relaxing and not working what is your favourite thing to do?

I like to paint in my spare time. I have always loved drawing and painting. It’s another artistic outlet that I don’t have to be judged on. I can just do it for fun.

I do like home improvement as well. I like building things and working with my hands. I helped my folks remodel their basement. Put up wall studs and dry wall, put stone up in the wine cellar. It’s nice to feel like you’re doing something productive.

I love to read as well. I finally broke down and got a kindle (mostly because it was a gift). I love the feel and smell of books but it’s hard to pack light with them. I just finished reading, How the Universe Got It’s Spots: Diary of a Finite Time in a Finite Space, by Janna Levin. I love anything having to deal with science. If I weren’t a singer I would totally go back to school to be a science teacher.

Five more about appearing in the COC production of Die Fledermaus:

1) How does singing the role of Rosalinde challenge you?

This will be my fourth role in German. I have over a dozen in Italian. So doing this operetta with all of the dialogue is a bit of a challenge. However I love the fact that you get to act more in these types of scenes. I really miss doing plays. I used to think memorizing lines in English was hard but learning them in German is a whole other level.

On the vocal side of things I think she’s a really great fit. She has everything, a little coloratura, high notes galore and long legato phrases.

2) What do you love about Rosalinde: both the role & your part in the intrigues of the production?

I LOVE the fact that I get to be funny for a change. Most of the Verdi roles I sing don’t have even a glimpse of levity to them. It’s nice to not be suffering for once.

Director of the COC Die Fledermaus, Christopher Alden

I really enjoy the acting aspect of Opera. This production is very thoughtfully constructed. Our director, Christopher Alden, did not want to do a rehashing of what everyone else has done with this piece. It is a bit of a different type of comedy. Ambur Braid, one of our Adeles and I think it’s more like a Wes Anderson film. A dryer comedy than the usual screwball versions associated with this piece. I always like to try things that are different from the norm. It makes things far more interesting.

3) Do you have a favourite moment in Die Fledermaus?

Musically speaking, I love the slow Duidu waltz in the party scene. I think it’s some of the most gorgeous music. This score in general is built on great tune after great tune. It’s easily one of those shows you go home from humming.

We’ve just started our staging this week and the Rosalinde/Alfred scene in Act I might be my favorite so far. Alfred comes in wearing a Caruso-esque Shakespearean costume and promptly does a strip tease. Not gonna lie, it’s pretty amazing.

4) How do you relate to Rosalinde as a modern woman?

In most of the productions I’ve seen Rosalinde is not a very likable character right away. She’s mean to her maid. She’s either taking pills or drinking to fill the void her husband creates in their relationship. Then she has a gentleman caller who she doesn’t really do anything with but probably wants to. At the end of the opera it’s a little hard to swallow that her husband treated her unfairly. Both of them flirt with others. They are both guilty.

This production is trying to show that Rosalinde and Eisenstein do love each other, but the passion has run out. Now they’re just trying to get it back. A situation like this is universal. Every marriage/relationship has this period where things aren’t as easy and fun as they used to be. It gets to the point where you actually have to work on the relationship to make it successful. Rosalinde feels neglected while Eisenstein feels smothered and wants to be on the prowl again. I think that today there are many women that deal with this all the time.

Back in Rosalinde’s time it was sort of expected that a man would be able to have a little on the side. A woman’s place would be in the home, period. Nowadays women can be man’s sexual equals. Everyone is free to cheat equally. Women have sexual desires so why should men have all the fun?

Maybe I would regulate a teensy bit more self control than Rosalinde does. Plus I don’t think disguising myself at a party to trick my husband would be such a great relationship builder.

5) Is there a teacher or an influential recording you’d care to name whose work you especially admire?

Barbara Honn

I have known my voice teacher, Barbara Honn, since I was 17 years old. I am now 30 and I still go to see her (when I’m actually in the country). She was the one who taught me not only how to sing but how to teach, be a better human being, and learn how deal with our business. She has been a true mentor. Plus she makes sure you don’t get away with anything. I sang Don Carlos in Houston last year. After the performance she said, “I have a few exercises that will help you not sing that in your neck. It was ok but it could be better.” That, my friends is the mark of a true teacher.

~~~~~~~~

One of Constance Hoffman’s costume designs for the COC production of Die Fledermaus

The Canadian Opera Company production of Die Fledermaus, starring Tamara Wilson runs October 4^th – November 3^rd at the Four Seasons Centre.  Find out more here.

No matter how well they may sing, Johann Strauss Jr’s operetta Die Fledermaus requires its singers to act.  Although the music may be irresistible, I haven’t fully surrendered to any of the Fledermice I’ve seen.  No wonder it was usually done in English in the past (if memory serves: as it was a long time ago), as the skills were probably beyond the casts assembled here.

It’s therefore a great pleasure to be able to proclaim the excellence of the Canadian Opera Company production that opened tonight at the Four Seasons Centre.  It’s deep and it’s funny, it feels a bit decadent, and has undertones of madness & violence: just like our century.  Director Christopher Alden rips off the surface of this comedy of class disparity, exposing the disturbing psychological underpinnings of that wild & wacky period between the rise of Freud on the one hand, and the onset of fascist madness on the other.   While these images have been seen before, Alden, working with set designer Allen Moyer and Costume Designer Constance Hoffman, give us just enough gravitas to make these deeply satisfying laughs.  This is the best production from the COC in awhile, and possibly the best thing I’ve ever seen on the Four Seasons Centre stage.

Moyer dangles the key image above the stage, namely a pocket watch.  The watch signifies time of course, where the chronological framework of the story sets up a dreamlike assumption of new identities.  We’ve seen this sort of thing in stories such as Cinderella, where the dream represents a kind of wish-fulfilment, ended again by the arbitrary passage of time.

The watch signifies at least two other things.  Eisenstein carries a pocket watch, which plays an important part in the intrigue.  But for me the most powerful –and additional –meaning Moyer and Alden find in the watch is the association to psychiatry.

Are there bats in heaven? there ought to be. Michael Schade as Gabriel von Eisenstein and Laura Tucker as Prince Orlofsky (Photo: Michael Cooper)

Alden says in his program note (although it’s beautifully clear in the staging) that “Dr Falke seems a lot like Dr Freud as he invites Rosalinde, Eisenstein, Adele and Frank to the dreamy libidinous party”.  Falke wields his watch at key moments even though his control is as unnecessary as the superficial plot mechanisms Wagner uses of a love potion (Tristan und Isolde) or a curse (the Ring cycle).  We are watching a story about dreams & wish-fulfillment, where the good doctor helps each of these people explore their hopes & expectations.  No wonder, then, that Alden employs more bats than the Toronto Blue Jays, exploiting the overtones of something nightmarish and scary to probe deeply into this pleasure-seeking milieu.

But don’t get the wrong idea.  I would say it’s Constance Hoffman’s costumes as much as Moyer’s sets that set up this story, pulling it all into a wonderful parable about repression and truth.    Aided by the most impressive performance from the COC chorus since War & Peace, we visit a laboratory of dreams, where all our modern ills are grown for study or perhaps amusement.  I hope I haven’t given too much away, because the show is full of surprises, a few of which I stumbled upon via social media.

There are several wonderful portrayals with two upon which the entire evening rests.

Ambur Braid as Adele as “Olga”, directed by Christopher Alden, set designed by Allen Moyer, costume designed by Constance Hoffman (Photo: Chris Hutcheson)

In the first scene Tamara Wilson & Ambur Braid are instantly real, their German dialogue compelling as we’re instantly plunged into their dramas.  Although the stage will fill with personnel and imagery, we never really lose our interest in them.  While there will be diversions throughout, it’s their show through and through.

I wasn’t at all surprised by the excellence Tamara Wilson brought to Rosalinde, a young woman with a wonderful voice that can be powerful or delicate, and with a genuine flair for comedy.  But Wilson was matched by her maid Adele as portrayed by Ambur Braid.  I’d been expecting to enjoy this portrayal, but was not prepared for how fully she inhabited the maid- who- becomes –Olga.  While I’d seen the photos in the publicity, I was unprepared for the power (and comedy) of her transformation from the ugly duckling of Act I into the seductive Olga in Act II   Her rendition of the laughing song had a delightfully angry edge to it.

Jan Pohl as Frosch and James Westman as Frank (photo Michael Cooper)

But the excellence doesn’t end there.  Michael Schade brought his usual fluid German and effortless singing to Eisenstein.  James Westman was a suitably embarrassed Frank, Peter Barrett, a constant presence (especially when he was hanging above the stage) as Dr Falke, and Jan Pohl, able to steal the show whenever he wanted to as Frosch the jailer; he was a troubling spectre of what was to come, giving the part a decidedly brown-shirted aura.

Laura Tucker’s Prince Orlofsky was among the most successful among several examples of performed travesty, on a stage full of ambiguities.  Sets blended one room with the next, costumes were flipped off or pulled on at will, aiding Alden in creating the sense of subjectivity & dreams.

Conductor Johannes Debus & the COC Orchestra are their usual excellent selves, ably supporting a reading that never let the serious moments onstage hijack this joyful score.  We never forget for a moment that this work is all about fun & enjoyment.

I am expecting Die Fledermaus to be a huge hit, and look forward to seeing it again with  Mireille Asselin who assumes the role of Adele for half the remaining performances.

Further information

Tamara Wilson as Rosalinde, Michael Schade as Eisenstein and Ambur Braid (kneeling) as Adele (Photo: Chris Hutcheson)

Ambur Braid may have a catchy name, but the reason you remember it is because of what she does with her opportunities.

The voice gets mentioned almost in passing (a secure dramatic coloratura that allows her to undertake challenging roles such as Semele and the Queen of the Night), because of the extras Braid brings to everything she does, an actor of remarkable depth. I think I missed it at first (the acting) because I was so carried away with her visual impact whenever i saw her onstage.

Soprano Ambur Braid (clicking the photo takes you to her bio at the time of her first year at the COC)

My first review–with the Canadian Opera Company–almost sounds resentful, because I literally couldn’t take my eyes off of her.

If success can be understood as the greatest applause for the briefest appearance, then Ambur Braid was champ as the Queen of the Night, earning huge applause for both of her arias. She brought a seductive presence to the stage with every entrance, always the focus whenever she appeared.

Later that season, the COC presented Robert Carsen’s production of Orfeo ed Euridice in May 2011, a reading that was much deeper than what I might have expected.  I was somewhat perplexed by what I saw, and again, Braid was at its centre. With hindsight I realize now that underlying this was the subtlety of Braid’s portrayal of a character with two different genders, as first the male then female version of Love.

I am still trying to decode an interesting approach to Amore from Carsen/Hoheisel. Love is both God and Goddess, changeable and all-powerful in this world. Ambur Braid’s portrayal of Love first appears in an apparently male aspect in the first act, reappearing in a female guise in the last act. I am not sure I understand the rationale; perhaps Love has no gender, or is a shape-shifter able to do anything?

This past autumn I saw her most impressive recent performance, as Adele in Die Fledermaus.

Ambur Braid as Adele, directed by Christopher Alden, set designed by Allen Moyer, costume designed by Constance Hoffman (Photo: Chris Hutcheson)

In the first scene Tamara Wilson & Ambur Braid are instantly real, their German dialogue compelling as we’re instantly plunged into their dramas. Although the stage will fill with personnel and imagery, we never really lose our interest in them. While there will be diversions throughout, it’s their show through and through.
I wasn’t at all surprised by the excellence Tamara Wilson brought to Rosalinde, a young woman with a wonderful voice that can be powerful or delicate, and with a genuine flair for comedy. But Wilson was matched by her maid Adele as portrayed by Ambur Braid. I’d been expecting to enjoy this portrayal, but was not prepared for how fully she inhabited the maid- who- becomes –Olga. While I’d seen the photos in the publicity, I was unprepared for the power (and comedy) of her transformation from the ugly duckling of Act I into the seductive Olga in Act II Her rendition of the laughing song had a delightfully angry edge to it.

Graduate of the Glenn Gould School of the Royal Conservatory of Music and San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Braid is in her last season with the COC ensemble. I am sorry I missed her epic Vitellia in Clemenza di Tito just a few weeks ago, a production hit by flu indispositions (although the virus didn’t stop her). Next season Braid sings Konstanze in Die entfuhrung aus dem Serail for Opera Atelier.

Rehearsals have just begun for Opera Atelier’s Magic Flute, with Braid singing the Queen of the Night. I ask her Ten questions: five about herself and five about her role in the Mozart opera.

1) Are you more like your father or your mother?

Both of my parents have a brilliant work ethic and I am so thankful to have had such great role models to learn from. They loved travelling, and would take my brothers and me on fantastic trips!

I would say that I am a bit more like my father in that he’s very goal oriented, and driven to be successful in the business ventures he undertakes. I may also get my love of food and wine from him.

My mother is a social worker and thanks to her, I met and hung out with people with mental and physical disabilities as a child and teenager, and I am so grateful to have had those experiences. It is pretty amazing to have a job where you make peoples lives better!

2) What is the best thing or worst thing about being a singer?

The amazing part about being a singer is that the work is never done. (That phrase is beginning to be a bit of a mantra for me.) Things are never going to be “perfect”, despite all one’s attempts in practice.

You get to work with people who push you emotionally, mentally, and physically.

You will never know a score well enough.
Your voice will never be flawless on a show day.
You don’t know where the next contract is going to come from.
You don’t know where you are going to live next.

I love all of those things because I love a challenge!

It is pretty annoying to not know when you’re going to see your family
next, though.

3) Who do you like to listen to or watch?

I adore watching Wes Anderson movies and Formula 1 auto races. Most of the people I spend my days with remind me of Wes Anderson characters; dry, sarcastic, quirky, sensitive, dark, and overly-educated. There are many movie nights in my apartment watching films by Quentin Tarantino, Paul Thomas Anderson, Francis Ford Coppola and David Fincher. A couple of years ago I went through a Hitchcock and Fellini phase, and ended up dressing like the women in those films. I should do that again!

If I’m learning a role, I like to watch every film related to the character as I can, and potentially use other movie characters as my touchstone. For Adele, I channeled Mrs. Danvers in Rebecca, Margot Tanenbaum in The Royal Tanenbaums,…

…Lulu in Pandoras Box, and switched up accents impersonating Sarah Bernhardt. For Vitellia, I thought of Lolita and Justine in Melancholia. These days I’m watching (and reading) everything on the Tudors and Elisabeth I of England. This part of my job is really fun for me!

4) What ability or skill do you wish you had, that you don’t have?

Being a mermaid would be pretty great.

5) When you’re just relaxing and not working what is your favourite
thing to do?

I am a neat freak, so I tend to clean and organize my apartment to relax and decompress. The excitement that I get from cleaning products is probably not sane, but it is so satisfying!

Being on the water is ideal. If there is a beach, a boat, sunshine, bubbly and loved ones involved – I’m blissfully happy!

~~~~~~~

Soprano Ambur Braid (photo: Helene Cyr)

Five more about portraying the Queen of the Night in Opera Atelier’s
production of The Magic Flute.

1) How does portraying the role of the Queen of the Night for Opera
Atelier challenge you? 

Singing anything at Opera Atelier is interesting because Marshall has such a clear, focused vision of the production, and the choreography is quite stylized. Today in rehearsal, Marshall was holding my hips and making sure that my balance was directed on the proper foot at the right time. Do you know how hard it is to control my 6 foot wing-span in a controlled, danceresque and beautifully stylized (but angry!) manner while singing the most famous coloratura of all time?

Yeah, that’s what challenges me.

The amazing part of this choreographed business is that I can FINALLY be aware of my long limbs! Relaxing into it all is the tough part.

This production is also in English, which is brilliant for the audience but makes me feel silly sometimes. Things seem so much more profound and beautifully ambiguous in foreign languages…

Technically speaking, singing the Queen of the Night is like Tennis; there is a HUGE mental component. It is quite the mind game singing two arias where all anyone cares about are the high F’s. The second aria is so well known, and sung by so many coloratura sopranos, that people expect it to be a certain way, and always have something to say about what the singer did or did not do. My challenge is to stay focused, just relax, and have fun with it. I have things that most other coloraturas don’t have (you’ll have to see and hear it to find out what) but that throws some people off because they don’t understand what’s happening and I’m not a “robot”. The vocal range of the role doesn’t concern me, but I do not like singing staccati notes.

Character-wise, she’s a delightful character to portray. She’s me before my espresso in the morning: “Stay back!”

Ambur Braid getting fitted backstage (photo: Ambur Braid)

2) What do you love about The Queen of the Night?

It is always more fun to play the villain, and it seems to come pretty naturally to me. Sigh. My stature helps as it seems to give people the idea that I’m confident (even when I’m not) and this works onstage as well. I don’t believe that the Queen is evil, (obviously she does not), but I do think that she loves herself a bit too much. Yes, her disregard for anyone but herself borders on sociopathic, and she seduces young men, but that’s why she’s fun!

She is just a seductive lady with a bit of a temper trying to get ahead.

3) Do you have a favourite moment in the opera?

My favorite part of any opera is the overture. You have no idea how amped I get backstage and it is just the most fun! This is often the time where I am dancing in the dressing room, or in the wings with some other members of the cast.

Oh the memories…
Musically, The Magic Flute can blow your mind. I love all of Sarastro’s music, including the hymn his guards sing.

4) How do you relate to the Queen of the Night as a modern woman?

The Queen of the Night is so modern it hurts. She might enter on a flying mechanic cloud, but she has pain, anger, career goals and a weakness for tenors. She uses her feminine charm and seductive manner (high notes) to get people to do her bidding and when things don’t go her way, she has a bit of a tantrum. A very, very famous tantrum. 

5) Is there a teacher, singer, actor or an influence that you especially admire?

It is part of my job to be influenced by as many things as possible, and that is one of the things I love about this business. The work is never done. Anybody in the theatre business should experience as many things, in all forms, as possible in order to create something interesting onstage. I’ve lived a VERY full life in my (almost) thirty years, and am so thankful to draw on those experiences and all of the incredible people that I have met. It is incredibly therapeutic, and I know that some people get a kick out of seeing bits of themselves in the characters that I create.

My teachers, bosses, coaches, family and friends all know how brilliant I think they are and how important they are to me. I am nothing without them.

~~~~~~~

Ambur Braid will be onstage with Opera Atelier in Mozart’s The Magic Flute at the Elgin Theatre April 6- 13th.

Performance Dates:

The Elgin Theatre, 189 Yonge Street
Saturday, April 6, 2013, 7:30 PM
Sunday, April 7, 2013, 3:00 PM
Tuesday, April 9, 2013, 7:30 PM
Wednesday, April 10, 2013, 7:30 PM
Friday, April 12, 2013, 7:30 PM
Saturday, April 13, 2013, 7:30 PM

The fast-rising young tenor Stephen Costello has firmly established himself as one of the current generation’s most impressive artists.  He came to national attention in 2007 when, at age 26, he debuted at the Met’s season-opening night and was quickly invited to appear again that same season. In 2009, Costello won the prestigious Richard Tucker Award. He subsequently made his debuts at a number of the world’s most important opera houses and music festivals, including London’s Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, the Deutsche Oper Berlin, the Salzburg Festival, and the Vienna State Opera. In 2010 he inaugurated the role of Greenhorn in the Dallas Opera’s acclaimed world-premiere production of Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer’s Moby Dick.

His performances as Cassio in Verdi’s Otello, conducted by Riccardo Muti at the Salzburg Festival, were released on DVD in 2010 (Major/Naxos), and his Covent Garden debut in Linda di Chamounix was released on CD in March 2011 (Opera Rara).

Next week Stephen Costello will headline Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor at the Canadian Opera Company as Edgardo opposite soprano Anna Christy in a revival of David Alden’s ground-breaking English National Opera production.

It was in Lucia that the tenor made his house debut at New York’s Metropolitan Opera back in 2007, when his portrayal of Arturo so impressed Met Music Director James Levine that the young tenor found himself undertaking the opera’s male lead that same season. As Parterre.com reports, thanks to his “youth, sweet timbre, precocious poise, and emotional involvement” as Edgardo, it was Costello who “got the biggest ovation at the end” of the night.

Now the Richard Tucker Award-winner looks forward to reprising the role for all nine of the Canadian Opera Company’s upcoming performances between April 17 and May 24.

I ask Stephen Costello ten questions: five about himself and five more about his portrayal of Edgardo in Lucia di Lammermoor.

1) Are you more like your father or your mother?

Tenor Stephen Costello (photo: Dario Acosta)

I am not really sure. I am sort of a mix of both I think. I can’t complain I had great parents growing up.

Sure like all families we have had fights and I am sure I have said terrible things at one point, but I love them both very much. They have taught me to be polite and respectful, and never forget who you are and where you have come from. That also keeps me grounded as a person.

2) What is the best thing or worst thing about being a singer?

There are so many great things about being a singer. You get to travel all over the world, work with amazing artists and musicians. You also get to bring music and joy to audiences and people who really need to be entertained and forget about life for a while. These are the things that keep us in the business.

The worst part about being a singer is not seeing family and friends. I spend weeks away from my wife at a time and it is terrible. I have also missed watching my nephew Sean and Godson Patrick grow up. I have missed birthdays and Christmases. In this business you have to be willing to make sacrifices. That is the worst part of being a singer. A lot of people will say rejection, I think that makes you stronger. It is not seeing the ones we love, that’s what gets me.

3) Who do you like to listen to or watch?

I listen to everything and everyone. The more you listen to, the more ideas are in your head. I can watch YouTube for hours. I feel it is important to watch the stars of the past and the stars of today and see what makes them famous or special. I think we learn more as a singer watching others. I have been on a Bruno Mars kick for a while. I think he is so talented. I also love watching movies. Anything with Jimmy Stewart, Tom Hanks, or Johnny Depp, I am There. Would love to meet these guys and pick their brains.

[Is it my imagination or does Stephen Costello resemble the young Tom Hanks? see for yourself]

4) What ability or skill do you wish you had, that you don’t have?

I wish I had the ability to make a decision. I can make decisions on work, but nothing else. It is awful. I will end up trying to decide on lunch or dinner, and then it is too late. I also wish I could fly, but then again who doesn’t.

5) When you’re just relaxing and not working what is your favourite thing to do?

Hangout with friends and go to the movies. If I am not doing that I am getting in touch with family members and planning trips to see them all. I think family is the most important thing in a person’s life.

*******

Tenor Stephen Costello (photo: Dario Acosta)

Five more concerning Edgardo in Lucia di Lammermoor

1) How does portraying Edgardo challenge you?

Edgardo is a role that I had to grow into. The first time I had sung Edgardo was on stage at the Met and I think I was 25 or 26. I was so young and just hoping not to pass out from nerves. However, I had one of the greatest conductors of all-time leading the way in the pit, Maestro James Levine. Knowing that he believed in me and my ability gave me confidence and security as the night went on. Today having worked with him is something I will always remember and treasure.

Since then I have had a chance to get to know the role better. That happens with every role the more you sing it. It is a role that is not long, but very demanding. I have also had tonsil surgery so I have also had to re-vocalize the role as well.

I feel more comfortable with Edgardo and enjoy singing it very much. It is mostly realizing to not get excited and dramatic too soon. It is easy to get carried away in the wedding scene or the Wolf’s Crag scene, but you have to remember there is a very taxing tomb scene still to come. Pacing is the key to singing Edgardo.

2) What do you love about preparing Edgardo for the Canadian Opera Company production of Lucia.

I love working with this cast. It is a great group of people and never a dull moment. Plus the COC has been such an inviting company. I only wish that the weather was nicer!!!!!!
[The forecast for tomorrow is for a mix of rain & snow, with a wind-chill in the 20s Fahrenheit.  Hopefully it will be warmer by opening night next week]
I also enjoy working with a good friend and mentor Stephen Lord. He has helped me so much in this process. I look forward to working with him more and more.

3) Do you have a favourite moment in the opera?

I love the Wolf’s Crag scene in this production. I get to feel like a stunt man. They throw me around and pour water on my head, it is a lot of fun. Plus it is such a good duet.

4) How do you relate to Edgardo and the story of Lucia di Lammermoor as a modern man?

It is hard for me to relate to Edgardo. I was married into a family that has welcomed me with open arms. I think I relate to his passion for Lucia and his beliefs, but thankfully I have never had to feel his pain.

5) Is there a teacher, singer, actor or an influence that you especially admire?

I admire my teacher Bill Schuman very much. He has been by my side from the beginning and has believed in me from day one. He has also given me the tool to be in a career and now support my family. I will always be thankful and grateful to him. He is part of our family. I look forward to many more years together.

*******

Stephen Costello opens in Lucia di Lammermoor with the Canadian Opera Company on April 16^th at the Four Seasons Centre.  Further info 

Tonight the Canadian Opera Company opened their new production of Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor, the dark tale of a bride forced to marry against her will who goes mad on her wedding night, killing her new husband.  This is not your usual Lucia.

In the past I’d come with low expectations, preoccupied by the singing as if I were watching American Idol, measuring individuals for their high notes rather than the dramatic credibility.  But this time, with director David Alden’s English National Opera Production, conducted by Stephen Lord, and starring Anna Christy & Stephen Costello, my expectations were much higher.

For Act I, the production mostly persuaded me, even if there were troubling elements.  Alden has moved the action to a more recent time (instead of the 17^th century, we’re in the 19^th century).  While i resisted the production for awhile, let’s cut to the chase, and conclude that I was blown away on the whole.  The last act especially knocked my socks off, giving me much more than just virtuosity, but a deep and probing exploration of the story & its implications.

Christy & Costello both deliver.  With Anna Christy, you get a Lucia who looks very young.  She could have been Juliet Capulet.  Her voice was good, but what you remember is the portrayal, which is understated.  An article in the Toronto Star said that Alden had used the film Carrie as a model, which come to think of it makes sense, given that in a real sense, Lucia is the prototype for the horror film.  The glory of that mad-scene (both in the film and the opera) is that a person who has been wronged breaks free of constraints, and becomes like an avenging angel, righting the huge wrongs that we’ve seen in the previous scenes.

Christy didn’t really surprise me, given what I’d read, and given that the material is so well written/composed as to be sure-fire, working even when the soprano looks 55 rather than 15.  But I’ve never –until now—seen an Edgardo that I really liked.  He’s a troubling character, sailing off into the sunset early on, and then suddenly appearing self-righteously five minutes too late, romantic in the ineffectual way that’s classic Walter Scott.  While it’s really a team effort –that is both soprano and tenor have to paint a convincing portrait of a couple who can love one another, and of people who deserve love—I feel Costello deserves special credit, making such a likable and charismatic Edgardo.   I had been warned privately (an email from someone who saw him in NYC in 2007) that while he sings like a god, his acting is mediocre; that was then, and this is now.  Not only is the voice spectacular, but Costello has become quite a good actor.

Thank goodness I have tickets already to see/hear them again!

Yet the man with the hardest job is the nub of my objections to the production, playing an impossible role.  Forgive me if I sound conservative, but I can’t help knowing the opera, can’t help hearing what the singers are singing.  When a director does as Alden did, changing the story slightly, it’s usually in order to create some important effect with the key protagonists: Lucia and Edgardo.  In my experience director’s theatre works in the big moments of the opera, but will have at least a few places where it falls down because either it wasn’t fully thought out or worse, where they got lazy.  And the usual nexus for this problem is the baritone role.  It happened in a Traviata I saw, where “di Provenza” is sung in the strangest locale, but can’t be cut because it’s a pivot in the plot.

Similarly, tonight I watched the grim brilliance of Brian Mulligan as Enrico.  He is the power in this opera even as he struggles to arrange a marriage for his sister to save the family fortune.  Enrico blocks the happy ending that should be possible in this story, forcing Lucia to marry the wrong man, forging letters to discredit Edgardo in Lucia’s eyes.  In another century he might be the one that gets boos and hisses from the audience.   But does he also have to be a pervert who ties up his sister, who jabs his arm under his sister’s dress just as she squeals a high note as if in response?  We see him rolling around with Lucia’s doll in her bed, reminding me of Hedley Lamarr as played by Harvey Korman in Blazing Saddles (minus the cry of “where’s my froggy”).  If you think i am exaggerating see the opera and then tell me that’s not what Enrico resembles [a morning-after addition to explain the similarity; both Hedley and Enrico are infantile and tyannical, capriciously switching back and forth].   And I reiterate, Mulligan was wonderful, managing to not merely do as he was asked, but to be genuinely unavoidable, the centre of everything, regardless of how blatantly absurd the creation that was foisted upon him by the director.  This was grace under pressure.  In Act II I was laughing out loud as he played with Lucia’s toys in her bedroom.

Anna Christy and Brian Mulligan (Photo: Chris Hutcheson)

It seemed to me that the opera was being re-framed as a kind of dark comedy, and by the way there were lots of people laughing throughout this scene, so it wasn’t just me (even if i was the big-mouth who started the laughter).

And then in the next act, I stopped resisting Alden, and then it clicked into place.  Nathaniel Peake struts in as Arturo, accompanied by quiet thugs who reminded me of those quiet thugs in Yellow Submarine (except the colour scheme is different; but otherwise they move exactly like the tall “bonkers”: those scary cartoon dudes, except nobody drops any apples on anyone’s head). 

When Arturo hands his hat to Enrico as if he were simply a valet? Poof! we get a very new kind of tension that makes wonderful sense.  The family dynamics suddenly cohere perfectly, even if I wondered whether we really needed all the madcap antics from Mulligan.  So I forgive Alden for that, even as I quietly mutter under my breath that it’s a gratuitous attack on the most macho creature onstage.  From the wedding scene onward, everything worked magnificently.

Alden does create some wonderful conceits that take us into a symbolic realm suitable for such a story of myth & consciousness.  For me the best of these is the use of a stage within the stage, but I am a complete sucker for self-reflexive devices.  When Edgardo arrives he comes as if out of a story-book, arriving from that stage, and exiting too into that stage.  It will be the site for Lucia’s mad-scene, undermining all the performativity of the coloratura showpiece we’re watching.  And later, when we meet up with Edgardo, how wonderful that it’s as though we’re backstage, where the poor hero has gone to meet his not-so-heroic end.

Stephen Lord was quite magnificent to watch, deliciously flexible with the COC orchestra in following the singers no matter where they wanted to go, one of the most impressive displays of musicianship I have ever seen. And the orchestra were in splendid form, especially the horns.

So this is a Lucia that’s much more than just a virtuoso vehicle, with fabulous singing and where there’s madness running through the whole family.  All in all, I’d say it’s way better than I dared expect.  You should see it.

Stephen Costello (Photo: Chris Hutcheson)

It was August 15, 2007.  I recall hearing the news that Richard Bradshaw had died.

The Canadian Opera Company now have a resident conductor & a general director. Johannes Debus conducts the COC Orchestra & Alexander Neef is the canny executive managing the company’s operations.  Those two men now do what Bradshaw expected to do alone (admittedly with all sorts of discreet help in the background).  Bradshaw conducted at least a few operas each season.  And he somehow organized the activities of the company.

Richard Bradshaw, general director of the Canadian Opera Company, built an international reputation for the COC. (Michael Cooper/COC)

I was not surprised when I heard that he’d had a heart attack.  I’d wondered about his health.  Bradshaw was a hard worker, apparently tireless, but hearing that he’d died of a heart attack was sad news indeed.

I’d met him precisely once.  I’d walked up to him in the lobby of the O’Keefe Centre (or whatever it was called: as it’s had several names), noticing that he was not as usual surrounded by admirers.  I congratulated him for his Pelléas et Mélisande, meaning his conducting.  I told him that I found it wonderfully bold and  (I suspected) authentic in its crisp tempi.  He was very polite, giving me enough time to express myself.

But I noticed that even in the lobby for an opera conducted by someone else, he was working.  I felt badly, that even in a friendly  I  chat I was making him work.

I recall his unpretentious comments at one of the “Opera Exchange” conferences, when he declared his conducting philosophy, his unwillingness to let the music drag, especially in Wagner.  While the majority (if not all) of the available recordings of Wagner operas are slower than Bradshaw’s tempi, from what I’ve read I’ve come to believe his brisk tempi were authentic.

I recall reading that Bradshaw sought to stage the best theatre in Toronto with the COC.  I’ve always been impressed by this brave and ambitious goal.  And many times they pulled it off in a very competitive theatre city.

R. Fraser Elliott Hall in the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts. Photo Credit: Tim Griffith © 2006

The great achievement of his era is surely the Four Seasons Centre, a wonderful home for the COC, christened by the first COC Ring Cycle.  I’ve heard the home field of the Seattle Seahawks called the 12^th man, as though the supportive crowd were players; the Four Seasons Centre is something like that in opera, changing the nature of the game.  Singers are cast in parts for which they’d be over-parted in a bigger house: and they manage to pull it off.  The orchestra sounds wonderful, yet singers come through clearly. The space feels intimate, without a bad seat anywhere. What more could an opera fan want?

As I said, it’s the achievement of his era, a team-effort, not his creation, yet it feels so unfair that he only enjoyed one brief season in that amazing space. The COC is a very different company in the six years since. I’m sorry Bradshaw didn’t get to see the COC’s growing profile in the city & indeed on the continent.

He would have been proud.

I thought about what to call this, the first free concert of the season from the Canadian Opera Company at the Richard Bradshaw Auditorium:

• Alpha & Omega? (no… too Biblical)
• Ave Atque Vale? (no…obscure)
• Alumni Reunion? (hm….partly)

Lotfi Mansouri (1929 – 2013), former COC General Director. Click for further information from COC’s website

The first program of the season is normally a beginning, introducing new members of the COC’s Ensemble Studio.  But it also felt like an ending, what with the passing less than a month ago of Lotfi Mansouri.  The concert, dedicated to Mansouri’s memory, was presented with a great sense of the occasion, in the presence of many of the originals from 30 years ago.

This concert was therefore more than just the introduction of the new cohort:
•    Pianist Michael Shannon
•    Soprano Aviva Fortunata
•    Mezzo-soprano Danielle MacMillan
•    Baritone Clarence Frazer
•    Bass-baritone Gordon Bintner
•    Tenor Andrew Haji
•    Mezzo-soprano Charlotte Burrage

General Director Alexander Neef & former Ensemble member Janet Stubbs both bore witness to Mansouri’s place in the history of the COC, and his generous mentoring.  The retrospective serves to remind us how far the COC have come in such a short period.

The performances were all good, although (recalling our conversation in class last night about opera singing as exhibitionism) some performers boldly embraced the occasion, taking the stage in the tiny space more confidently than the others.  I was especially impressed by Claire de Sévigné (a returning ensemble member) & Bintner, and delighted with the playing of Shannon throughout, especially in his accompaniment to the two Richard Strauss pieces on the program.

As an encore, former Ensemble member Simone Osborne (back in town for the new Boheme that opens next week) sang a heartfelt “When I have sung my songs” as a fitting conclusion to the event, accompanied by Ensemble Music Director Liz Upchurch.

However retrospective it felt, it’s a very promising beginning to the new season.

Click logo for more info on the current COC Ensemble

Dimitri Pittas

Who is Rodolfo? He is a young poet in love.  And he is the hero of Puccini’s La Bohème, opening in a new Canadian Opera Company production on October 3^rd at the Four Seasons Centre.

In this production, three different singers undertake the poetic lover: Dimitri Pittas, Michael Fabiano and Eric Margiore.  Each of them gets to woo Mimi. This is an old-fashioned romance.  Mimi and Rodolfo are brought together by chance, not by choice.  They will argue and fight, yet their love is true.

How is it for the singers coming together onstage?  Yes, it’s theatre, not real love.

Eric Margiore

Or is it?  When three different Rodolfos each romance and win Mimi, can we think of a kind of competition, at least for the hearts of the audience, if not for the love of Mimi herself?

I couldn’t help thinking of something much newer than the fin de siècle in Paris.  What if this were the dating game?  Instead of calling them “Bachelor #1”, “Bachelor #2 and “Bachelor #3” let’s imagine Mimi, asking questions of each of her possible Rodolfos, asking them to win her over.

No we won’t actually have her pick one and reject the other two: because in fact, all three will play Rodolfo.  But let’s imagine Mimi asking her suitors questions, and see what they will say.

MIMI:

Michael Fabiano

“Rodolfo, I am knocking at your door.   And OH NO, my candle has blown out!  You’re all alone in this big apartment.  I’ve heard your voice for awhile but we’ve never met.  So tell me,…How can you help light MY fire, Rodolfo as played by ERIC MARGIORE!?”

Eric Margiore as Rodolfo:

Well, Mimi, that is a lovely name.  I believe that I can help light your fire, especially on those cold winter nights of Paris. I am really quite swell with the kindling and I must admit that I love to cuddle, so it seems that I am your man! Since I am a poet, I would love to just sit by the fire and look at you to become inspired.  I believe that you will find significant warmth in my words…

MIMI:
“Mmm thanks Eric!  Now,
“RODOLFO—as played by Michael Fabiano:
same question…!?

Michael Fabiano as Rodolfo:

My heart is a hearth.
Let us rejoice in the
exudence of our
permeating souls . . .

MIMI
(Ahhh nice!):
“And how about RODOLFO—as played by Dimitri Pittas….?

But tonight Dimitri Pittas is in Amsterdam tonight (Sept 27^th) and Sunday Sept 29^th singing the Verdi Requiem with the Concertgebouw.

MIMI: Hm, Dimitri, you’re not here(!!?)….Well then next question:
I want you to imagine you love me.  We’re so in love! And: you see me in a cab with ANOTHER man.  Tell me how this makes you feel!!!
Rodolfo played by Eric Margiore.,.?

Eric Margiore as Rodolfo:

Well, I do become incredibly jealous! I am so intensely passionate about our love that when I see other men even looking at you, I cannot handle it!  I know you love me deeply and I cannot picture anyone else with you.  I will fight for you and protect you with all of my soul because you inspire me so deeply.

Mimi smiles.  “Thank you.  Michael Fabiano, same question.  We’re in love and you’ve seen me in a cab with another man.  How does this make you feel?!!!”

Michael Fabiano as Rodolfo:

A thousand arrows pierce my bleeding soul.
My ire points to its zenith.
Willow, o willow, will you hear my plea?
My being faces the abyss . . .

Mimi would like to ask Dimitri Pittas the same question about jealousy, but… he’s not here!

So she goes on.   Mimi wants to know.
“You’ve told me you’re a poet.  Can I be your muse?

Eric Margiore as Rodolfo:

The woman that I am in love with will be my greatest muse. You will inspire my thoughts and I am incredibly grateful to you for that. I see you in my dreams that I wish always to dream and I am rich beyond compare from the privilege of looking into the jewels that are your eyes. When I touch your tiny hands I feel and see the extraordinary clay from which humankind was made. You give me hope for the future. You are my life’s blood.

Mimi:
“Mmm nice.  And what about you, Michael Fabiano as Rodolfo?

(l – r) Dimitri Pittas as Rodolfo and Joshua Hopkins as Marcello in the Canadian Opera Company/Houston Grand Opera/San Francisco Opera co-production of La Bohème. (Photo: Felix Sanchez © 2012 (Houston Grand Opera))

All is calm in the air
and the strings of my poetry
will vibrate to the bow of your hair. Blind, make me move
forward in the ecstasy of bliss.

Yes Mimi will get her turns, with Rodolfo as played by Fabiano &
Rodolfo played by Margiore.  But on October 3, 6, 9 and 12, to open the production? Mimi is with Pittas, her first Rodolfo.

And Fabiano & Margiore will get their turn..!

Canadian soprano Ileana Montalbetti has been one of the standouts in the new Canadian Opera Company production of Peter Grimes.  The Toronto Star’s review, for instance says

“when we start to consider Ileana Montalbetti’s saintly Ellen Orford, we are in the realm of greatness. The heartbreaking emotional openness of her voice and the wealth of feeling she gives every moment mark her as the beating heart of this production.“    (Full review)

Ileana Montalbetti (photo: Bo Huang)

Last season included debuts with Edmonton Opera as Antonia in The Tales of Hoffmann (Offenbach) and Michigan Opera Theatre as Leonore in Fidelio (Beethoven).

Montalbetti is a graduate of the COC’s Ensemble Program & the University of Toronto’s Opera Program, a winner of the 2012 New York District Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and a 2012 Encouragement Award from the Sullivan Foundation.   She placed second in the 2011 Christina and Louis Quilico Awards and was nominated by the Canadian Opera Company to compete in the 2011 Stella Maris Vocal Competition.

And Montalbetti has a new facebook fan page:

I’m looking forward to seeing Peter Grimes for myself this week.  In anticipation I ask Montalbetti ten questions: five about herself and five more about her portrayal of Ellen Orford.

1- Are you more like your father or your mother?

Ileana Montalbetti (photo by Chris Hutcheson)

My mother is a trained singer and the Artistic Director of Saskatoon Opera and my father is a trained stage actor.  For the obvious reasons, I would say I am a good mix of the two.  I have always been drawn to performing and I completed a year of theatre studies before switching to voice performance.  They are both artistic, independent, free thinkers and I know I have these traits from both of them.  They followed their dreams and spent the majority of their 20’s living, studying and working in Vienna.  This has prompted me to always follow my dreams, to work as hard as possible and never give up. They are extremely supportive but never led me to believe that this career is easy.  Having such wonderful examples has helped form me into the artist I am today.

2- What is the best thing or worst thing about being a singer?

To be a singer is to be an eternal student which is wonderful but also challenging.  Musicians are perfectionists but the job is never and will never be done and this is where the frustration and challenges lie.  Our career also requires a lot of sacrifice and there is quite a bit of instability, one must be very flexible and adaptable.

And even though there are times when I am missing friends or family and I am alone in a hotel room I feel very lucky to have acquired these skills and traits through being an opera singer.  One of the best things about being a singer is the opportunity to travel and meet people from all over the world.  I feel incredibly blessed to have close friends on many continents and to feel love and support from so many people and places!

3- Who do you like to listen to or watch?

My iTunes consists mainly of opera and the singer I listen to the most is Adrianne Pieczonka.  I have looked up to her for many years and consider her one of my role models.  She is extremely kind and generous and one of the most genuine artists I have ever seen perform.  I have been lucky enough to coach with her and to get to know her a bit on a personal level and she is incredibly supportive.

Aside from opera I really like the group Pink Martini.  When I worked at the Music Store at Roy Thomson Hall we listened to their CD’s all the time and I own all of them.  When I am walking around the city that is what I’m usually listening to.

4- What ability or skill do you wish you had, that you don’t have?

I wish I could fly!  That would make all my traveling MUCH easier and it would also allow me to sneak visits in to my loved ones whenever I wanted!

5- When you’re just relaxing and not working what is your favourite thing to do?

I watch a lot of TV; Downton Abbey, Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Grey’s Anatomy, Game of Thrones, Scandal and (I may regret saying this) but I am a bit of a reality TV junkie – it’s my guilty pleasure!  I’ve also taken up knitting!  I learned to knit for the role and it has now become one of my hobbies!  I really enjoy it!

*******

Five more about playing Ellen Orford in Neil Armfield’s production of Peter Grimes for the Canadian Opera Company

1-How does portraying Ellen Orford challenge you?

Ellen is an extremely complex character and it has been a challenge, as an actor, to find the core of her character.  She is a school mistress in a village full of narrow minded people and being an educated woman and a free thinker has led her to be a bit of an outcast along with the fact that she has aligned herself with Peter, who the whole town is very sceptical of.  Vocally there are many challenges in the role as well.  Britten’s music requires a lot of concentration and I feel like I always need to be counting.  Also, the duet with Peter in the Prologue is unaccompanied and, basically, the first music I sing so that is always a bit of a nail bitter!

2- What do you love about your role?

Ben Heppner (photo: Michael Cooper)

I love Ellen’s strength and fortitude and playing this amazing character has helped to develop my own strength and fortitude, not only as a singer but as an artist and person.  I am surrounded by an amazing cast of colleagues, including the phenomenal Ben Heppner.  Watching him and my colleagues fully embody their roles has pushed me to dig deep inside of myself and discover who Ellen truly is.  The learning curve on this contract has been steep but the growth I have made as an artist is priceless.  It was, of course, a bit nerve wracking on the first day, especially being opposite Ben, but they have all been incredibly generous and supportive and have always made me feel like I belong.

3-Do you have a favourite moment in the opera?

The opera is full of amazingly dramatic and intense moments and there are many that grab me.  I would have to say my favourite is near the end of the opera where the entire chorus and most of the principals come right down to the front of the stage and sing “Peter Grimes” three times.  The silence between each reiteration of his name is spine chilling.  Our chorus is one of the best, if not THE best, in the world and to hear them in this moment but also in the entire opera is absolutely phenomenal.

4- How do you relate to Ellen Orford & her relationships to Grimes & the town, as a modern woman?

I relate to Ellen in many ways and I think she is a very progressive and modern woman in her own right.  She stands up for what she believes in and for the people she cares about.  Her relationship with Peter is challenging as she sees someone who is hurting and wants to save him.  I care very deeply for all of my friends and family and want to be there for them all the time so I relate to her in that way.  I also relate to her very directly in her love for children as I nanny for many of my friends and colleagues between gigs.  I have always loved children and being with them and, I believe, Ellen does too!  They teach us so much about ourselves, especially about honesty and being in the moment.  Being both an opera singer and nanny has provided me with a wonderful life balance.

Alexander Neef (photo bohuang.ca © 2012)

5-Is there a teacher or influence you especially admire?

I have the deepest admiration and respect for both of my teachers; Mel Braun and Wendy Nielsen.  They both have a tireless work ethic and commitment to their teaching and the craft of singing.  They have stuck with me through thick and thin and have always believed in me and encouraged me to work hard and dream big.  They have taken countless hours to work with me on honing my craft. I would not be here without them!

I also owe a lot to the Canadian Opera Company and Alexander Neef.  Alexander has become an incredible mentor to me.  Being a member of the Ensemble has shaped and formed me into the artist I am today.

*******

Ileana Montalbetti continues her portrayal of Ellen Orford in the Canadian Opera Company production of Britten’s Peter Grimes until October 26.

Ileana Montalbetti and Alan Held (photo by Michael Cooper)

Identified by Opera News as one of the “25 Most Powerful Names in US Opera”, Stephen Lord is a conductor known for his sensitive handling of singers.  In my review of April’s Canadian Opera Company production of Lucia di Lammermoor I said the following:

Stephen Lord was quite magnificent to watch, deliciously flexible with the COC orchestra in following the singers no matter where they wanted to go, one of the most impressive displays of musicianship I have ever seen.

That’s not surprising, considering that Lord began his career as a pianist, before becoming a coach & accompanist.  Lord also teaches and mentors artists, whether in his previous role as Music Director at the Banff Festival Opera, or more recently as artistic director of opera studies at New England Conservatory.  He is currently music director for Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, formerly was music director of Boston Lyric Opera, and has led productions at companies such as Lyric Opera of Chicago, San Francisco Opera, and English National Opera.

On the occasion of the new Canadian Opera Company production of Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera I ask Lord ten questions: five about himself and five more about his work on the COC Ballo.

1-Are you more like your father or your mother?

Conductor Stephen Lord (photo: Christian Steiner)

You know, I think I am truly a 50/50. I used to look like my mother, now I look like my father – especially when passing a shop window and seeing my reflection. “Who is that old man?” I am intensely curious about things like weather and all sorts of world news, farming (he was a fruit grower), etc. But I am at times hyper energized like my mother who, at 87, is doing quite well.

2- What is the best thing & worst thing about being a conductor?

I came to conducting late after having spent my first fifteen years in career as a coach and, even luckier, coach to many of the great singers ending the golden age of the 50′s and 60′s and then the best of the singers in my generation. So the BEST thing about being a conductor is that the thing that challenges so many opera conductors – the theatre and the vocal styles – is second nature. As a pianist I was always slightly nervous as playing a wrong note was anathema to me and, since I came to piano in my teens, I never truly had the assurance of those that start in their single digits. In spite of that it all seemed to work, but the comfort level was an issue. When I started conducting, the possibility of wrong notes is someone else’s problem! I was suddenly liberated to conduct the music, live the music, be inside the music and the feeling when younger of loving it so much you wanted to climb into the stereo speakers, is now a realized sensation. And I can do theatre when doing opera. I spent a lot of time on stage in my past in various types of plays, shows and even operas and so realizing the theatre in music and discovering it is a huge joy for me. While there are no doubt greater conductors than I everywhere, the fact that I know theatre and am intensely interested in it is my ace in the hole.

The worst part of conducting opera, and there is a downside are the long periods away and on the road in unfamiliar digs. I am not someone who does this job as a step in last minute thing as I love being involved in the whole process. And this takes time to rehearse, work out various aspects musically and theatrically, etc. The average away time is 6-8 weeks and when one goes from one to the next with little time between, it becomes a living nightmare. But there IS the music and some truly wonderful colleagues. Right now, in the Ballo cast, I knew everyone but two, some from their very beginnings. So one is never lonely for the familiar. And meeting the terrific director, Sergio Morabito, and working with him is incredible fun.

COC Music Director Johannes Debus (photo: Bo Huang, 2012)

The COC, a company I have been involved with in many capacities since the early 80′s, is a welcoming, warm and first rate operation. This starts from the top with Alexander Neef and Johannes Debus, plus my old friend Sandra Horst and many others. This is great compensation for the sometimes devastatingly lonely times alone in terrific but strange digs.

3- Who do you like to listen to or watch?

Wow. This is a tough one. I have to drive a lot and in my car I have Sirius radio and I often listen to The Metropolitan Opera Radio. This is at times thrilling (older performances with idols like Melchior, Bergonzi, Tebaldi, Sutherland, etc.) and sometimes shockingly disheartening, especially in the years 1990 to the early century. Now, however, I hear people on there I either knew in the beginning of my career or, in some cases, actually started a career and it is wonderful to hear them all grown up and giving of themselves so well.

In the USA, we have NPR, which is terrific and gives me thought provoking subjects to follow.

As for music, just last week on a long car trip it was the whole MESSIAH (which I admit I didn’t hear as I was singing along too much), Carlos Kleiber doing Beethoven and Dame Myra Hess. Sirius also has a Frank Sinatra station, and Elvis station and a 40′s and 50′s pop station. These make me smile as they were sincere and you could still understand the words.

I rarely play piano any more. I developed tendinitis when I was at the end of that career from playing in Dallas on a terrible piano. And that was probably good since I started learning my conducting scores away from the keyboard and in my head. It helped develop my ear and score reading abilities. I have the urge to play piano occasionally again, though, and might get back to it.

4- What ability or skill do you wish you had, that you don’t have?

Woodworking

5- When you’re just relaxing and not working what is your favourite thing to do?

I confess to being a terrible gardener and I just love doing it. I prune too aggressively, and don’t design what I plant carefully, I love buying guy toys by John Deere (my Gator is an especially fun one and the new, big, and more rugged lawn mower might just be coming). One more admission — while pruning on a ladder by myself with a chain saw, I did cut too aggressively, the limb pushed me off the ladder, I landed in a pile of rocks, broke four ribs. Mercifully, or not mercifully, my head hit grass between the rocks. So I am terrible and love doing. I also love working on ways to improve my home. Being on the road is dangerous because I start thinking of what to do next.

Stephen Lord (Photo: Christian Steiner)

*******

Five more about Ballo at the COC

1-Please talk about the challenges in leading the COC production of Un ballo in maschera.

I used to think some operas were relatively easy to conduct. The older I get the more I realize the folly of that stupid notion.

Because we are dealing with humans on the stage and humans in the pit and humans in the public experiencing it live, the unknowns are tremendous. Sometimes conducting an opera like Ballo is rapturous, sometimes conducting any of them is triage as one tries to analyze all sorts of real time issues and find solutions to them in a split second. Because we have such great resources available in the form of past and/or favorite recorded performances, a great challenge is forgetting what one has heard and inventing it fresh. And, of course, there are naturally times when you’re used to hearing one thing but tailoring to the available forces is the immediate issue. Also, when one has a very strong point of view, as our production does, one has to constantly remind the singers that the action follows the music and the sometimes untraditional action is not the beginning but the end result of the music itself. Theatre in opera comes from music but many fine young singers use the action as an end result. But the music inspires the action, the words inspire the music, and the action is a result of the other two. If a singer thinks the production style is their biggest job, we can get lost. It is my job to bring them back to the truth of the music as their primary impulse.

Ballo has a lot of back stage music, which is always a worry as you can’t see them. Mercifully, I have Sandra Horst, who is brilliant doing that along with the chorus.

The other great challenge, of course, is that the roles in this opera are big, full, grown up opera roles. And with these, come the pressures on the singers to stay in tip top form because if one is in less than best form, the piece cannot happen.

Musically, the challenges in this piece start with the libretto. The poetry of Piave in something like TRAVIATA, for example, is direct. This libretto has some very atypical word and sentence structure and some very unusual text for Verdi. And this affects the musical phrasings. So learning these and getting them into the brain is difficult.

On the plus side, of course, is the COC orchestra. They know opera and play it with heart and soul.

2-What do you love about Ballo?

What do I love about Ballo? Well, let me start by saying I have never been driven to be rich or famous and so I have been fortunate enough to be able to only do pieces I either love or that are very interesting and curious to me. There may be times when I wish I would just go and phone something in and take the money but that is not me. So, Ballo is a piece I love and I am honoured to have been invited to do it. This way we start with the wanting to show my love for the piece by being involved with it again. For the one and only audition I ever did and play on piano, I chose Amelia’s second act aria as the aria selection. I love the danger in the piece — the vocal danger of the role of Amelia and the conquering of the repertoire’s most difficult high C, the length of the role of Riccardo and the stamina it takes to do this, the dangerousness of the dramatic situation – all of these make the superhuman challenge of doing a super performance of this opera make me love its challenge. It is like Everest – it is THERE.

At this point in Verdi’s oeuvres the orchestral writing gets more and more exposed for solo instruments. The cello has quite long stretches of solo writing. The English horn in Amelia’s aria seems a prelude to the oboe writing in AIDA. The trombones probably play more in this opera than in any other of Verdi. In this period of Verdi, everyone has great challenges on stage, chorus, pit, backstage. And my challenge is to see that it is all of one style, theatrical, beautiful, and in the rare occurrence that something goes wrong, to do my best to fix it.

3) Do you have a favourite moment in Ballo?

I think for me the most thrilling moment in this opera is the moment in Act 2 when Amelia confesses her love to Riccardo, the tenor. This is, of course, one of those moments when one’s assistant comes and says “Maestro, the orchestra is too loud here.” I of course listen but also realize that there are times, very occasional, when the sum of the parts (orchestra and singer) is greater than any one thing. The overwhelming moment here in the orchestra tells us more than the singers do. In our age of having recorded performances always perfectly balanced (like the unrealistic MET HD performances) our public oftentimes gets lulled into thinking singers are always forefront and forget that at times the orchestra becomes the soloist. I am not one of those bombastic kind of guys, but there are times you just have to let the race horse run.

4) How do you feel about Un ballo in maschera as a 21st century performer?  

And now we come to the hornet’s nest!  This probably is worth a whole book of writing. And I have some very strong opinions here. I am totally for whatever brings the piece to life. I think an issue with what some people call Regietheater is that those that produce it bring a particular and often peculiar personal idea to the fore without truly knowing the people in the seats. But the personal and expensive point of view, while interesting, at times supersedes the spirit of the music and the interest of the public. This does not at all mean that these things should not be tried. But the producer who forgets his public and, like a spoiled child, says LOVE IT OR LEAVE have now often reaped the “rewards” and people have left.

Think of the great pianist Glenn Gould who made his career on the works of Bach played on an instrument Bach could possibly never have imagined. The spirit of the music is always there and it brought a lot of this music to the attention of the public. Now, had he worn a clown suit while playing it, the music would  have been lost for the distraction of cosmetics. And yet he updated the performance with an instrument the public could relate to.

I firmly believe that the rise of this kind of production (and don’t get me wrong, I appreciate it when done well and musically) coincided with a precipitous decline in musical and vocal standards in the world. I am not talking the early music repertoire, because that is vocally and conductorially less demanding. I am talking about the style of singing that is athletic and as dangerous as NASCAR. I am talking about the singer who has to bat 1.000, while a star ball player can be in a slump and still be paid millions. When the dinosaur generation died off, who on the norm studied longer and at younger ages and were immersed in the repertoire in their cultures and families, replacing them has been a struggle, with exceptions of course. So to replace the visceral thrill that made opera so very popular, people felt forced to replace that thrill with a more intellectual/personal/controversial sort of thrill which, when done badly drives the public and donors away and, when done well, at least has the press and spin doctors abuzz.

My conducting colleagues need to shoulder some of the blame for the bad stuff. When they show up at the end of the rehearsal period and have no input into the process and THEN complain, they have no legs to stand on in my book. Bear in mind I am talking about new productions here, not revivals for which one has been hired. But the uninvolved conductor has been one of the reasons this art form has suffered some bruises. I think even with a production of dubious taste a conductor can make a difference and help the producer by motivating the action with the music and keeping the cast on a tight leash stylistically.

5) Is there anyone out there who you particularly admire, and who has influenced you?

Conductor Tullio Serafin (click photo for more information: scroll down to Tullio Serafin)

Conductor wise, one cannot deny Toscanini, Carlos Kleiber, Tullio Serafin, Antonino Votto, Mitropoulos. Directorially, there is always Jean Pierre Ponnelle, a true renaissance man whose work in the whole repertoire and not simply a niche was exemplary and musical. So many singers have touched my heart they are impossible to name.

But those I admire most? With no question I admire those who are out there, leaving home and family to entertain the public. Each and every one of them.

And if they get the added thrill of a great performance that moves him, all the better.

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Stephen Lord leads the Canadian Opera Company production of Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera that opens February 2nd (further information).

click for information about tickets to the production, originally from Berlin Straatsoper (Photo: Ruth Walz)

When you walk into the Four Seasons Centre for the new Canadian Opera Company production of Cosi fan tutte the first thing you see is a huge reproduction of Frida Kahlo’s painting Two Fridas.

I imagined what Frida might have said had she seen this.  “”HA Diego, see?! This is bigger than any of your murals!”

Frida Kahlo’s painting Two Fridas. To read more about the painting, click on the painting to go to another site.

If you know Da Ponte’s libretto you could be forgiven for thinking that these gory images of blood & surgical instruments are incongruous, as you encounter Mozart’s comedy.

If you’re like me –an incorrigible opera nerd—you probably knew that Atom Egoyan was directing Cosi, that he was attempting something ambitious.  I believe what he was attempting tonight was more difficult than either of his previous forays into opera with the COC.  Salome is outrageous while Die Walküre is automatically symbolic and deep.  Both works are dark, without a shred of comedy.

The old saying, attributed to Edmund Kean on his deathbed is “dying’s easy. Comedy’s hard” and I doubt he got a laugh.  I wonder if Egoyan realizes this, as his Cosi fan tutte is often deep, sometimes wildly funny, but just as often, very dark.  This is no light romp.

For starters, Egoyan does something that reminded me of Woody Allen.  The subtitle of the piece –school for lovers—is taken as a logical departure point for the story.  Don Alfonso’s bet with the two men—that he can demonstrate that women are unfaithful by nature—is a kind of illustration for a school.  This is no friendly wager (as it has been in some productions I’ve seen), but something darker.  Egoyan doesn’t hide from the sexism of the story, indeed he seems to underline it, and thereby to transcend it.  The women are all fascinating, because it’s their drama that is in the spotlight, while the men, in comparison, seem to be abusive libertines with all the privileges.

And so yes, I thought of Woody Allen:

• because the women’s parts are all so interesting that the men are more or less blown off the stage, superficial and flawed, compared to these fascinating women.
• And yes, I had that other recollection of Woody Allen, the man recently castigated as a pedophile, who married Soon Yi.  We’re all implicated in this production as we stare at a stage filled with what seem to be schoolgirls, two of whom are being pursued in this bet.  Oh sure, I know that the singers playing the parts are of age; but the costuming is sufficiently ambiguous as to invite us into a very uncomfortable place.  What’s more, the youthful mien of Fiordiligi and Dorabella makes perfect sense, when you look at their innocent fantasies; for all intents & purposes they could be children, considering their meagre understanding of the real world.

Egoyan isn’t content with that simple layer, perhaps because of the dark implications I just mentioned.  Remember the huge Frida Kahlo reproduced on the curtain that seemed incongruous?  In Act II we’re given ample reason. In Fiordiligi’s aria “Per pieta, ben mio, perdona” the painting that was already seen on the curtain, was now not only front and centre on the stage, but gradually enlarged, until the heart was almost the only thing visible.  And then our viewpoint wanders to other disturbing images in the painting, such as the surgical instruments.

Layla Claire as Fiordiligi in the Canadian Opera Company’s new production of Così fan
tutte, 2014. Photo: Michael Cooper

It’s a tribute to soprano Layla Claire’s performance that this odd projection gradually growing could not upstage her.  As the aria mentions her heart it did follow logically, but the conceptual shenanigans were completely redeemed by the performances.  Claire was matched by Wallis Giunta as a very playful Dorabella, their voices blending wonderfully, and looking very much like sisters.  There was so much going on at times between them, that I couldn’t take it all in.  The stage action was very rich and detailed even without including the work of the chorus.

When I think about this story, which is sometimes so glib in its treatment of genuine human feelings, I like what Egoyan seems to be doing, essentially validating the deeper feelings of all his characters, if not asking us whether true love is even possible.  The modern director usually seeks to problematize that which has been straight-forward in the past, but in this case it’s a worthwhile exercise, taking a story that is in some respects  (if you’ll excuse the choice of words) heartless.  But as I said, the story really concerns the drama of the women and their choices, not the men, who are simply predatory & exploitive.  It doesn’t leave you with a bright breezy feeling at the end, because in fact it’s just kicked you in the gut with its truthfulness and integrity.  At the first intermission I didn’t think I’d be saying this, because I was a bit bewildered by all the bells and whistles, the butterflies with pins through their hearts, the ships in hats, the loose ends that didn’t seem to be cohering.  But not only do they cohere, finally (the butterflies perhaps a reminder that we are all potential specimens to have our hearts broken), but one can even say that it does end happily enough.  We’re all challenged & implicated in various ways, so it’s a relief that there is so much laughter.  Act II is much funnier than Act I, perhaps because so much of the first act is setting up what’s to come.

I hadn’t laughed once before Tracy Dahl arrived as Despina, but whenever she appeared, the mood lightened.  Not only did she manage the usual comic bits, but she brought extra, especially in her scenes with the two young women.  It’s good to see her back on the COC stage.  I last saw her in one of my all-time favourite productions, the Mansouri Ariadne auf Naxos with Elizabeth Connell & Judith Forst in the 1980s. I am not the only one who thought so (if you’ll excuse a slight digression). I found this reminiscence online from George Heymont (scroll halfway down to the paragraph about Toronto) echoing my sense that Dahl & Connell & Forst were as good as what they offered at the Met that year.

The men were certainly good too, even if I found myself almost embarrassed for my gender.  Does that make me –or Egoyan—a feminist? Perhaps, and I’d say that proudly rather than as a critique.  By the end all get their reward.  Thomas Allen’s Don Alfonso is in some respects a waste of such a profound talent, given that he’s more of a ringmaster or master of ceremonies.  The voice is as splendid as ever, the delivery full of subtleties.   Paul Appleby & Robert Gleadow each had their moments to shine, thoroughly enjoyable to watch.

I’m looking forward to seeing it again, to see how I feel about it now that I know what Egoyan was up to and where it’s going.  The COC’s Cosi fan tutte runs at the Four Seasons Centre until February 21^st, including the annual Ensemble performance –with a cast comprised of members of the Ensemble Studio—on February 7^th.

The talent pool at the Canadian Opera Company is deeper than ever, yet even so, few singers have the credentials of Sir Thomas Allen, one of the great singers of his generation.

Currently starring as Don Alfonso in the COC’s Cosi fan tutte until February 21^st, Allen is also an unparalleled interpreter of lieder & songs, who will offer a program titled “Songs of the Sea” as part of the free noon-hour series at the Richard Bradshaw Auditorium (at the Four Season Centre) on February 13th.

On the occasion of his recital, I ask Allen ten questions: five about himself, and five more about singing “Songs of the Sea”.

1-Are you more like your father or your mother?

Tracy Dahl as Despina and Sir Thomas Allen as Don Alfonso in the Canadian Opera Company’s new production of Così fan tutte, 2014. Photo: Michael Cooper

I’m certainly more like father than mother. Mother was very much the typical devoted wife for dad. Her job was the home, looking after dad and bringing up the boy….me.

Dad on the other hand was blessed with curiosity. They both grew up in the North East of England when times were not entirely easy. There was a great deal of struggle in just surviving for quite a long period of time in their lives. Their life wasn’t easy but despite that they did all they could for me.

My father loved sport as a young man but the loss of a leg when he was 21 put an end to that.

His passion was music. He played the piano at any spare moment …popular songs, dance tunes and such like and he was the accompanist for a male voice choir and conducted a glee club.

He was my only piano teacher. When I joined the church choir and later began taking organ lessons he was really thrilled. Nothing gave me more pleasure than seeing the pleasure he got from my music-making, whether it was when I sang in the choir, played a service at church, or later when he saw me at Covent Garden or the Metropolitan Opera…his only trip abroad.

I miss him every day.

2- What is the best thing & worst thing about being a singer?

Certainly the worst thing is the business of moving around the world and making a home away from home, wherever that may be. So many apartments are the same and after a while they all blend into one boring conglomeration. It’s that business that takes one away from family for long periods of time. Now after so many years of travelling I look back and feel what a great sacrifice was made to miss so much of my sons growing up. The trouble is that once on that treadmill, it’s accepting that life is ever going to be so and one must either embrace it or leave and find something more ordinary and stable to do in life.

The good thing about singing is not the obvious thrill of listening to the cheering of an audience after a special performance…..one quickly realises that special performances are few and far between. For me the good thing is the fact that being a singer has made me inquisitive about so many aspects of life. Every day is different; each day is an involvement in a study of one sort or another – language, history, literature and people, the latter being arguably the most fascinating of all. It’s made me curious about so many things and I have learned so much as a result.

3- Who do you like to listen to or watch?

I don’t listen to singers much ….not a natural canary fancier. Having said that, Fischer Dieskau was a big influence when I was growing up. But I love the quality of certain voices and that of James Mason, for example, I could listen to all day.

4- What ability or skill do you wish you had, that you don’t have?

There’s too little appreciation of the skills of craftsmen in the UK as opposed to those who are more academically inclined. I think that’s a tragedy. As a skill, more than anything I’d want to make good furniture and generally be an accomplished carpenter.

5- When you’re just relaxing and not working what is your favourite thing to do?

When relaxing, or rather not working, I’ve put together several pursuits that have kept me sane when I might otherwise have gone crazy with this job. I’ve been a bird watcher since schooldays and that remains… I usually travel with a small pair of binoculars. There is always a sketch book and pencil in my bag along with a small box of watercolours. Golf was a big part of my life in early days though I play less these days ….it annoys me too much that I can’t play to 3 handicap any longer. But when I’m home I have a workshop and that’s where I like to be to work with wood, either making toys or serious model boats.

Sir Thomas Allen (photo: Sussie Ahlburg)

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Five more about the upcoming concert “Songs of the Sea”

1-Please talk about the repertoire you’re singing, especially as a departure from what you’re doing as Don Alfonso in the COC production of Cosi fan tutte.

The recital programme has been put together because the sea is a favourite subject for me.

I’m not a desert person. I was born by the sea, have observed its many moods and find it endlessly fascinating in devising recital programmes.

2-What do you love about singing songs?

Life started for me with the singing of songs. It was something I did that came entirely naturally from the time I was a treble to those first baritonal attempts. I never had a strong desire to sing opera initially. Song is a challenge, each one in a programme asking different questions of us, and all in their own right mini scenes. The pictures in my head that I need for song repertoire have become very extensive over a long period of time. No makeup, no costume, just the imagination, the vocal palette and, importantly, the message the body conveys.

3) Do you have a favourite moment in the program?

Billy Budd is in the programme and I make no excuse for including this short operatic piece in a song programme. The reason being, that it is one of the finest examples of setting the English language that I know.

But I’m also very fond of the Eric Coates song, “I heard you singing”. It’s probably not the greatest creation but it is an example of a sentiment largely lost and which I believe warrants some attention.

4) Talk about the “Songs of the Sea” as a modern singer.  

Some of the songs are dated ….well they all are really, some as far back as late 18^th century. That certainly doesn’t preclude them from being heard.

The very idea of a recital, whether it be a reading of poetry or prose or song in our times is something that comes in for question.  Why? We hear so little of narration of stories or anything else now, be it in school, university or conservatoire . That’s a tragedy in my book and I’m doing all I can to rectify it. Without the song recital we would lose a very important aspect of musical composition.  A composer saw fit to set verses to music.  My job is to try to show why that happened in the first place, bringing out the qualities of the musical line and the poetry.

5) Is there anyone out there whom you particularly admire, and who has influenced you?

My dad.  He was a good man and lived a truly honest life. He was my model.  I looked up to him when I was young; I tried to show him that I worked hard to try to achieve something in my life. Perhaps that was because I realised he never had the opportunities …though I wished he might have had and I did it all for him as it were by proxy.

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Thomas Allen sings “Songs of the Sea” on February 13^th with Rachel Andrist, piano at the Richard Bradshaw Auditorium.

Click the photo for more information about the COC’s free concert series

Although today’s free noon-hour concert by Thomas Allen at the Richard Bradshaw Auditorium was titled “Songs of the Sea” the waters could have been the fountain of youth.  Allen is the biggest name singer currently appearing in the Canadian Opera Company winter season, with three performances remaining in the run of Cosi fan tutte.

Tracy Dahl as Despina and Sir Thomas Allen as Don Alfonso in the Canadian Opera Company’s new production of Così fan tutte, 2014. Photo: Michael Cooper

I don’t pretend to understand the mysteries of voice, of classifications & casting, only that Allen has graduated to the more senior instigator role of Don Alfonso, after having sung Guglielmo in his youth.  Now in his seventieth year (if the internet is to be believed), Allen still commands a formidable instrument.   Alfonso doesn’t go as low as Sarastro (Magic Flute) but still lies lower than the baritone roles such Count Almaviva (Marriage of Figaro).  Any voice is a mixture of colours, a combination of higher and lower registers.  It’s a privilege to watch a great singer mixing from his varied tonal palette, choices influenced both by what he’s been doing with his voice recently and a lifetime acquaintance with these songs.

The glory of these noon-hour recitals is in the removal of theatricality and illusion.  We’re all alone with the voice in a most intimate setting with clear acoustics.  For close to an hour we’re watching facial expressions, body language, hearing intakes of breath and tiny details of articulation lost on the larger stage.

Allen sang four blocks of songs with pianist Rachel Andrist:

• Three by Haydn (“Piercing Eyes”, “She Never Told Her Love”, and “Sailor’s Song
• Four by Schubert (“Fischerweise”, “Meeres Stille”, “Lied eines Schiffers an die Dioskuren” and “Der Musensohn”)
• A group mostly “by” Britten: that is, a small operatic excerpt from Billy Budd, plus four songs arranged by Britten with a fifth a capella song inserted into the group.
• Three more sentimental songs that Allen associated with his youth, in the period before he even knew opera

It was traditional programming in the sense that we moved chronologically through the compositions, from classical to romantic to modern and even popular at the end.  I couldn’t help thinking that in the process the real Thomas Allen gradually showed himself.   The Haydn songs are a lovely and varied group, especially the contrast between darkness of the second song and the boisterous masculinity of the third: our first excursion into anything genuinely maritime.  Indeed the whole program is quite comfortably male without being ostentatiously so.

With the Schubert songs a warmer and gentler tone came to light as the voice warmed up.  In “Der Musensohn“ Allen’s baritone began to re-assert itself, a glorious sound that could have been made by a singer in his 40s.

And yet coming to the monologue from Billy Budd, I was struck by the contradictory magic of the moment.  Allen won’t be cast as Billy anymore, the part requiring youth.  The scene is a reflection in the face of death from a young man, but now portrayed for us by an older artist: as though in valedictory.  At one time opera was more open-minded in its casting, to allow older artists to play youth, but nowadays the visuals seem to trump everything.  I was surprised just now –when I pulled up a recording of Allen singing this role a quarter of a century ago—to discover how dark he can sound even when singing delicately with his head voice.  At least for this one scene he demonstrated that he can still sing the part as eloquently as ever. 

The closing trio of songs seemed to take us closer to the Allen who had not yet encountered opera, a young voice that at times seemed to croon gently and without any apparent effort.  At the end of the program Allen was clearly having fun with Andrist, enjoying the enthusiasm of the RBA audience.

Allen’s concluding performances in Cosi fan tutte are  February 15th, 18th & 21st.

Sir Thomas Allen (photo: Sussie Ahlburg)

Back on February 2^nd (aka Groundhog Day: when the cowardly little varmints ran back into their little holes) I had a choice.  I could have gone to see the opening of the Canadian Opera Company’s Ballo in maschera, which purported to be a fascinating production and one of the better casts this season.  I passed it up with great difficulty: because Opera in Concert offered their single performance of Rameau’s Hippolyte et Aricie.  I knew I’d catch a later performance on my subscription: tonight in fact.

There’s one more performance left Saturday at 4:30.  I will keep this simple.

Right now I think Adrianne Pieczonka is the most impressive Canadian singer in the world.  Now of course i am horribly promiscuous (and was torn between Pieczonka & Jane Archibald when they shared the stage in Ariadne a few years ago), so perhaps i can’t be trusted.  Even so, in a cast where the set offered no acoustical support to the singers–because they played in a big vacant space without  reflective surfaces—competing with an orchestra unleashed –because Stephen Lord turned the COC orchestra loose, as he said he would—it was like the second coming of Birgit Nilsson. I am trying to strike a balance between rapturous excitement and  something resembling a rational response. But my brain melted listening to this voice tonight, and it was a good thing.

Adrianne Pieczonka as Amelia in the Canadian Opera Company production of A Masked Ball (Un ballo in maschera), 2014. Photo: Michael Cooper

The aria to begin Act II –Ecco l’orrido campo—is the first of several successive challenges for the soprano.  At this point Pieczonka sang with restraint, her high notes laser accurate.  I sit quite close to the stage, so, while unaccompanied voice can be big, when the orchestra is pounding, voices get covered by the musicians who are right in front of me.  But not Pieczonka.

A couple of days ago, Charlie Handelman –recalling Leonie Rysanek—mused “let’s talk about the last great Sieglinde”.  Perhaps I was being difficult when I responded “did you see Pieczonka”?  Because of course she is the last greatest voice to sing the role.  She’ll sing the Empress in Frau ohne Schatten in a few months.  Her Ariadne is the most beautiful, most wonderful combination of power, vulnerability, sweetness and musicianship I’ve ever heard.  One of these days –I hope—she’ll undertake Isolde & Brunnhilde.

But I think I have to stop being narrow-minded, thinking of her and Wagnerian roles, when there are other dramatic roles to be conquered.  I was only okay with her Tosca, perhaps because I was less than thrilled with the chemistry she had with her tenor, and yes, I suppose I took it for granted that she could sing this role easily.  Sorry, I guess I was a bit unreasonable,wanting to hear her sing Wagner & Strauss.  But maybe Aida and Turandot are possible for this voice.  And I never heard a really big glorious voice sing Amelia.  The magic of a really good voice trumps every other consideration.

Tonight?  I was very happy with the whole cast.  Pieczonka pushed Dimitri Pittas to a higher level than what I’d seen from him as Rodolfo a few months ago.  Roland Wood found his stride in the latter acts, an affable Renato who turns quite believably when betrayed.  Simone Osborne made more of the odd role of Oscar than I’ve ever seen, in this wacky production. Elena Manistina as Ulrica seized the stage at every opportunity with her powerful presence and beautiful tone.

The run is almost over.  Please let no one complain that it’s not like the usual Ballo. As  I argued awhile ago, there’s no such thing.  Enjoy it for what it’s doing.  The relationships are vivid and powerful, the key moments as good as you can hope for even without the vocalism, the COC orchestra under Lord sounding magnificent.

If you can get there Saturday see it.

Do you know who you are?

Today’s performance of the Canadian Opera company production of Roberto Devereux  at the Four Seasons Centre seemed like an investigation of identity.

For one thing, there’s the opera’s plot, which concerns Elizabeth I and intrigues surrounding her.  In Donizetti’s opera we’re not coming at the story from the usual pro-British perspective but instead from the Catholic side.  It makes Mary Stuart a tragic hero (different opera but part of the “trilogy”), and quite possibly portrays Elizabeth more truthfully than what we get from Hollywood.  This is a vain & troubled Elizabeth, which is something unexpectedly edgy when you’re watching a bel canto opera.    So be advised, this is not what you’d expect.

Stephen Lawless’s productions of the trilogy are self-referential, particularly in the last scene of the last opera.  We’ve been in a kind of Globe Theatre replica, in recognition that in her world surely Elizabeth was in some sense a performer with an audience.  I avoided speaking of this aspect the first time I saw the production because I dislike spoilers; yet today, where I deliberately sought a front row seat for a full-frontal experience of the last scene, and knowing what was coming I was still so bowled over I was without a voice for a long time.  The last scene is very much about Elizabeth coming to terms with who she is, both her private sense of herself and the larger spheres such as the political and the historical.  In a good production at a special moment, it doesn’t change anything knowing it’s coming.

Leonardo Capalbo (from earlier in the run) as Roberto Devereux and Sondra Radvanovsky as Elisabetta in the Canadian Opera Company production of Roberto Devereux, 2014. Conductor Corrado Rovaris, director Stephen Lawless, set designer Benoît Dugardyn, costume designer Ingeborg Bernerth and lighting designer Mark McCullough. Photo: Michael Cooper

And the identity of our Elizabeth was of course the main reason I had intended to be there in the front row.  This was a chance to see Sondra Radvanovsky again from very close up.  Sometimes good performances don’t look quite as good from up close.  I’d been very moved, for example by Lucy Crowe’s singing in Hercules when seen from afar, as I’d been moved by Alice Coote; up close I found Crowe histrionic and unconvincing (but still nice to hear) whereas Coote, who’d already moved me blew me away even more up close.   Similarly, Radvanovsky was ready for her close-up.  She made me cry three times (at least) in Aida a few years ago, so I wasn’t really surprised.  I didn’t expect to be reduced to a blubbering mess at the end, by the solemn horror with which she–literally– steps into her place in history to end the opera.

Maybe the biggest identity question for me today was the title role.  Ernesto Ramirez, who was the cover for Roberto Devereux, got the nod today.  Knowing that people were coming to see Radvanovsky from all over the world, I can imagine the pressure Ramirez must have felt when he was told he’d be getting a performance.  And so –speaking of theatrical drama– this was the classic drama within a drama.

Tenor Ernesto Ramirez

And Ramirez knows who he is.  While I was grooving on Radvanovsky’s voice, I was wondering how the young tenor would approach the role.  I say this because I recall seeing something rather interesting in the run of Aida, a matter of identity and self-knowledge.  Radvanovsky shared the run with a young soprano named Michelle Capalbo (coincidentally the same name as the tenor who sang earlier in the run). Here’s what I wrote in my blog back in 2010, just after I started.

Radvanovsky enticed the Rhadames of Rosario La Spina to sing louder than he probably intended.  By Act IV, he was a spent-force, after heroically singing himself out earlier, cracking and fading.  On the night I saw him with Capalbo, on the other hand, he stayed within his usual limits, and as a result never cracked.  At times the voice sounded lovely.

In other words, singing opposite one of the most powerful voices in the world, do you know who you are and continue singing as you should, or try to perhaps be something you’re not, press, and sing yourself out (as La Spina clearly did)..?  So I wondered if the same thing might happen to Ramirez, singing opposite such a powerfully-voiced soprano.  But no.  Ramirez knows who he is.  The singing was thoughtful, well-planned.  I have not heard a performance that was so accurately pitched in a very long time. Every single note was exactly on pitch, including two high B’s in his final scene.  I believe there may have been other posssible interpolated notes –that Capalbo gave us on opening night– that Ramirez had the good sense to skip.

Ramirez is not Pavarotti –again speaking of identity– but to my ear, the resemblance is striking.  The line, the lovely precision attack on high notes… but one big difference.  The Great Pavarotti was known to be an instinctive singer who did not read music.  Ramirez? I saw him accompany his wife Michelle on clarinet at a concert I reviewed, as she sang ““non piu di fiori” from La Clemenza di Tito.  Later? He sang “Grenada”, among other things.  I hope this is the big break that shows the world what Ramirez can do.  Who have we heard around here who sounds as good?  Stephen Costello, Ramon Vargas? lovely sounding to be sure, but Ramirez is genuinely in their league, and i swear, a prettier voice.  Yes he does sound like Pavarotti.

Could this be a scene from some operatic equivalent to A Star is Born?  Perhaps it should be.  Ramirez seemed fearless even though the costume didn’t quite fit, even though he’s required to be all over the stage in business that’s above & beyond the singing, for instance as Bottom in a brief snippet from A Midsummernight’s Dream complete with ass’s head.  But I don’t trust the opera world.  I’ve seen too much mis-casting and bizarreness of late –here and abroad– to believe that could happen.  It should happen, the same way the voters of Toronto should wake up and elect someone competent as Mayor.  Sure, I don’t mind if my friends take drugs or drink.  But I wouldn’t want the plane I’m on to be piloted by a drunk.  I’d want someone competent in the driver’s seat.  I want to win my case, not get drunk after losing my lawsuit with the fun chubby guy who’s my lawyer. And yes, I am accustomed to seeing singers who can’t find the right pitch sharing the stage with people who sing perfectly, and nobody in the audience or running the company seeming to give a damn or know the difference.

Sorry, I don’t mean to be negative on a night that was surely a triumph for all involved.  Speaking of identity, what am I doing exactly and who am I?  I’d like to be the one who builds up rather than tears down.   Last night left me feeling sad both for what I saw and for what I felt unable to say.

Tonight? My faith is restored.