Is #AtGdeathdesire a new genre?

Posted on May 21, 2015 by barczablog

The word “new” is getting old pretty fast.  It’s used every time we encounter something a bit different. Nowadays everything is either retro, new or some combination of the two.  I am hesitant about using the word in the headline even though it’s probably apt: for once.
Toronto’s Against the Grain Theatre presented a sampler from their latest project Death & Desire (coming June 2nd – 5th) under the auspices of the Canadian Opera Company’s free noon-hour concert today at the Richard Bradshaw Amphitheatre.  Death & Desire combines songs from Schubert’s Die Schöne Müllerin and Messiaen’s Harawi in one program.

Some works are puzzles to be solved.  Here for instance is a performance I found on youtube of one of the songs in Harawi to suggest that the puzzle has several solutions.  There’s nothing wrong with it, but it pales alongside what I heard today, not so much a solution to the puzzle as a declaration of puzzlement. 

“AtG” as they’re known have already partnered with the Canadian Opera Company at the Banff School the past two summers, and the distinction between the COC and AtG might be getting a bit blurry.

  • We heard AtG Music director Topher Mokrzewski at the piano, so recently a member of the COC’s musical staff
  • We heard introductory words from AtG AD Joel Ivany, soon to direct the COC’s Carmen
  • It was a delight to once again hear Krisztina Szabó singing challenging 20th century rep.  With one performance left in the COC‘s Erwartung, which I called “one of the strongest performances of any COC season,” her next stop is AtG on June 2nd.

AtG have a reputation for adventurous programming, having brought la boheme to the Tranzac Club, Messiah to a rock music venue including brilliant choreography, Pelléas et Mélisande to an outdoor courtyard location, among several forays into rethinking the ways and means of live performance.  A few weeks ago I watched a workshop of Mozart’s Requiem that challenged the performers, leaving me wondering how it will look in its final form.

When I heard that Death & Desire would incorporate song cycles by Schubert and Messiaen I was eager to hear what they’d do, certain that the encounter between the old and new would serve to both invigorate the more recent work while refreshing the overly familiar older one.  I am glad they decided to try interspersing the two works, which has the potential for the creation of a new genre.

Just as it’s said that all philosophy is mere footnotes to Plato (Google tells me Alfred North Whitehead said that), we have some interesting debts to the poets & musicians who came before us.  In a real sense every song cycle seems to build upon the foundation laid by Schubert.  I envisaged that when we began, we’d be exploring that debt, as indeed two of the first songs were “Das Wandern” and “Wohin”.  The burbling waters created by Schubert in these songs seem to turn up in other compositions, Messiaen included.  When Rachmaninoff offers his piano paraphrase of the latter song, it’s as a well-known tune that he puts it before us, an adaptation not so very different from a famous singer or musician’s cover of a jazz standard. 

The two singers – Szabó in the Messiaen and Stephen Hegedus in the Schubert—begin far from one another.  I didn’t expect they would encounter one another, perhaps because in my literal-mindedness I saw one piece as foundational of romance, the other as very daring and modern.

Silly me, I should have realized.  Indeed the two do encounter one another.  So far at least (in the sample I saw) Ivany & the AtG adaptation aka Death & Desire have an interesting way of putting these two people in the same world.  Of course I should recognize that the narrative thread of the Schubert, while rooted in the early 19th century, is still a fairly reasonable description of male romance in the 21st century, whereas the subtleties of rational and irrational expression found in the Messiaen, that leave Hegedus and the archaic heterosexual males gasping in its wake? they are boldly contemporary.

For example Hegedus sings “Mein” whereby Schubert (or Ivany) would tell us what’s on his young lover’s brain.   

If you weren’t already impressed with Szabó for her work in Erwartung, Messiaen seals the deal.  Even the most authentic & officially authorized performance of “Doundou Tchil” (the same song I cited above) with a piano part played by Messiaen’s widow Yvonne Loriod pales alongside what i heard today in Toronto. Yes it’s odd to cite other performances, but they’re not as good.   You must go see what Ivany, an obstreperous Szabó and a silent, frustrated Hegedus make of this fascinating composition, as if giving an in-your-face reply to the innocent adolescent maleness of “Mein”.   Just as the two COC works she’s concluding –Erwartung and Bluebeard—are essentially battles between male and female, so too with Death & Desire.  I don’t know how it’s going to end, but as of this afternoon, the 21st century female seemed to be slam-dunking the 19th century male all over the basketball court, aka the RBA performance space.

The one i didn’t really mention is the key. Topher Mokrzewski doesn’t just play this music, he enacts it, playfully working with Messiaen.  If someone can coax Peter Oundjian to see this perhaps he’d discover the logical soloist for the Toronto Symphony to play Messiaen’s Turangalila, which is where Topher’s brain was recently (out west).  The meeting between Schubert & Messiaen begins at the piano, and it’s a loving encounter.

I’m curious to see what AtG does with the other songs, how they stage it, light it and dress it.

And I’m curious where this leads us.  As with the “Doundou Tchil” that was so electrifying, the combination of works opens up all sorts of interpretive possibilities, for irony and self-reference, and all sorts besides.  One could be very funny and/or parodic doing something like this, although I suspect that won’t be their first impulse.

Death & Desire is on June 2nd – 5th at the Neubacher  Schor Gallery, 5 Brock Avenue.

 

Posted in Music and musicology, Opera, Reviews | 4 Comments

Brecht, Music and Culture: Hanns Eisler in Conversation

Posted on May 20, 2015 by barczablog

I have a fondness for interviews, having conducted quite a few on this blog, but I can only look on in awe

  • when I see someone capable of asking really good questions
  • when I see someone capable of making really good answers.

Two heads are better than one, or so it seems when we encounter dialectic.  I suppose I was mindful too of the advantages of two minds working collaboratively as I read the Hutcheons’ book Four Last Songs on Saturday, a book that hijacked my attention, pulling me away from the other book I was reading, which happened to be an explicit conversation (whereas FLS was perhaps distilled from the ongoing conversation between Linda & Michael).

It’s new even though it’s old.

  • Composer Hanns Eisler had conversations with Hans Bunge between 1958 and 1962
  • They were published in German in 1975 as Hanns Eisler Gespräche mit Hans Bunge. Fragen Sie mehr über Brecht, which could be translated as “Hanns Eisler talks to Hans Bunge.  Ask me about Brecht”.
  • And they were just translated in 2014 by Sabine Berendse and Paul Clements, published as Brecht, Music and Culture: Hanns Eisler in Conversation with Hans Bunge (which I shall refer to as BMC)

click for more information or to buy

Let me add, that I am again in awe of the Edward Johnson Building’s library, the collection for the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Music.  Currently I have Harawi (Messiaen) and Die Schöne Mullerin (Schubert) out in anticipation of Against the Grain’s June show, Rachmaninoff piano concerti 2 & 3, as I listen to a new recording i picked up, the Mendelssohn violin concerto (for a recent concert), and songs from Des Knaben Wunderhorn by Mahler, that figured in a recent church service.  I can’t recall the last time I looked unsuccessfully for something in this library.  They regularly have amazing new books on display, where (for example) I’ve also found another fabulous book about Liszt.

A library is a pretense for virtual conversation, the dialectic of minds meeting books.  The magic of a library lies in the oxymoron of a repository for thousands of personalities in a safe retreat for introverts, a silent agora jammed full of virtual people.

The title on the book makes it clear that while Bunge interrogated Eisler, there’s another key figure here, namely Bertolt Brecht, the great man at the centre of many of the questions and the reason for the interview.    I wonder if drama scholars –or the book-purchasers for the drama collections at the university—know about this book, which could easily fly under their radar. I suppose that is one reason I wanted to write this, to alert my friends & colleagues about this remarkable book.

But it’s in the Music Library because Eisler is also a great man, albeit one with a lower profile than Brecht.  I can’t forget the whole question of the life-choices of artists–so prominent in the Hutcheons’ book—as I look at Eisler, a man whose story would make a wonderful film or opera.

  • He fought in the First World War
  • He was a student of Arnold Schoenberg
  • In spite of his rigorous training, he chose to turn his back on serious music, seeking instead to write music that would appeal to the average person.
  • Like his friend Brecht, he was a Communist
  • He came to America, writing music for several films
  • He wrote one of the first theoretical studies of film music “Composing for the Films”, co-written with Theodor Adorno
  • He left America after a run-in with the House Un-American Activities Committee
  • He went to the DDR (East Germany) immediately after the war, composer of the DDR national anthem.
  • He came into conflict with the Communists of East Germany too

You’d never know from this book that Eisler was prone to depression, but perhaps like many comedians, wit is a defence mechanism against depression.  The conversations sparkle without any evidence of depression: at least at this point in his life.

Brecht was his life-long friend & collaborator, first in Germany before the Second World War, then in America, and again in East Germany after Eisler was deported in 1948.  In this series of conversations we encounter Brecht via Eisler.  Bunge orchestrated a series of conversations meant to cover a variety of topics, encouraging Eisler to speak at length, showing his fascinating combination of intellectual acuity and moral fire, a political thinker in every aspect of his art.

So for example, Bunge asks Eisler to talk about Brecht’s understanding of music as well as his taste.  The replies range across several topics, giving us insight into how Brecht’s mind works.  Eisler was a professor, accustomed to speaking at length, and usually with lots to say.  I will offer a single large quote to give some idea of the way Eisler ranges across disciplines & topics.

Brecht never went to concerts because you weren’t allowed to smoke there, and besides, he had a lot on – although I have to admit he did make exceptions.  If a concert piece by one of his friends was performed, he suddenly appeared—I never sent him an invitation—and listened to it.  He did this because, as I said, he possessed a Chinese politeness.  His taste in music was excellent –with one weakness.  You have to understand that Brecht saw all the arts, equal as they all are, from the viewpoint of a playwright, a dramatist.  Art only existed for him in terms of its usefulness; this is what he was interested in.  He found the music of Johann Sebastian Bach useful and he also looked for this quality in music beyond the context of the theatre.  Furthermore, he admired Mozart very much.  He liked certain Turkish Chinese and Algerian music; flamenco, as in folk music; or the ancient and stylistically formal music of ancient China.  I once played him a record –‘the Virgin on the Seven Stars’, or was it the Seven Virgins on One star?”—which thrilled him bcause of the way in which the texts were receited.  And he admired Spanish flamenco.

He never knew what to make of Beethoven.(…)

Indeed, he also read for the most part only what he could use. As he got older, Brecht, who was a highly educated, brilliantly educated man (his education in some areas was astonishingly deep), read only those things that he could use, either for information or as a stimulus to thought.  He read certain academic books for this purpose alone.  Brecht wasn’t an ‘art for art’s sake’ reader; even crime novels, which he read with touching dedication, interested him like a game of chess—how do you weave together the threads of a story? Brecht studied crime novels in order to answer this question, and he always complained loudly to me if he found out in the middle of a book, that he had already read it three times and had just forgotten it.  He’d put it aside.  It was an eternal battle: “aren’t there any new crime novels?” was Brecht’s almost daily cry and all his friends were continually on the lookout.

Apart from that, he also read very difficult things. He was very interested in physics and had a strong mathematical ability even though he didn’t have any formal training in mathematics—it was the same in music.

Sometimes we’re in the realm of popular art, as when we hear of the humiliations of Brecht’s working life in Hollywood, including an encounter with Daryl F Zanuck, head of 20th Century Fox.  Or Eisler gives us something more theoretical concerning Brecht’s politics or dramaturgy.  Eisler speaks about his collaborations with Brecht, music he wrote for plays they did together.  It’s highly entertaining hearing about the famous people they encountered – Chaplin, Odets, Schoenberg, Toller, Reinhardt, WH Auden and many more.  Yes there’s a ton of name dropping but first and foremost we’re in the presence of a great man –Eisler–speaking of one of the titans of the 20th century.

I have to finish the book before anyone else can take it out.

Posted in Books & Literature, Music and musicology, Personal ruminations & essays | 2 Comments

Four Last Songs: aging, creativity and the meaning of life

Posted on May 18, 2015 by barczablog

Click for further information and for link to purchase book

The cover picture shows Giuseppe Verdi sitting with a reflective expression on his face while he plays the piano. The book’s title is Four Last Songs: Aging and Creativity in Verdi, Strauss, Messiaen and Britten, the latest collaboration between Linda & Michael Hutcheon, and I believe it is their deepest work yet.

As usual the work is multi-disciplinary, another interesting meeting place for a couple who come from divergent disciplines. He was a doctor and professor, she was an English professor and literary theorist, both at the University of Toronto. It is no wonder that these two students of conversation (he in his home department of Medicine, Respirology Division, she in her study of discourse itself) should be sharing their masterful conversation with us.

Previously that has meant books such as

  • Opera: Desire, Disease, Death (1996)
  • Bodily Charm: Living Opera (2000)
  • Opera: The Art of Dying (2004).

Their books look at life & death and the fascinating boundary between the two, especially when opera is so often situated right on the interface.

There can be several reasons why this book seems to hit me at a deeper level than the previous ones. Perhaps it begins with my awareness that we’re all getting older. Linda & Michael are now retired. My history with Linda is lengthy, the book Irony’s Edge, a graduate seminar on the multi-disciplinarity of opera, and the Opera Exchange series with the Canadian Opera Company representing delightful encounters over at least a couple of decades. Perhaps all four books are equally weighty, but for me this one seems genuinely momentous, and indeed catching me a bit by surprise. Their other books were entertaining but I think with this one there is something else at work.

While the title suggests Richard Strauss’s familiar “Four Last Songs”, the book studies the compositional choices of four different composers coming to the end of their lives, so that in effect we are looking at four different last songs:

  • Giuseppe Verdi’s Falstaff
  • Richard Strauss’s final compositions, including Capriccio, the Four Last Songs, Metamorphosen, and his second horn concerto
  • Olivier Messiaen’s Saint François d’Assise,
  • Benjamin Britten’s Death in Venice

While we’re ostensibly reading about aging composers and their late compositions, we are encountering them in context. For each composer we are enquiring into the meaning of life: their life, and indeed, any life. Perhaps it is because the focus this time is less the creations than the creators, in these case-studies of the composers themselves and the questions they each faced of how a life can be lived: questions we all must face.

This baby-boomer has been hearing about our aging cohort and the relevance of gerontology for almost as long as I’ve been aware of our cohort, that collective bulge in the population gradually moving its way from youthful rebellion to maturity, success, middle-aged comfort, and now with retirement staring us squarely in the face. I thought I knew what aging was, what the issues were, but after reading Four Last Songs, I recognize how much there is to know, how two-dimensional our cultural assumptions concerning aging truly are. A good analysis is ultimately a kind of deconstruction, and by telling me so much concerning what age and life do not actually mean, Four Last Songs is a book deconstructing our assumptions about aging. Many of our generalizations are wrong.

There are some moments reading this book that I was distracted from the subjects –the composers that is—in my thoughts about how this is relevant to my own life, the people I know who are aging, and yes, my own life choices. I’m grateful for the gift of some new language that I will incorporate into my conversation, and perhaps also into my life narrative. I needed to encounter “Vollendungsoper”: an idea via Constance Rooke (who spoke of the Vollendungsroman), whereby the Hutcheons posit the opposite to the Bildungsoper (or Bildungsroman, the old story idea of the novel of the youth coming of age). This is a story of completion or winding-up, whether it’s the completion to the life of the protagonist or the finale to the career of author or composer.

As far as the critique concerning late style –which segues us back into a discussion of opera, rather than the meaning of life—I like this passage for the way it problematizes the big pronouncements of the critic:

Because, as we have seen in the first chapter, late style is a matter of reception, critics cannot resist seeing and hearing in these last works the “style” of a dying man. But what they mean by “style” is never clear: sometimes it is thematic, while at other times it is formal, or even a matter of a perceived tone or mood. Whatever it is, as we have noted, it is always an interpretation, a projection, in a way, of the critic who knows these are the last works.

Michael & Linda Hutcheon

The Hutcheons have left me with a healthy skepticism concerning sweeping generalizations, even if when I look in the mirror –or re-read what I am saying about their book (which is roughly the same thing)—I seem to be guilty of wielding the same broom. Four Last Songs is at times as accessible as pop culture yet very careful in its language, scholarly in its research and in the conclusions it draws. Age and aging are concepts to be used with care, particularly now –in this era of “60 is the new 40”—when so many of our assumptions are being re-thought or jettisoned outright.

Yet for all its probing questions there are still the composers.  In the final analysis Four Last Songs is an extremely inspiring study of a heroic quartet.

Posted in Books & Literature, Music and musicology, Opera, Reviews | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

Ensemble Barber an initiation

Posted on May 16, 2015 by barczablog

This was my third look at the Canadian Opera Company Barber of Seville but through a very particular lens.

Each season the COC gives over one of their performances to their Ensemble Studio, the talented young singers who are serving a brief apprenticeship with the company before launching their careers.  The Barber we saw tonight was a very special performance.  The energy in the theatre is completely different, the vibrant electricity of youth.  They will attempt everything that a director asks with a commitment you will not see from seasoned professionals. Each of them had at least one scary moment with the orchestra, as conductor Rory Macdonald seemed to welcome them to the big leagues, thinking of the way experienced pitchers will welcome rookies with a pitch that narrowly misses your head.  But instead of aiming a fastball at their ear, Macdonald merely aimed a full orchestra at them playing very fast, with no mercy for those who dragged or missed their cue.  Each of the soloists had at least a momentary misconnection with Macdonald, possibly because the conductor had been accustomed to racing through his Rossini with the other casts (who had weeks to get accustomed to Madonald, not just a few hours) like a bat out of hell, and was not going to adjust for the youngsters suddenly impersonating Rosina, Almaviva, Figaro, Bartolo, or Basilio.  Yet each in turn made their adjustments, showing that they were indeed ready for prime time.

This was a brave bold performance, and as seen in previous ensemble performances, at times more adventurous than the regular cast.  Both of the young Ensemble tenors—Andrew Haji in Act I and  Jean-Philippe Fortier-Lazure in Act II—dared to hit a high C (which the other tenor in the show did not attempt), even if they also cracked at least one note.   Yet these two were probably the voices that had the closest match to what Rossini likely would have wanted.  But while one cannot expect every voice to be a perfect match, everyone threw themselves into the physical comedy, the requirements of the singing and the characterization.  It was surely a valuable learning experience.   Iain MacNeil seemed accomplished beyond his years, brilliant a few days ago in the noon-hour sample (as duly noted), but that much more confident with costume & orchestra, and a big repertoire of different voices & facial expressions.  Bass-baritone Gordon Bintner was a deadpan Basilio (getting a very different sort of laugh than what I saw from the other cast, with his “La calunnia ” or in the wonderfully tight quartet “Buona sera”).  Charlotte Burrage had several lovely moments, both vocally and dramatically.  Clarence Frazer was willing to attempt a few amusing effects not seen from the regular cast Figaro.  And Karine Boucher seems to have a genuine flair for comedy, making the most interesting expression as she tipped us off that it was time for her aria, ostentatiously stepping into the spotlight.

(l-r) Clarence Frazer as Figaro, Andrew Haji as Count Almaviva, Charlotte Burrage as Rosina, Gordon Bintner as Don Basilio, Karine Boucher as Berta and Iain MacNeil as Doctor Bartolo in the Ensemble Studio performance of the Canadian Opera Company’s production of The Barber of Seville, 2015. director Joan Font, set and costume designer Joan Guillén ( Photo: Michael Cooper)

(l-r) Clarence Frazer as Figaro, Andrew Haji as Count Almaviva, Charlotte Burrage as Rosina, Gordon Bintner as Don Basilio, Karine Boucher as Berta and Iain MacNeil as Doctor Bartolo in the Ensemble Studio performance of the Canadian Opera Company’s production of The Barber of Seville, 2015. director Joan Font, set and costume designer Joan Guillén ( Photo: Michael Cooper)

I think I saw much in this version that seemed to validate the production, as though the willingness of the young singers to take direction means that we got a better look at what director Joan Font actually wanted.  The busy troupe of extras & chorus meshed beautifully with the energetic ensemble in a way that I did not see in either of the previous performances I attended.  I had the impression previously that the occasional dumb-show of extras (for example in arias from Basilio and Berta) upstaged the singers, whereas tonight there was a much better chemistry.

Or maybe I am finally getting it.

The COC spring season is into its final week, with performances of the Lepage double bill (Bluebeard and Erwartung) and Barber.  This seems like the logical time for the Ensemble Studio performance, a bit like the convocations we see at universities around this time of year, followed by a summer holiday.  They have earned their rest.

Posted in Opera, Reviews | 2 Comments

MYSTERY MURDER MADNESS for Mother’s Day with Robert Lepage’s Bluebeard / Erwartung

Posted on May 11, 2015 by barczablog

Director Robert Lepage (Canadian Press photo)

When the advertising screams out “MYSTERY MURDER MADNESS” you know it’s going to be a dark afternoon at the Four Seasons Centre even if it’s Mother’s Day.  But Dr Freud would approve the use of upper case.

The operas are Bartok’s Bluebeard’s Castle and Schonberg’s Erwartung.  Robert Lepage first directed these two short works (with designs from Michael Levine) for the Canadian Opera Company back in the early 1990s at the O’Keefe Centre,  where it was revived at least twice since that time.  This week marks the first time that these landmark productions have been staged in the intimate confines of the Four Seasons Centre.

They’re a matched set, complementary opposites if you will.

  • Both concern a troubled individual, one of each gender
  • Bluebeard comes from the outside in, as a woman interrogates her new husband about his past, while Erwartung starts on the inside, subjectivities writ large and acted out by doubles and acrobats
  • One could be seen as symbolist while the other is expressionist
  • Both show human relationships as a kind of battleground, and yes there’s lots of blood

I remember loving this in the old hall because it worked from any vantage point, distant or close-up.  Lepage & Levine seemed to have understood the weaknesses of the big barn where the COC used to play, creating a series of powerful images to match the works.   In the smaller hall?  It’s a mixed blessing.  While you’d expect it simply to be more intense up close that’s not always the case.  In the old space our inevitably distant vantage made everything universal & symbolic, images that in close proximity become fascinating yet problematic.  The fellow beside me giggled through much of Erwartung, because we were close enough to be able to see how it was done. While it’s mostly marvelous you don’t always get magic.  When Bluebeard stares at his castle in the distance both at the beginning and end of the opera, an effect that mesmerized me in the old space, this time alas it reminded me of the 36” Stonehenge in This is Spinal Tap.  I guess i was too close, which meant I was able to see everything clearly that previously was dim and dream-like.

Lepage is still very much the focus –no matter how you respond to his images and direction—in a show that employs so many clever effects to tell the stories.  I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve seen these shows and they haven’t lost their lustre, still as meaningful as ever, or as Lepage says in his program note

Today Bluebeard’s Castle and Erwartung still feel pertinent both in their  form and content as Bluebeard’s dominion of blood withers away and Erwartung’s  new way of understanding the world is emerging.

Even so I was inclined to think of Johannes Debus as the real star.  The pace of the Bartok was quite spirited, building relentlessly through the music associated with doors four, five and six, gorgeous sound as overpowering as the images we were seeing.  Curious?  you should investigate the opera, (if not actually coming to see this production) where Bluebeard’s new wife Judith demands to see what’s behind each of seven doors, discovering more than she bargained for.  With the opening of each door we’re in a new sound-world, although there are resemblances between a few, especially once Judith starts noticing that the treasures inside are tainted.

Debus’ first downbeat to begin Erwartung lands at the precise instant that the psychiatrist puts pen to paper.  Where Bluebeard is largely in a symbolist style, Erwartung is expressionist.  Bluebeard and his wife have a mythic encounter, two figures singing at one another, while the mysteries behind each locked door are never actually seen by the audience –until the last door opens that is—except via the suggestive orchestral greek chorus. For Erwartung in contrast, the pathology of the woman onstage is externalized.  Her obsessions materialize on the stage, sometimes in the form of naked bodies, sometimes at odd angles on walls.  This is some of the same stage-craft we’ve seen from Lepage more recently in Needles and Opium, where acrobatic performance techniques usually associated with circus (and incidentally, getting Lepage all sorts of condescension from those unwilling to take him seriously) become part of a new expressive vocabulary.

(l-r) Mark Johnson as the Psychiatrist, Krisztina Szabó as the Woman and Noam Markus as the Lover in the Canadian Opera Company production of Erwartung, 2015. (Photo: Michael Cooper)

(l-r) Mark Johnson as the Psychiatrist, Krisztina Szabó as the Woman and Noam Markus as the Lover in the Canadian Opera Company production of Erwartung, 2015. (Photo: Michael Cooper)

It’s startling to realize how long ago Lepage first came to the COC, to take stock of the actual passage of time.  Generations of singers have come and gone at the COC.  Russell Braun (who’s starred in several productions recently) is the son of Victor Braun, one of the previous Bluebeards for the COC.  John Relyea, another second generation star and son of longtime COC stalwart Gary Relyea, is the powerful Bluebeard in the new production and the face on the posters.  Relyea also starred as Mephistopheles in Lepage’s Damnation de Faust, his first production at the Metropolitan Opera.   Ekaterina Gubanova was a great match for Relyea as Bluebeard’s wife Judith, enacting the cautionary tale of the curious wife asking one too many questions about her husband.

Krisztina Szabó was The Woman in Erwartung, a most difficult role to sing even without the additional phantasmagoria from Lepage.   In this production the slightest implications of the text are actualized all around The Woman.  We watch someone tiptoe along the dividing line between subjective and objective, pulled in several directions by what’s going on around her, a tension that’s especially magical.  Szabó gives one of the strongest performances of any COC season, by turns raving and dangerous, or vulnerable and even child-like. In short she’s unforgettable.

So  while it probably wasn’t the ideal outing for your aged mom, the Lepage double bill is still edgy more than 20 years later.  It’s a perfect first opera for a young person, especially one who doesn’t believe the form can be cool.  Take them to see Erwartung and Bluebeard and watch them change their mind about opera.

Posted in Opera, Reviews | Leave a comment

10 Questions for Alex Fallis

Posted on May 9, 2015 by barczablog

Alex Fallis is a Toronto native who has been a part of the Canadian professional theatre for over thirty years. He is an actor, director, singer and teacher. As a performer and director, he has experience in opera, musical theatre, new Canadian work, classical works and performance art. He has performed at the Shaw Festival, Canstage, Charlottetown Festival, Young Peoples’ Theatre, the Citadel, the Belfry, VideoCabaret, and other theatres, as well as in Asia and Europe. He has acted in and directed shows in school gyms, parks, and vacant lots, as well as more usual theatre spaces. He received a Dora nomination for his performance as Feste in Twelfth Night (Dream in High Park), and toured Asia playing Monsieur Andre in the Livent/Really Useful production of Phantom of the Opera. He is highly experienced in new and collaborative work- he directed and co-created Seamless Songs with Madhouse Theatre (Doors Open Toronto 2005, and the Ottawa Fringe Festival), The Immigrant Years (U. of T.), and Johann’s Cabinet of Wonders, a one-man show (Summerworks). He has been involved in the development of pieces through Native Earth Performing Arts, nightswimming, Canadian Rep, YPT, Praxis Theatre, and the Canadian Stage Company, as well as colleges and universities. Alex was part of the directorial team (with Fides Krucker and Heidi Strauss) for Unfinished Passage at Humber College. He also recently directed The Caucasian Chalk Circle at the University of Waterloo, using a new Canadian score and translation. He is a highly respected teacher, and is at ease in both the studio and the lecture hall. He was the Theatre History instructor at George Brown College and Humber College for over 10 years, and has taught at Laurentian University, the University of Toronto, the University of Guelph, Sheridan College, Claude Watson School of the Arts, and the Charlottetown Festival. He has been a Guest Professor at Memorial University in Corner Brook, Newfoundland since 2011. In 2012, he co-direct the electro-acoustic opera Julie Sits Waiting for Good Hair Day Productions at Theatre Passe Muraille (which received 5 Dora Award nominations, including best production). He has a number of projects in development, including the electro-acoustic theatre piece Dive, and within a fortnight, a production of The Play of Daniel with The Toronto Consort, opening May 22nd .

On the occasion of Toronto Consort’s production of The Play of Daniel, I ask Fallis ten questions: five about himself and five more about the project.

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

I always find this a difficult question, especially as I grow older. I have usually thought that I was more like my mother, who had a more obvious interest in the arts, really gave me my sense of social justice, and seemed more supportive of people who were finding their own way (like artists). As well, like many in my generation, my relationship with my father was sometimes fraught – with disagreements over politics, personal lifestyle choices, etc. However, as I have grown older (and have now been a father myself for more than 20 years) I have started to see more of my father’s virtues in retrospect, and hope that some of those have rubbed off on me.

Alex Fallis

Alex Fallis

2) What is the best thing about what you do?

I think that the best thing about being in the arts is variety. Sometimes that is frustrating- one takes lots of jobs just to stay in the game (and pay the bills), but it also means that you are exposed to a HUGE variety of forms (I have worked in contemporary music and musicals, classical theatre, Canadian work, commercial musicals, and on and on) with a huge variety of people. I also teach at colleges and universities which I like for the research aspect especially- I am constantly seeing new things, new ways that people think. In the arts you can really see the world unfold, sometimes positively and sometimes negatively, and it keeps you active and alert. I love that.

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



My tastes are very wide-ranging. I see a LOT of theatre, that would be my main ‘watching’ experience, but I also enjoy a sporting event from time to time, too. Because of my family ties, I also feel quite connected to music performance in Toronto and see a number of concerts in a year. Toronto is a city where there is never a night where there isn’t a real choice of interesting performance, and I try to keep up, but it is really impossible.

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

Well, being from a musical family, and involved in the arts, I wish I had stuck with a keyboard instrument for longer as a kid. David (my brother who is a bit older than me) was always better at the piano, and I think I didn’t really want to compete, so I played cello and sang. But piano would be very useful (and enjoyable) for my theatre work as well as in the more musical work I do. That and having the time to REALLY learn to cook.

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

I have taught in Newfoundland over the last four years, and really fell in love with being in the out of doors again. I did a lot of camping when I was young (til my mid-twenties), and being in Newfoundland has really brought that back. I have made a habit of taking a lot of day hikes around Western Newfoundland, and I don’t think much could make me happier or more relaxed.

*******

Five more about the upcoming Toronto Consort production of The Play of Daniel.

1-The upcoming production of The Play of Daniel is in a new translation by your brother David Fallis, the Artistic Director of Toronto Consort. Please talk about this new translation, what David told you about the challenges this entailed, and what you can tell us about what we should expect when we come to see/hear the production.

The Play of Daniel was written in medieval Latin (with some medieval French thrown in), in a very rhymy, sing-song rhythm. As part of the aim of this project was to create a piece that had more immediate appeal to a 21st century audience, it was decided to do the show in English (which is actually very rare in the period music world). All the translations we found were very literal and seemed to lose the fun of rhyme and rhythm, which I wasn’t very pleased about. So David undertook to translate it, and I think he has done a great job. It has a certain elegance (words like ’laud’ and ‘proffer’ appear), but includes a lot of close rhyme. I think this makes the language more fun and really gives it a strong pulse and forward motion. We are also including bits of Latin (and also the shreds of medieval French) to keep a bit of a medieval and other worldly quality.

2- Please talk about what you understand by historically informed performance styles, and your objectives with Toronto Consort.

As I said above, one of David’s main aims for the project was to bring the play into the 21st century. For me, that meant maintaining the spirit of celebration and community fun that is in the original (it is thought that the play was originally performed during the Christmas season and is associated with the Feast of Fools). So we are not aiming for ‘historical accuracy’ in any strict way. I continue to be inspired by the ‘medievalness’ of the dramaturgy, music and characters, but I hope that we are also doing the show in a way that delights and engages the audience in Toronto, today.

3- Please talk about the joys of working with your brother David (have you collaborated before?), and what he brings to the process of making music and creating theatre.

Toronto Consort Artistic Director David Fallis

David and I have only worked together a few times over the years. He has helped me choose music for a show, I have sung in his choirs, but this is the largest piece we have worked on together, and this one is intended to be more collaborative. I can say that he knows his stuff! I certainly can’t ask for a more informed collaborator on Medieval Music. As the Artistic Director of the Consort, he has made very clear his aims for the show, but has allowed me to find designers and performers I trust and think will bring great work to this project. He has a very open mind about the possible ways to achieve his goals for the project, and has been very encouraging about finding interesting ways to bring the piece to life.

4- Please talk about the religious aspect of a work like The Play of Daniel, and your own perspective presenting this in a church where you have a direct family history.

As you note, I have had a relationship with the building of Trinity- St. Paul’s since before my birth. My grandfather was the minister there in the 30s and it was (and still is for some) our family church. So it feels extremely familiar in one way, but I am also trying to use the building in new ways. I definitely have a strong, clear relationship to the space, and I feel very much at home there. It is a beautiful space, and especially after the recent renovations, music sounds fantastic there. Much like an old piece of wood furniture (or a musical instrument) that has been worn smooth by being used, loved and touched by many hands, there is a real sensual pleasure to working in the space.

Trinity -St Paul’s (click for more information about the venue)

While I have a lot of issues with organizational religion (especially when groups decide that religion is really about rules, and deciding what is right or wrong), I have never had a problem with the celebratory, community side that I think is really at the heart of most religious music. There is something extremely wonderful and powerful about people getting together and singing (which can be seen in the current craze for amateur choirs that do non-religious material). So in The Play of Daniel we have one of the earliest examples of that in the European tradition. We go all the way back to the 12th or 13th century, when people were just figuring out how to write music down, and what do we find? People creating a piece that is full of humour, bad jokes, celebration, fun storytelling, and great music. I find the piece full of the simple pleasure of getting together, creating something, and having musical fun. And that is what I hope the project brings to 2015. We have approximately 40 performers, ranging in age from about 10- 65- it is a community event, and that is very close to what the spiritual means to me.

5) Is there a teacher or an influence you’d care to name that you especially admire?

David Parry getting outfought by John Mayberry in a long ago production of “Robin Hood and the Friar” with PLS (click for another long-ago picture of David Parry)

Certainly for my family and music, the choir director Lloyd Bradshaw was an enormously powerful and positive influence. I started singing with him when I was about 8, and sang almost continually under his direction until I was in my thirties. Again, while he was very concerned about making excellent music, he was even more concerned with making sure everyone in the choir felt a part of the whole. As a result, his choirs were great communities as much as great music-makers. Many of the things I learned in his choirs are equally applicable to theatre, and teaching.
As well, because this a Medieval piece, I would like to give a little recognition to the organization and man who taught me that Medieval theatre was a living form, and could be just as much fun as contemporary work. The Poculi Ludique Societas at U of T is the organization, and its director at the time I was involved there was David Parry (who has unfortunately passed away). He was another embodiment of community art making/play, and a constant pleasure to work with.

*******

Toronto Consort present the play of Daniel at 8 pm May 22nd and 23rd, and at 3:30 pm May 24th, at Trinity –St Paul’s Centre.

click for more information

Posted in Art, Architecture & Design, Dance, theatre & musicals, Interviews, Music and musicology, Opera | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Closer to the Barber

Posted on May 8, 2015 by barczablog

I had another look at the Canadian Opera Company’s production of The Barber of Seville, this time up close (aka my subscription seats which are in the front of the orchestra).

It’s an interpretation full of clever touches.

The sensibility of Els Comediants (the team behind the direction & design of this production) calls attention to the materialist underpinnings of the opera.  It’s not quite Marxist but most certainly putting money and wealth in the foreground of the story.  The Count Almaviva might be a nice guy, but he’s also wealthy as Croesus.  It means that while we have lots of fun in the opera, there are reminders of the darker side of life.  At moments throughout we see observers who might be street people, average souls who are outside the story watching it unfold, and in the process lending everything a little more dignity if not actual weight.  Near the beginning, when the Count sings for his beloved, he throws great wads of money at anyone in the vicinity, especially the musicians who accompany his serenade.  At the final curtain, money comes raining own on the audience in the front section.

The money that fell from the sky... but that's no Prime Minister's face on that bill.

The money that fell from the sky… but that’s no Prime Minister’s face on that bill.

It’s not real money of course, and it’s just another bit of fun.

As before, the two strongest portrayals were the chief antagonists, namely Almaviva and Bartolo, as played by Alek Shrader and Renato Girolami.  Shrader’s masquerades are slick, his coloratura delicious, his manner so attractive that even a Communist would have to forgive him for being so rich.  Girolami is a thoroughly lovable Doctor Bartolo, feeling very much the authentic buffo comedian in his singing & larger than life mugging.

New to the production on this occasion was Cecelia Hall as Rosina, who’ll sing the remaining four performance of the run (after tonight’s show).  I may be oversimplifying but I’d contrast her approach to Serena Malfi, in an emphasis on musicality & voice; where I think Malfi is funnier, Hall seems to have an amazing range, offering up a great many notes below middle C as well as lots at the top as well.  Joshua Hopkins is a lyrical bel canto voice perfectly suited to the role, energetic in his physical comedy, always with a winning smile.  Robert Gleadow probably got the most laughs per minute onstage as Don Basilio.  And Aviva Fortunata sounded even more impressive the second time, her big voice showcased in this little role in one of the more interesting casting choices of the season, her colour adding a wonderful dimension to the ensembles she’s in.

There are more casting changes ahead, plus a performance by the Ensemble Studio Friday May 15th.

If Rossini wasn't one of the Fathers of Confederation, maybe he should have been. Click for more info about the production.

If Rossini wasn’t one of the Fathers of Confederation, maybe he should have been. Click for more info about the production.

Posted in Opera, Reviews | Leave a comment

TSO on the road with Lau, Mendelssohn and Bruckner

Posted on May 7, 2015 by barczablog

Tonight’s Toronto Symphony concert was a kind of farewell before going on a short tour to Ottawa & Montreal. The Roy Thomson Hall audience heard the programme they’re taking on the road.

Each of the three works represents a special kind of challenge.

The best reception of the night? I’m not sure. It might have been the response to the most familiar work on the program, namely Mendelssohn’s violin concerto in E minor, played by young Augustin Hadelich.

Violinist Augustin Hadelich (photo: Luca Valenta)

Violinist Augustin Hadelich (photo: Luca Valenta)

Or it might have been the huge response to his encore, Paganini Caprice #5. As I listened to the encore, exquisitely articulate, sometimes soft, sometimes powerful, always bang on pitch and hugely expressive, it was as though to tell us, “sure we all like Mendelssohn’s concerto in E minor, but there’s a great deal more that a violinist can offer.”

Such as a Paganini Caprice.

Have a look.

In our recent interview he explained something about his playing. I had asked him about teachers & influences.

Some of the best teachers I had were chamber musicians: Norbert Brainin (from the Amadeus Quartet), whom my parents tracked down in Italy when I was around 12 and convinced to give me lessons, and later Joel Smirnoff (from the Juilliard Quartet) whom I studied with at Juilliard. Both of them, perhaps partially due to their chamber music background, taught the whole score, beyond just the violin part. It is amazing how many teachers, even the famous ones, do not really study and teach the orchestral scores of the great violin concertos beyond just the violin part. If you look at the violin part by itself, it seems like you have a huge amount of choices and so many different ways you could play it. But the better you know and understand the whole score, the clearer it becomes how you should play. You’ll be able to see how the composer put the piece together, what the other players are doing, and what it all means. A great composer like Mendelssohn would never write the violin melody first and separate from the ‘accompaniment’– rather, the overall harmonic processes and the expression of the violin are interconnected. Even though the violin is leading the concerto, the violinist has to listen and react to–and often also accompany–the orchestra. In the end, the way the soloist, orchestra and conductor interact in a concerto is really not that different from chamber music.

Hadelich played this concerto as though he had thought through the combined effect with the orchestra. It sounds simple, and it’s how every player should work. Yet when I think about it, I’ve heard very few violinists who seem to get this. Stern and Zukerman and Perlman for instance play this way: the most accomplished virtuosi of the past half century. They make their instrument sound beautiful with wonderful cantabile on the slow soulful passages, and bring out the key melodic highlights when necessary: but in collaboration with the orchestra. I’ve heard the outer movements played faster, yet that usually means that something is lost in terms of the clear articulation of the key moments. This dialogue with this orchestra, led by Peter Oundjian—who Hadelich reminded me was himself a violinist and therefore the ideal conductor for such repertoire—was very lucid, very direct.

To begin the orchestra played Treeship, a short work from Kevin Lau, who has been resident composer with the TSO. Sometimes compositions have fanciful programmes explaining the inspiration for the music. I don’t know that I understood the idea of “Treeship” except that the resulting composition was very entertaining, wonderfully tonal. It sounded a bit like film music in its embrace of lush harmonies such as you’d find in a film-score, instantaneous in its effects. There’s some gorgeous work for the cellos, and lots of delicate colours for winds scattered throughout. I don’t know how extensive the dialogue was between Lau and the TSO during the composition, but in Treeship he’s given them a handsome vehicle to open a concert.

To close we heard Bruckner’s 7th Symphony, a work to challenge both the orchestra & audience alike. Forgive me, I had the quintessential Toronto experience listening to this symphony tonight.

And what’s more Torontonian than to be feeling embarrassed by fellow citizens. I’ve been stirred deeply by the way Peter Oundjian has built the TSO audience, standing at the podium with his microphone addressing us across the cold gulf that is the ambience of RTH, an unwelcoming space, inspiring us and his players. He works miracles most times. For two movements of the Bruckner he had the audience listening in silence, a pair of movements of great intensity, played with fabulous commitment by the TSO, particularly the winds.

Bu it’s a long symphony, and challenges an orchestra in the subtlest ways. The fidgeting built up in the last two movements, even though the orchestra wasn’t backing down from Bruckner. Those who left –not so very many—sometimes did so noisily.  It may also have been the warmth of the the day.  There we were sitting right in front of Hadelich –who had come into the hall to listen to the Bruckner & perhaps to simply unwind after his virtuosic display—while we heard all the assorted fidgets and escapes.  I was tempted to explain to him that actually we were all tired from our hard days at work, that Bruckner is a stern test for orchestra & audience alike.

But I am grateful that Oundjian is stretching the audience with a program like this one, works that are well-suited to RTH and the skills of the symphony. We grow from such encounters.

Ottawa & Montreal will enjoy the TSO’s tour: especially Hadelich.

Posted in Music and musicology, Reviews | 3 Comments

Eitan Cornfield passes Music Mondays torch to Ian Grundy

Posted on May 6, 2015 by barczablog

Dear Friends of Music Mondays,

Our series has served as a launching pad for the best of Toronto’s emerging talent since its inception in 1992. We continue the tradition this year with an exciting lineup of performers  both familiar and soon to be familiar.

But before I reveal our brand new season, allow me to express my gratitude to the good folks at Holy Trinity Church, our magnificent performers and to you, our loyal audience for the privilege of directing this historic series. After three joyful years as Artistic Director at Music Mondays, I’ve now moved away from Toronto and, having programmed the coming season, I reluctantly relinquish the reigns. But no fear, I’ve left you in more than capable hands.

I’m happy to announce that the recently appointed  Music Director at Holy Trinity will also be assuming the duties of Artistic Director of Music  Mondays.  Ian Grundy has been active as a choral conductor, organ and harpsichord soloist in Toronto for many years. While Music Director at Christ Church Deer Park, he started a lunchtime chamber music series that has run continuously for over 15 years. Ian is also founder and conductor of VocalPoint Chamber Choir, a CBC Choral Competition national finalist three times running. He’s performed on every major concert series in Toronto, and at most major venues including Roy Thomson Hall and the Glenn Gould Studio for broadcast by the CBC.

Ian is the first to combine the roles of Music Director of Holy Trinity and Artistic Director of Music Mondays. Ian says “This fulfills one of my principal goals, which is to co-ordinate music at Holy Trinity and to enhance the already rich legacy of music at Holy Trinity and make it a cultural, musical as well as spiritual center, at the Eaton Centre – in the center of the city of Toronto. Just as many tourists flock to St. Thomas’ in NYC, or Leipzig, or St. Stefan’s in Budapest or Vienna, my vision is to see Holy Trinity as a musical destination for visitors and residents of Toronto alike. I want to continue to encourage emerging Canadian and International young musicians and give them a first rate venue and a knowledgeable and appreciative audience to perform for.”

We all wish Ian the best of luck.

Now, don’t hesitate another moment. Go to our website right now and see Music Mondays’ exciting lineup of talent for 2015. While you’re there, check out the video highlights of previous seasons on our Media page. Our 2015 season begins on May 4th  with the first of our CBC Young Artist performances. We hope you can make it – and why not bring a friend!

It’s all here:                        http://www.musicmondays.ca/

Sincerely,

Eitan Cornfield

Artistic Director ( Soon to be past)

Music Mondays
10 Trinity Square
Toronto, Ont.
M5G 1B1
416-598-4521 x223
musicmondayscs@gmail.com

Check out our website:
www.musicmondays.ca

Follow us on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/MusicMondaysToronto

*******

“Press releases and announcements” are presented verbatim without comment

Posted in Press Releases and Announcements | Leave a comment

10 Questions for Stu and Jess

Posted on May 3, 2015 by barczablog

The time is short.  Stu &Jess Productions will be presenting Ravel’s wonderful L’Heure Espagnole in Montreal the weekend of May 7-9.

Stu and Jess are Stuart Martin and Jessica Derventzis.

Conductor and pianist Stuart Martin received his Bachelors of Music at University of British Columbia under the tutelage of Dr. Terrance Dawson in Piano and Dr. Robert Taylor for conducting. In his last year, he was Assistant Conductor of The UBC Concert Winds. Stuart has also been student of Dr. Mark Shapiro at the European American Musical Alliance in Paris, France. In 2013, Stuart was the assistant conductor for Opera NUOVA’s “Don Giovanni”, and an assistant conductor at Accademia Europea Dell’Opera (AEDO) for “La Bohème”. During his time at NUOVA and AEDO he met Jessica Derventzis, and together they created Stu&Jess Productions, a chamber opera company. For their inaugural season, they produced Menotti’s “The Medium” and Bizet’s “Le Docteur Miracle” in Montreal. Just recently, they produced Ravel’s “L’Heure Espangole.” They also commissioned and premiered a new opera, “La Gioconda”, in which Stuart wrote the libretto and another NUOVA alumni, Pasquale D’Alessio, composed the music. This work has also been given a residency with Main & Station to be developed in August 2015. In the 2014 season of Opera NUOVA, he was the assistant conductor of “Candide” under Gordon Gerrard, and had the privilege of conducting the final performance. Stuart also conducted and coached the opera scenes class at the Vancouver Academy of Music for their fall and winter semesters. Coming up for the 2015/2016 season, Stu&Jess plan to produce an opera in Vancouver and Toronto.

Jessica Derventzis is a stage director from Toronto, Ontario. Originally a pianist, Jessica began her studies at Queen’s University as a music major, but quickly added theatre to her studies after accompanying rehearsals for the opera company in her first year, and falling in love with theatre. She went on to direct “Les Dialogues  des Carmélites” and “Trouble in Tahiti,” stage manage “L’Elisir D’Amore,” produce “Glengarry Glen Ross” and “Into the Woods”, design props for “Cabaret,” and become president of the Queen’s Student Opera Company.  After graduating, Jessica took over the theatre department at her old high school, Mentor College. She spent 5 years there moulding young minds and directing over 20 productions including: “Little Shop of Horrors,” “Twelve Angry Men,” “Crazy For You,” “The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee,” and Neil Simon’s “Rumors.”  Jessica also assisted at the summer opera programs Opera Nuova and AEDO. These programs introduced her to Stu Martin who quickly became her best friend and co-creative mind behind Stu&Jess Productions. So far, they have produced “The Medium,” “Le Docteur Miracle,” and “L’Heure Espagnole” together in Montreal.  Jessica also had the honour of assisting Rob Herriot on two productions with the Calgary Opera in 2014 “Candide” and “Le Portrait de Manon”. Coming up next, Stu&Jess will be writing and adapting their own works and taking their company on the road to Vancouver.

It’s almost time. Ravel’s L’Heure Espagnole goes on May 7.  I had to ask them ten questions, five about Stu & Jess, five more about the opera they’re producing.

Ravel Poster resized

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

STU:  I would love to say that I am a balance of both but that’s not true. Although I get a few things from my mom, like music, sensitivity and a good liver, I am more like my dad. My dad is a brilliant businessman. He is head strong, completely willing to struggle before coming out on top, and someone who people rely on. I find myself looking up to him and wondering how he does it, but then realizing I am that person, and it shows in the business I am building. Growing up my parents were always very supportive of music, but there wasn’t a lot of music around, except for Barbra Streisand, thanks mom. I grew up around politics, my mom is an elected politician, and business, both my dad and my brother are chartered accountants, and my sister a manager of a bank. There was this really nice balance of how to effectively talk to people, and also build a business. I took on these traits and put them towards music. Conducting needs my moms sensitivity, especially with singers, they are physically connected to their instrument, and you need to be very aware your words. Business side of conducting needs dads skills, organizing, managing, motivating and then ultimately having a successful product you can sell to people.

JESS: This is a complicated question, as I grew up with my mom and step-father, dad and step-mother, plus two very loving grandparents, so I am definitely an amalgamation of all of them. Each is also from a different part of the world, so culturally I am a mixed-bag (Greek, German, Austrian, English, and Portuguese) I find myself saying things that my dad says all the time. He swears a lot in Greek so those have become my favourite curse words- no, I won’t repeat them here! I also look much more like my dad than my mom. However, it’s my grandparents (my mom’s parents) that I think of the most when it comes to decision making, life choices, and general attitude of who I would aim “to be like”. “What would Omi and Opa think of this” pops into my head more so than any other adage.

2-What is the best thing or worst thing about your musical life?

JESS: The best thing about my musical life is that I chose to have it. I decided very early on that I would study piano at university and figure out a career after that, much to the chagrin of my family who wanted me to choose a career path that led to better job security. I’m very happy that I stuck to my guns. Luckily, playing piano for singers led me to the rehearsal hall. In turn, I became a theatre teacher and now I direct operas and run a company with one of my best friends. There are still moments where there is no contract or show on the horizon, or I consider going back to teaching, but ultimately, the fact that I am choosing to be an artist and make music my life, rocks.

STU: The best thing about my musical life, is feeling the high after a performance, or the pride I feel looking back on a production that I have poured months into. The worst thing about my musical life is waking up at 4am having whatever piece I am working on, waking me up and repeating itself incessantly. The only thing I can do to stop it from spinning is listening to David Attenborough talk about penguins or fungi.

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

STU: I listen to a lot of podcasts on history. As for music, besides “classical” I listen to anything that makes me want to sing as loudly as possible in my car. Right now, OMI-Cheerleader. I also watch a lot of documentaries.  I have exhausted every documentary in Netflix, and have watched every episode of Nova Science Now.

JESS: In high school, I always wanted to write for Rolling Stone magazine because I love pop culture and the movie Almost Famous. I listen to a lot of popular music: scour the blogs, listen to the radio, and type random things into my iTunes search to see what pops up. I love jazz music most of all and the evolution of THAT style just makes me giddy. My iPod will happily jump from Dixieland to Trombone Shorty.

My favourite TV show is Saturday Night Live. I watch that a LOT

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

JESS: Dancer/choreographer. As a director, I choreograph all the time-to a certain degree. But I’m talking, give me a brand spanking new Broadway musical, a rehearsal hall with a wall of mirrors, and a chorus of tap dancers and let me choreograph THAT! That would be amazing.

STU: I want the ability to have a conversation with my dog. That would be enlightening, especially to find out the reason why he only brings back the ball half of the time. A real skill I would love to have is picking up languages quicker. I love learning new languages, but often I start learning one language it just begins to replace the others.

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

STU:  Favourite things to do are going to the park with my dog, and drinking wine while playing board games with friends.

JESS: I’m an avid walker. Walking helps to clear my head, work through a show, or simply unwind. Especially when travelling to new cities, walking and exploring is my favourite way to spend an afternoon.

*******

Five more about staging L’Heure Espagnole  in Montreal May 7- 9.

1-Tell us about the history of your partnership, how you came to work together and the previous operas you’ve produced.

JESS:  My first encounter with Stu was in the hallways of the residence where we were both staying in Edmonton. We were both assisting at the opera training program, Opera Nuova. I was complaining about the pillow on my bed, and he overheard me and loaned me his because he had brought two of his own from home. We were friends instantly. Our friendship blossomed from there with late-night bowls of cereal, watching RuPaul’s Drag Race, and chatting about our thoughts on the opera and music worlds. Later that same summer, we both went on to do another program in Italy together called AEDO. As a budding director and conductor combo, we knew that we would spend a lot of the beginning of our careers assisting, which is very beneficial, but we were also anxious to stretch our own creative muscles, which was how Stu&Jess Productions was born. For our first production, we decided on Menotti’s “The Medium.”

An earlier production: the Medium

An earlier production: the Medium

The eerie plot and gorgeous score drew us in right away. We brainstormed singers that we knew who could pull off the challenging roles of Baba and Monica, and decided on two awesome gals who were studying at McGill at the time, Samantha Pickett and Chelsea Mahan. That is how our love affair with Montreal started. It was also when Stu and I realized how well we actually work together. We trust each other, respect each other’s work, and share the same philosophies for the rehearsal hall; we are both all about collaboration.

2-Talk about what drew you to present Ravel’s L’heure Espagnole

STU: When deciding on our next opera, it takes about 2 or 3 weeks of constant listening and reading. We started looking into a few one-acts that people had suggested, but they just didn’t stick. One rule of thumb that Jess and I go by is, if one of us doesn’t like the opera, we drop it and keep looking. There is no point in doing something that we both aren’t passionate about. I can’t remember who found the Ravel first, but I remember listening to the overture and instantly getting excited. Ravel puts in metronomes at the top of his score to set the scene of the ticking clocks in the shop. Amazing. Then this music starts, and the characters burst through this musical landscape. Each character has their own style of music, Concepcion’s being frantic with hints of seduction, Ramiro being dumpy and innocent, Don Inigo has pompous rhythms and waltzes, and so on. Also it’s such a pay off with this opera because there is no ensemble singing until the finale. You hit the finale and it is this beautiful habanera, with peppy rhythms and accents. When they start singing together it’s like this wave of release of tension that you have not been aware was building. Drama wise, it is also quite wonderful. Fast paced, you can connect with these characters, there’s a clear story, and it’s hilarious.

From rehearsals of L'Heure Espagnole

From rehearsals of L’Heure Espagnole

3) Why this place in Montréal?

JESS: We used this same venue for “Le Doctor Miracle” last season. When we decided on “L’Heure,” this venue popped right into my head because there is a gorgeous, large staircase attached to huge catwalk. In “L’Heure,” our protagonist Concepcion’s lovers are carried to and from her bedroom encased in gigantic grandfather clocks. The stairs add great depth to the setting, allowing us to play with the levels and really encompassing the audience. They will hear commotion upstairs in Concepcion’s bedroom, watch the clocks move up and down the stairs, hear the footsteps, laughter, and any singing that goes on up there.

Stu and I have always been drawn to atmospheric venues, as opposed to traditional theatre spaces. For “The Medium” we used an old church that a man has turned into his home. When the audience walked in, it was like they were in Baba’s apartment. They were so close to the action that they were practically at the séance with the other singers. We crammed 40 patrons plus a 17-piece orchestra into this living room. It was an explosion of sound and a really cool environment in which to experience that particular piece.

In terms of choosing Montreal, it seemed like the perfect fit for Stu and I in the beginning. As I mentioned before, the singers we wanted for “The Medium” were all in school here, so that was the jumping off point. Toronto has a rather large community already to indie opera companies, which is awesome, but Montreal does not. There is only a small handful of companies doing what we do, so we felt that this would be a great place to start and build a niche for ourselves. The art and music scene is already so vibrant, we wanted to explore that.  It has since become a second home for both us, so to speak. Arriving back here and connecting with our friends and collaborators here feels so great.

We are hoping to branch out to Vancouver and Toronto in the future!

4-Talk about your values as artists, what Stu & Jess seek to do when you produce an opera.

STU: As artists, Jess and I are rather similar. We both believe that art should be something that when you leave one of our shows, that you feel like you have experienced something special. We believe that opera was created to be entertaining; it is an art form that people don’t necessarily realize is accessible. This doesn’t mean taking opera and putting shtick after shtick in (unless it involves shoving people in clocks like Ravel has asked), but making opera a balanced force of music and drama. Our goal is to make audience members excited from the moment they purchase their ticket to well after the opera. The idea behind Stu&Jess Productions is that you are going to an event, not just a show to have an expensive nap in. We choose venues that are not traditional in the sense of a theatre, because people feel special when they climb these 3 flights of stairs, open this heavy wooden door and see this loft, as an example. The excitement in the room in tangible and people really get into the opera. We want people to feel comfortable. This extends from the rehearsal room to the audiences in performances. With everything Jess and I do, we try to do with the utmost respect of the artists and people who are paying us to see a show. As a company this isn’t about walking over people, or trying to get on top, this is about creating art, sharing it with the public, and collaborating with a group of artists. We specifically gather people around us that we know want to the same vision of exciting and memorable art. I think one reason we have people still willing to work with us, is that they feel like they really get to explore, and be creative with Jess and I. So often there is a feeling in rehearsal halls that you are told what to do and you move on. With us, we know our vision, but we are not opposed to exploring an idea when it pops up. Two examples in relation to “L’Heure,” are:  In a coaching, our Conception, just for fun, spoke a very important line, and it worked so well that I told Jess that she was in for a surprise at rehearsal the net day. Jess, and the whole room, loved it and now it’s in the opera. Another involves Dimitri Katotakis, who plays Ramiro. He was just kidding around about playing tambourine in this production, and guess what, everyone is now playing an instrument at some point- Dimitri got the tambourine. I hope that if in 10 years Stu&Jess Productions is still around, we will have the reputation of putting on shows that encompass a high quality of music, fantastic drama on the stage, and making it look effortless.

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

STU: I have many people I admire. Firstly my piano teacher Dr. Terance Dawson who shoved me into conducting class when he found out I was going to take an acting class. This is where I met Dr. Robert Taylor who is one of the most dedicated teachers I have ever gotten to work with. The reason I run rehearsals the way I do is directly tied into how Dr. Taylor does. There is a sense of freedom in the rehearsal hall that you feel like you can still be an artist, but you need to be part of a larger group. Next person on the list is Gordon Gerrard. He has been a friend and mentor for the past 2 years, and last year I assisted him on a production of Candide. Gordon is beyond supportive, and he is always right there when I have a question. I also admire Kim Mattice-Wanat, who is a force of passion. Kim’s program of Opera NUOVA is where Jess and I met, and this year we are going back to conduct and direct their production of Ned Rorem’s Our Town. Lastly, our patron Harvey Lev, who didn’t know us, and gave us his living room for our first opera. Since then we has been nothing but supportive and his arts organizing, Main & Station, has allowed us to get the Dandy Andy award for Performance Arts. He has also now given us a residency grant to work on a new opera we are writing.

JESS: Having had the privilege to sit in a number of rehearsal halls with great directors, I have been influenced by all of them in one way or another. My favourite part of assisting is watching how directors approach their first rehearsal, either the table read or diving into staging. It sets the tone of how the rest of rehearsals will go and establishes the mood in the rehearsal hall. This past year I had the amazing opportunity to assist Rob Herriot on two productions for the Calgary Opera. His approach to directing is the one I am now most trying to emulate. He is incredibly smart and quick-witted. Listening to him talk about his ideas at the production table and then watching how he translates that into a staging rehearsal is fascinating. His mind works in a wonderful way. He is also a fantastic teacher.

On a company level, I have had the opportunity to sit and chat with the Opera5 gang about what we do a number of times over the last few years. Aria Umezawa and Rachel Krehm are two ladies are that I admire very much in this industry. They have built a solid company that is putting on, what I believe to be some of the most creative work in Toronto. They back up a great company mantra with talent and passion; their most recent performance of “Modern Family Opera” is the perfect example of that.

Also, every production of Robert Carsen’s I have ever seen or researched has me drooling and thinking “I would have never thought of that.” His creative brain is one I would love to have a small swim in.

*******

“L’Heure Espagnole” goes up May 7-9 in Griffintown, Montreal. Tickets and more information can be found at www.universe.com/stuandjess

Posted in Interviews, Opera | Leave a comment