This spring Opera San Luis Obispo inaugurates two new offerings designed to enrich opera devotees' experiences and forge closer ties in the community. A salon-style series of vocal recitals begins February 19, with a program entitled ‘That's Amore!," an operatic Valentine featuring mezzo-soprano Sarah Kleeman and tenor Ben Gulley. The young husband and wife team will sing romantic arias and duets from Turandot, La Boheme, The Daughter of the Regiment, The Magic Flute,and Faust.
Kleeman and Gulley wowed the audience as guest soloists at the Cuesta Master Chorale's December concert of great opera choruses. Both are rising young artists, each with numerous awards to their credit, and growing experience. Kleeman has recently returned from a national tour of the Broadway show Spring Awakening. Gulley has just finished his second season as tenor apprentice at the Lyric Opera of Kansas City. He was a winner of the Metropolitan Opera's National Council District and Regional Competitions, and was a national semi-finalist.
That's Amore! is the first in an OperaSLO series of recitals designed to provide a more intimate setting for the performance of popular operatic repertory. Each program will feature a young artist on his or her way up in the operatic world. Guests will have an opportunity to meet the singers and enjoy conversation with them.
This first event will be held in the elegant Garden Room at Madonna Inn, Sunday, February 19, 1:00 – 4:00pm. Wine and hors d'oeuvres will be served prior to the performance. Afterwards the artists will join guests for coffee, tea, and the Madonna Inn's famous desserts. Tickets are $65 per person for individual tickets, or tables of 8 for $520, and may be purchased by calling 805.541.5369 or online at OperaSLO.
OperaSLO has also announced a major expansion of its artistic and educational mission. Beginning this spring, OperaSLO will collaborate with Cal Poly's Student Opera Theater in a production of classic opera and musical theater scenes, and Puccini's Suor Angelica. Artistic Director Brian Asher Alhadeff, Artistic Advisor Jacalyn Kreitzer, and Executive Director Sharon Dobson have proposed that the joint production become an annual event, giving young artists opportunities to perform with a professional opera company. Dobson noted that "providing educational opportunities for young people is one of our primary goals, as provided in our mission statement."
This year's co-production will include scenes from Rodgers and Hammerstein's Oklahoma, Richard Strauss' Der Rosenkavalier, Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor, and Mozart's Cosi fan tutte, followed by the complete Suor Angelica.
Suor Angelica is one of three short operas by Puccini, collectively known as Il Trittico. The story is that of a nun who has been forced to enter the cloister after having had a child out of wedlock. She is torn by grief at not being able to see her child.
Angelica's aunt, the princess, comes to the convent and demands that Angelica sign away her share of her parents' inheritance. The younger sister is to be married and the money is needed for her dowry. When Sister Angelica asks about her child, the princess reveals that he has died. Stricken, Angelica agrees to give up her inheritance. Soon thereafter she brews a poisonous drink and takes it. She repents her rash deed, and as she expires a chorus of angels appears with the Virgin Mary, who holds Angelica's son by the hand.
Performances this spring are scheduled for March 8 and 9 at 7:30pm, and March 10 at 2pm in the Pavilion at Cal Poly. Tickets are $10 general admission, $6 for students.
The Met Live in HD
The Met Live in HD continues in February with performances of Wagner's Götterdämmerung February 11, beginning early at 9:00am and Verdi's Ernani on February 25, beginning at 10:00am.
Gotterdammerung (Twilight of the Gods) is the conclusion of Wagner's monumental four-opera cycle The Ring of the Nibelungs. Interestingly, it was also the beginning of Wagner's ideas for The Ring. The original sketch was entitled "Siegfried's Death," and told the story of a great hero's death. But as Wagner composed the libretto, which he called the "poem," he became aware that the mythic scope of his story required a more expansive musical and dramatic vehicle; hence the four operas.
In closing out the Ring cycle, Wagner composed one of the grandest operas seen to that time. In the course of this opera we will have a luminous love scene near the beginning, a triumphal boat trip down the Rhine with alpine horns announcing a hero's arrival, Brünnhilde riding her steed onto Siegfried's funeral pyre, Valhalla in flames, and the Rhine overflowing its banks!
The Met's new production will be led by Jay Hunter Morris in the role of Siegfried and Deborah Voigt as Brünnhilde. The Met's music director and resident conductor, James Levine, has stepped aside for the remainder of the season, due to serious back problems. Principal guest conductor Fabio Luisi will lead the opera.
Verdi's Ernani, composed in 1844, is one of his most successful early operas. Based on Victor Hugo's romantic play Hernani, it is the tale of three powerful men who all want to marry the lady Elvira – Ernani, a bandit, Don Carlo, King of Spain, and Don Ruy Gomez de Silva, uncle of Elvira. In a tangle of romantic, social, and political intrigue, Silva and Ernani call a temporary truce in order to conspire against Don Carlo and Silva spares Ernani's life. Ernani vows, however, to forfeit his life when Silva requires him to do so. Thus, on the eve of his marriage to Elvira, Ernani is called to account. In accordance with his word of honor, he stabs himself and dies in Elvira's arms.
Verdi scholar Julian Budden considers this opera a real breakthrough in its treatment of the male voice parts, his male "archetypes:" "the granite-like monochrome bass (Silva). . .the heroic tenor, lyrical, ardent, despairing (Ernani), and — partaking of both natures, now zephyr, now hurricane — the Verdi baritone (Carlo), the greatest vehicle of power in Italian opera. Ernani is built out of the clash of these three voice-types, each setting the other more and more strongly in relief."
