Nope in a few weeks it will be opera season, and not just in Toronto. Thank goodness we don’t have to hear Elmer Fudd try to say “opera season”.
That’s right, they really will be shooting the opera..!
Not with guns.
But with video cameras. That’s how it will be possible to watch the COC from coast to coast, indeed anywhere in the world.
And yet, maybe it’s more accurate to call it election season. The Liberals are running for re-election. The news broadcasts are full of talking heads, politicians announcing new programs.
And that means there are also going to be the inevitable attack ads.
No wonder that I feel that the Canadian Opera Company’s fall opera season is caught in the crossfire.
Not literally I hope.
Perryn Leech is the new General Director of the COC, taking over in the midst of a pandemic that has devastated the lives of artists and performing arts companies all over the world.
If you read the press release from the COC announcing their fall seasons, you can’t help but notice how the role of General Director is political at this delicate time. On the one hand there’s the audience, especially the donors and subscribers. On the other, you have to literally reconcile this on a balance sheet. There are artists who have lost most or all of their fees since March 2020. The COC Orchestra, the backstage staff, the singers: all wonder about the future, how they can pay their bills. When the offerings are offered entirely free of charge you wonder: how much money will it cost?
As an opera fan, as a COC subscriber, I am enormously grateful for the choices made by the COC and by their new General Director.
CANADIAN OPERA COMPANY CONNECTS ARTISTS AND AUDIENCES THROUGH FREE, DIGITAL PROGRAMMING
Purpose-produced fall lineup features monthly offerings recorded at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, including new production of Gianni Schicchi Toronto – The Canadian Opera Company is reuniting artists and audiences with an exciting, performancepacked fall for 2021/2022: A Season Like No Other. Regular monthly offerings combine opera classics, renowned and emerging voices, as well as new commissions and innovative community collaborations that will be available for six months from the date of each premiere. In a company first, programming can be accessed from coast to coast to coast – and beyond –through the launch of a major digital streaming initiative and new, free digital membership.
“Getting singers, instrumentalists, craftspeople, technicians, and creative teams back into the opera house and creating new work is a major milestone,” says COC General Director Perryn Leech. “This is an important first step in paving the way toward the next stage in the recovery and return of live opera: welcoming our audiences back into the opera house as soon as it is safe to do so.”
“Being able to perform again from our stage is a wonderful moment of celebration and we’re thrilled to be able to share that with as many people as possible through digital streaming and our exciting new membership program,” continues Leech. “We want to make it easier than ever to sample what we do for the first time or go back and rediscover something new in a favourite piece of music.”
INTRODUCING THE COC DIGITAL MEMBERSHIP The COC’s new digital membership is an all-access pass to the company’s fall programming with year-round membership perks that include: New digital programming released every month at coc.ca/watch Insights and backstage stories from this season’s artists and creators Priority ticket access to COC’s in-person performances and events, when these resume Current COC supporters and subscribers will automatically have the membership applied to their accounts, in addition to their existing benefits. New members can sign up now at coc.ca/stream.
2021 FALL PROGRAMMING The curtain rises on the magnificent Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts on September 25, 2021 with In Concert: Russell Braun and Tamara Wilson with the COC Orchestra. The evening features one of Canada’s best-loved opera stars, baritone Russell Braun alongside internationally acclaimed American soprano Tamara Wilson. The two are reunited with COC Music Director Johannes Debus and the COC Orchestra in a lovingly curated program of iconic arias and orchestral pieces from Verdi, Bizet, Wagner, and Puccini, among others. The concert will also feature Wilson’s first public performance of the “Liebestod,” the climactic finale of Richard Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde.
On October 30, 2021, the COC presents Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi, in a new production directed by Amy Lane with music led by Italian conductor Jader Bignamini with the COC Orchestra. In this lighthearted and brilliantly paced comedy, a Florentine family mourns the death of patriarch Buoso Donati – but the tears are all for show until they learn they’ve been cut from the will. British baritone Roland Wood takes on the role of schemer Gianni Schicchi, and rising South Korean soprano Hera Hyesang Park makes her COC debut as Lauretta, performing one of Puccini’s most recognizable, show-stopping arias, “O mio babbino caro.” The strong Canadian cast includes: mezzo-soprano Megan Latham, bass-baritone Thomas Goerz, tenor Andrew Haji, and tenor David Curry, among many others.
On November 13, 2021, the COC presents contemporary Afro-Cuban roots and jazz group, OKAN in selections from their latest JUNO Award-winning album, Espiral. Taking their name from the word for “heart” in the AfroCuban religion of Santeria, this women-led ensemble performs songs about immigration, courage, and love. Espiral delves deeper into the group’s rich Cuban roots while also drawing upon the multicultural mosaic of Toronto, which principal members Elizabeth Rodriguez and Magdelys Savigne now call home. The concert is a celebration of the larger scope of vibrant and diverse programming typically showcased in the COC’s beloved Free Concert Series in the Richard Bradshaw Amphitheatre, Presented by TD Bank Group.
As the year draws to a close, the COC partners with Against the Grain Theatre for Mozart’s Requiem on November 27, 2021. Following the profound impact of COVID-19, this multidisciplinary presentation of Mozart’s astonishingly moving work offers a powerful moment of healing and renewal. Incorporating interviews with frontline workers and community members directly affected by the pandemic, this interpretation connects individual stories of loss and resilience to the sonic world of Mozart’s heartbreakingly beautiful piece. The concert features Kwagiulth and Stó:lo First Nations mezzo-soprano Marion Newman, as well as current and graduate artists from the COC’s Ensemble Studio, showcasing the next generation of local opera talent. COC Music Director Johannes Debus leads the COC Orchestra, and Price Family Chorus Master Sandra Horst leads the COC Chorus in this stirring ensemble performance.
Finally, the COC marks the change in seasons with In Winter on December 18, 2021. The concert features the world premiere of a new commission by Métis and French-Canadian composer Ian Cusson and the company’s full artistic ensemble will be on display for this winter celebration. In Winter merges instantly recognizable pieces, such as Vivaldi’s exhilarating “Winter” section from his famous Four Seasons with classic songbook selections like “Deck the Halls.” Cusson’s “In Winter” is a meditative piece for chorus and orchestra that sets text by Métis writer Katherena Vermette to original music, and featured performers include: Métis soprano Melody Courage in a COC debut, the COC Orchestra under COC Music Director Johannes Debus, the COC Chorus led by Price Family Chorus Master Sandra Horst, as well as artists of the COC Ensemble Studio.
Throughout the fall, the COC presents the Free Concert Series in the Richard Bradshaw Amphitheatre: City Sessions, Presented by TD Bank Group. These short, digital performances continue the spirit of the company’s popular and long-standing concert series; recordings will take place in the Isadore and Rosalie Sharp City Room at the Four Seasons Centre, the iconic, glass-enclosed space connecting the building to its surroundings and community. City Sessions support Toronto’s cultural ecosystem with much-needed performance opportunities and provide a globally inspired, locally focused array of artists with a platform to share music and stories that resonate with them. All performances will be available on the COC’s social channels, beginning in October.
For further cast and creative team information, please visit coc.ca/2122.
All repertoire, dates, productions, and casting are subject to change without notice.
ABOUT THE CANADIAN OPERA COMPANY Based in Toronto, the Canadian Opera Company is the largest producer of opera in Canada and one of the largest in North America. General Director Perryn Leech joined the company in 2021, forming a leadership team with Music Director Johannes Debus and Deputy General Director Christie Darville. The COC enjoys a loyal audience, including a dedicated base of subscribers, and has an international reputation for artistic excellence and creative innovation. Its diverse repertoire includes new commissions and productions, local and international collaborations with leading opera companies and festivals, and attracts the world’s foremost Canadian and international artists.
The COC Academy is an incubator for the future of the art form, nurturing Canada’s new wave of opera creators with customized training and support. The COC performs in its own opera house, the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, hailed internationally as one of the finest in the world. For more information, visit coc.ca
“Press releases and announcements” are presented verbatim without comment
Toronto Summer Music’s 2021 Festival season concludes this weekend.
In a year when theatre, opera & classical music have mostly been clinging to a precarious life through online presentations, this year’s festival was certainly a bit different, mixing vimeo links with the pleasant surprise of the first in-person concerts most of us have seen in over a year, offered at Grace Church on-the-Hill. The venue observes the now familiar public health procedures one experiences when we go to a doctor or dentist, such as a contact questionnaire (name, email address, queries about any symptoms we might have, and who we might have recently encountered), taking our temperatures, and with the enforcement of a reduced seating capacity, socially distanced and masked. These simple protocols have the by-product of reminding us how lucky we are to live in a country where the social contract is strong, where few have tantrums about the small sacrifices we’re asked to make in the interest of hygiene. In the absence of a church service or the ministers, these small rituals remind us to be grateful for what we have.
Philip Chiu, piano and Jonathan Crow violin
Last time as mentioned I was very fortunate to sit close to Jonathan Crow and Philip Chiu making music. Today I had a different perspective, further back and to the side: but still wonderfully intimate. This time the audience (some in front, some behind me) and their response were a big part of what I saw and heard. Last time I was so intent upon the performance I more or less ignored the audience except when I heard them clap. I remember a semiotician (semiotics being the study of signs and symbols) arguing that the concert is really begun with the arrival of an audience, and that the performance is in some sense a response to our action. If you recall that old saying –“if a branch falls in the forest and no one hears it, is there a sound?”—one might be tempted to modify it slightly to ask: “if music is played without an audience, is there a concert?” I think one can argue that the answer is no, particularly when we remember the part played by supporters & donors in making concert series happen. Showing up to listen is not as passive as one might think, especially when it’s the first time in awhile that we’ve had the experience. I took in the breathing, the physical sounds, the silence in the moments between movements and the suspenseful seconds before applause. It’s especially interesting watching the faces of Crow and Chiu right after a performance, enjoying this cycle of communication between us and them.
Today’s finale of the five-part Beethoven sonatas series is to be repeated online Sunday at 2:00 pm
The program was as follows: Ludwig van Beethoven – Sonata for Piano and Violin, No.4 in A minor, Op.23 Gavin Fraser – like years, like seconds [World Première, TSM Commission] Ludwig van Beethoven – Sonata for Piano and Violin, No.10 in G Major, Op.96
It may be a cliché to say this, but Jonathan Crow wears a lot of hats. He’s the Toronto Symphony’s concertmaster and the artistic director of Toronto Summer Music festival, stepping forward to comment on the music we’re hearing at each concert, while thanking donors and talking about the mission of the festival. Even as a violinist Crow has multiple roles, when I recall that in addition to opportunities like today’s to hear him play chamber music, sometimes he leads his section of the TSO, sometimes playing a solo emerging from the orchestral texture, as for instance in Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade and occasionally the concerto soloist. There are different sorts of violin sound, different approaches to ensemble playing and blending that call for varied approaches. The multiple demands of Crow’s different personas will push him to grow as an artist. Just as I had a different view watching Crow and Chiu obliquely from my pew further back today, similarly we see the music and the musicians differently in chamber music than in the higher-profile Symphony appearances. And they likely see themselves and hear themselves in new ways.
It’s counter-intuitive that Sonata # 4, the earlier of today’s two sonatas, is the edgier work, every movement including some unorthodox choices. In Wednesday’s concert, for instance, we went from the restrained grace of one of the charming earlier sonatas, to the troubled passion of the Kreutzer, from something small and restrained to something big and flamboyantly angular. This time, we’re seeing Beethoven’s growth in transcending the dramatic style of the first sonatas. But that still makes for charming music-making whether in the bold first movement presto, the charming scherzo second movement or the agitated rondo finale. While there is beauty throughout, Beethoven won’t let his players relax and enjoy the moment, pushing them to work, changing from major to minor, never quite giving his themes release.
Between the two Beethoven sonatas we heard a piece from Gavin Fraser that received its world premiere at the 10 a.m. presentation of this concert, repeated at noon (the concert I attended). When Crow told us the title of the TSM commission, “like years like seconds”, he made mention of time. I can’t tell whether the piece really dealt with the concept of time, or that I simply became aware of it due to the title plus Crow’s announcement. Even so, it’s a feat to be able to do something conceptual in a work of short duration. Chiu began with some lovely but dissonant noodling at the piano while Crow gave us a variety of capricious and playful sounds from his fiddle, leading to bigger sounds in the middle of the piece. Gradually the work came to resemble something more conventional, where the piano made chords against plaintive violin. They seemed to diverge, Chiu softly playing the notes at the bottom of the piano while Crow gave us gentle soft harmonics at the top end of his instrument.
For that last sonata that concludes the cycle and our concert, composed roughly the same time as the 7th and 8th Symphonies, Beethoven’s maturity is showing. It’s a sonata quite far removed from the time and tormented mindset we see in all the others. The two instruments are in concert without showing off, without seeming to be one-upping each other as in sonata #4 and so many moments in the first 9 sonatas. This time the piano plays in self-assured chords or tinkles along softly under the violin, not unlike what we hear in the 4th Piano Concerto. For the moment the composer sounds like a far happier man, or at least less likely to get into an argument. The tranquility Crow and Chiu displayed, reflects the calm eloquence of that last sonata. They have been busy with the ten sonatas and new compositions over the past week.
The performance is almost incidental to the miracle of live music.
Please let me never become blasé, never lose my sense of wonder and gratitude, inured to magic. This is a privilege. I was stunned that not only the Toronto Summer Music Festival personnel but also both of the artists (Philip Chiu and Jonathan Crow) thanked me for being there. I hope I remember this when we’re back to “normal”, and larger crowds push us all further apart.
My wife doubted whether this was safe, to be going to an indoor concert. But we adhered to the safety guidelines, rattling around inside a big church like the beans in maracas.
I had the best seat imaginable, directly in front of them as you can see from the picture I snapped before shutting off my phone.
A masked Jonathan Crow making adjustments before playing. Note: he and Philip Chiu would remove their masks to play.
There were perhaps 20 of us in Grace Church on-the-Hill.
Did I mention that I feel like a lucky guy?
The fact we were attending a concert at 10:00 a.m. adds to the magic. My first concert in over a year felt like rebirth in the stillness of the church. Oh yes, it’s also my first time in a church since early 2020. I pulled out the hymnal to have a look, awed by the stained glass and the beautiful space.
Violinist Jonathan Crow
Pianist Philip Chiu
We listened to Jonathan Crow and Philip Chiu play two sonatas by Ludwig van Beethoven plus a piece, excuse the pun, from Jessie Montgomery.
Beethoven – Sonata for Piano and Violin, No. 2 in A Major, Op. 12 Montgomery – Peace Beethoven – Sonata for Piano and Violin, No. 9 in A Major, Op. 47 “Kreutzer”
We began with a sonata as fresh as our new beginning. When I look at Beethoven’s list of works, the Op 12 sonatas (his first three) date from late in the 18th century just after the three Op 10 piano sonatas and just before the Pathetique piano sonata. The opus numbers are a bit tricky, given that opus #15 is assigned to the first piano concerto, which dates from earlier in the decade. Haydn, who supposedly taught Beethoven in the 1790s, is still very much an influence in the comical flourishes, the witty dialogue between violin and piano, and a light texture. Yet as Crow remarked it’s very true that even if both sonatas are in A major, they’re very different.
Montgomery’s Peace is an aptly titled work that served us as a bit of an interlude, a rest for the ear between the two big Sonatas.
Composer Jessie Montgomery
I wanted it to be more than just a mouthful of baguette to cleanse the palate, a deliberate contrast to the intensity of the works on either side, yet even that was welcome. We listen to calmly melodic left-hand figures from the pianist, setting up clusters that follow, against gentle melodic playing from the violin. It’s a tonal work to contrast the two brilliant A-major sonatas in its mellow laid-back sound. It’s never strident nor angry, never very loud, but instead true to its name, a sotto voce meditation.
We’re well prepared by Peace for Sonata #9 and its ostentatious melodrama, seeming to tell a story through music. The outer movements are larger than life in their construction, the first movement sometimes seeming to shift emotional gears as abruptly as a slap in the face, gut-wrenchingly anguished. The middle movement consists of a series of variations, an oasis of tranquility before the third movement’s wild ride to the finish.
I couldn’t help thinking, how does one choose to reconcile different works of a composer, how to play the early works of a composer still finding his authentic voice, if one was also undertaking one of his most accomplished works? We’re looking back from 250 years later, hearing Beethoven not just as the heir to Mozart or Haydn, but as the eventual creator of huge symphonies, and his influence on those who follow. Excuse me if I’m prematurely suggesting a bigger discussion from a single concert, but Crow and Chiu present this concert as part of the complete Beethoven cycle. Tafelmusik took years to complete their survey of the Beethoven Symphonies. We had the magical experience of hearing Stewart Goodyear play all 32 piano sonatas in a single day. Does one play the early works with the same assumptions as the late ones, or does one differentiate between the stylistic norms of the times? Can one look at a work from the 1790s vs one after 1800 when Beethoven leaped ahead in his development? I wonder if this is confused or confounded by hindsight, that shows us who Beethoven would become.
I’m perhaps overthinking all of this, coming to the concert after a huge break spent deep inside my navel.
But I’m sensitive to the choices Crow and Chiu made, that likely must be consistent with what they’re doing in this series, choices they have to make for the whole set of sonatas. So indeed, they do not come at the young Beethoven as though they were players of his time, but instead seem to play with the same interpretive assumptions on this piece as they will later in the concert with a more mature composition. It’s all from the same big book of sonatas, one might argue, as seen from a distance. Conversely, I wonder if we can imagine the cognitive dissonance implicit in playing the youthful Beethoven the way one plays in the 1790s, and then playing the middle period or later Beethoven in another way. Crow and Chiu are not time-travelers even if musical scores do sometimes allow us to imaginatively time-travel. And so they opted to be consistent across Beethoven. I say this, as I observed their choice to play the light-hearted earlier work with a romantic approach: which maybe tells you next to nothing. I’m calling attention to a couple of things. They were ready to enlarge the dynamic range, to be very soft at times, to show due respect for Beethoven and what he would become. And occasionally they toyed with the tempi. Maybe I’m erroneous to think that Mozart & Haydn are more rigorous in their symmetry, that one aims to play the exposition exactly as fast as the recapitulation, and that a classical reading of Beethoven or Schubert aims to honour the structure where possible, rather than inserting anything expressive, rubati, expressive moments that resist the classical rigor. But I say “romantic” to suggest that Crow & Chiu attack Beethoven never underestimating the young composer and always ready for something deep. For the Op 47 Kreutzer Sonata, we’re rewarded not just with the accurate playing but an approach to the sonata matching its melodrama. The duo seemed to make tempo changes as though motivated by raw emotion, sometimes whispering, sometimes issuing enormous surges in the dynamics. The early morning performance seemed that much more spontaneous, more organic, as though the pair were of one mind. The ff from the piano in the opening movement were not spoiled by being telegraphed in any way from the two calmly deadpan players, utterly surprising the way they erupted. It’s as much the drama that Beethoven composed as the theatre that Crow and Chiu portrayed for us.
I had a socially distanced schmooze afterwards, more than a bit star-struck. Luckily I had my mask on, which served to conceal one’s facial expressions. More and more, I understand the attraction of masquerade parties.
If you have a chance to catch any of the concerts this week you won’t see better music-making (as if there were any alternatives as of July 2021), especially when you factor in the additional intimacy of the space with small audiences. The Festival concludes on Sunday August 1st.
For further information and tickets go to their website.
2020 was to have been the Beethoven year, the 250th anniversary of the composer’s birth in 1770. But of course the plans for operas, plays or concerts collided with the restrictions imposed by the pandemic.
Thank goodness Toronto Summer Music Festival are now offering a mix of live & virtual programming, permitting them to belatedly celebrate Ludwig van Beethoven in 2021, as we all enjoy the first live concerts many of us have seen in well over a year (observing the current COVID protocols: masked, distanced, venue capacity carefully monitored).
One of the concerts this week features the so-called Kreutzer Sonata for violin, a piece with an intriguing history plus an afterlife as an influence upon other artists.
First there is the story of the dedication, originally to George Bridgetower, but later withdrawn after a disagreement between the composer and the dedicatee.
George Bridgetower
Or was it a fight? Beethoven was known to have strong opinions and a certain volatility to his expression, perhaps due to his impaired hearing. But how can one be subtle if they cannot shade the voice between a whisper and a shout? between pp, and ff?
Rodolphe Kreutzer
Rodolphe Kreutzer? He was just another violinist, the replacement for Bridgetower. It’s a great irony that the violinist whose name did get immortalized supposedly never much liked Beethoven’s composition. It’s not as though Beethoven had any sort of relationship with Kreutzer.
So much for the piece in its own time.
But there has been much more since Beethoven’s time, a novella, a string quartet and the realm of film adaptations & explorations.
Leon Tolstoy wrote The Kreutzer Sonata, a novella that uses the Beethoven piece to focus a marital triangle of suspected infidelity, coming to a head when the husband sees his wife and the supposed lover performing the Beethoven piece. Does she deserve to die? surely not.
Leos Janacek wrote a string quartet with a subtitle “Tolstoy’s ‘Kreutzer sonata”. What’s the connection? Where the husband in Tolstoy’s novella angrily kills his wife, Janacek is more of a feminist in his outlook, seeking something more sympathetic. Of course it’s a piece of music not a lecture or even a novel, so it is completely ambiguous. Perhaps there are inter-textual references, quotes from Beethoven? but as far as I know Janacek meant the title to refer to Tolstoy’s novella not Beethoven.
Does the sonata itself tell a story? After all this is music that inspires the husband to imagine infidelity, seeing the passionate connection between violinist & pianist, that inspired Tolstoy to use the sonata as a site for something more than music.
The music inspired others to project their own fantasy story upon it. Among those we can include Bernard Rose who had undertaken the story in 1994 with his film Immortal Beloved, a film that he wrote & directed purporting to be a biography of Beethoven, but largely fictionalized. A scene in Rose’s film uses the sonata to reinforce the thesis of the film, concerning the identity of the “immortal beloved”, Beethoven’s true love. It’s a fascinating, wonderful idea, that has alas been debunked for me by a Beethoven scholar. That shouldn’t prevent you from enjoying the film.
Because videos sometimes are withdrawn, and become unavailable, I’ve made a transcription of Rose’s wonderful dialogue, in the scene in the film where we’re first told of the mystery of the sonata.
Schindler: It was that damned sonata, the “Kreutzer”. At the time I entertained ambitions of a musical career.
I’d gone to Vienna to study and was fortunate enough to be taken by Schuppanzigh as a pupil.
He and George Bridgetower, the famous virtuoso from Africa were about to premiere this new Beethoven sonata at Count Razumovsky’s that evening, and I was allowed to attend the rehearsal.
[Let me jump in to point out that this account clashes with what we know for certain, that it was in fact Beethoven who played the sonata through with Bridgetower, not Schupppanzigh. But don’t let that stop you ]
Schindler: It was there that the seed of a mystery was planted that haunts me to this day.
[Beethoven walks in and taps Schindler on the shoulder]
Beethoven: Do you like it?
Schindler: Shush!
Beethoven: I cannot hear them. But I know they are making a hash of it.
[What we’re hearing in the film is a perfect performance so maybe Beethoven is simply being harsh? even so Bridgetower was a last minute substitute in the performance, arriving at the last minute, so he was more or less sight-reading the sonata. I’ve read that Beethoven was supposedly wildly enthusiastic about the quality of his friend Bridgetower’s playing. Yes Bridgetower was for a time Beethoven’s friend.]
Beethoven: what do you think? Music is a dreadful thing. What is it? I don’t understand it. What does it do?
Schindler (writing on a tablet for Beethoven to read, and then speaking aloud) It exalts the soul.
Beethoven: Utter nonsense. If you hear a marching band is your soul exalted? No you march. If you hear a waltz, you dance. If you hear a mass you take communion. It is the power of music to carry one directly into the mental state of the composer. The listener has no choice. It is like hypnotism. So now… what was in my mind when I wrote this? Hm…? A man is trying to reach his lover. His carriage has broken down in the rain. The wheels stuck in the mud. She will only wait so long. This… is the sound of his agitation. “This is how it is” the music is saying. “Not how you are used to being. Not how you are used to thinking. But like this.”
Schindler (now thinking to himself) Who was the woman? He never told me. I knew better than to ask. He made me see the world in an entirely new light.“
The mystery, of course, is the mystery of the Immortal Beloved, whose identity has not been confirmed with certainty. The film presents a theory that I’m told is impossible even if it makes for a terrific film.
Rose came back to the Beethoven composition, in a film adaptation of Tolstoy’s novella The Kreutzer Sonata in 2009. Confused? The title keeps coming up, but means something different every time.
I’m looking forward to hearing Jonathan Crow play the sonata this week at a Toronto Summer Music concert with pianist Philip Chiu.
Violinist Jonathan Crow, Artistic Director of Toronto Summer Music Festival & Toronto Symphony Concertmaster
Performers have struggled with the loss of income, companies evaluating their business models as they contemplate the future. It remains to be seen just what impacts will be felt upon opera, the art form known to be the most expensive of all. COVID19 has been a catalyst for change in every arena, so why not in the realm of opera too. Although some might claim that the changes were inevitable, I believe the drama of the past 18 months will change the way we experience theatre.
Unable to offer performances inside its building, the Metropolitan Opera offered free streaming, that comes to an end this week after more than a year of free operas, as seen in their announcement: “After 70 weeks, 112 different operas, and more than 21.2 million views from 152 countries, our series of free Nightly Opera Streams reaches its grand finale. Enjoy one last week of exceptional performances, specially chosen by viewers.”
They picked the following operas: Monday, July 19 Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro Tuesday, July 20 Mascagni’s Cavalleria Rusticana and Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci Wednesday, July 21 Bizet’s Les Pêcheurs de Perles Thursday, July 22 Offenbach’s Les Contes d’Hoffmann Friday, July 23 Donizetti’s La Fille du Régiment Saturday, July 24 Verdi’s Il Trovatore Sunday, July 25 Verdi’s Un Ballo in Maschera
San Francisco Opera offer free streaming each weekend. Theirs is a bit different from the Met, in that you have to register as a member to get access. After Berlioz’s Les Troyens this past weekend (July 17–18), upcoming operas are Strauss’ Elektra July 24–25 and Verdi’s Luisa Miller July 31–August 1. I don’t know if it ends there or if there are more for August…
Which brings us to the Canadian Opera Company. If you’ve been watching the monthly Check-in with Perryn, a regular series with the COC’s new general director Perryn Leech, you will have heard him say that while there are question-marks about how the COC will return, their fall season will be virtual. While we don’t know precisely who (the singers) or what,(the operas) the COC now have new toys to play with, thanks to government grants to fund the “Digital Infrastructure Enhancements Project at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts.”
So move over Met. Get ready San Francisco Opera. Your neighbours to the north are getting into the act. Although it’s not yet clear exactly what we will be seeing & hearing, Episode 5 of Check-in with Perryn promised a big announcement on August 16th to give us a better idea what to expect.
Episode 5 also included a lovely picture of George, Perryn’s dog.
She’s not an energizer bunny, but she is still going. My mother has passed her 100th birthday.
She received a letter from Queen Elizabeth, congratulating Katherine on the milestone. Let that be an incentive to you, that you might live to see your own letter from the Queen, congratulating you on your longevity.
The Queen was born April 21st 1926, so she is only 95 at this time.
My nephew Peter Bodrogi cleverly suggested returning the favour, that when the Queen turns 100 my mom should send a birthday card to her. She agrees, so if my mom is still here she will do it. I’m happy to help.
But first she has to survive the rigors of all the people wanting to congratulate her. On her birthday naturally she was toasted with champagne while we all ate birthday cake. The Wednesday before, she was feted by her grandchild Zoe (via smartphone) and Zoe’s mom, hoisting more glasses of bubbly. And there have been additional visits & toasts, lots of bubbles and songs in several languages, including English.
A few days ago (this past week, but after the birthday) I took my mom to a dental hygiene appointment.
With the teeth cleaned & pronounced healthy, what does one do, if not go buy something sweet to keep the dentist in business? And so, afterwards I was instructed to visit Ararat International Fine Foods, a delicatessen across the street from her dentist. My mom wanted me to pick up marzipan as thank you gifts for us, her kids.
When I got there, I mentioned to the proprietors that my mom was in the car outside, a regular customer who had turned 100 last week.
When they went to look in my car, they took her a coffee + a birthday gift.
I remember them when they were younger, when I was younger.
I’m embarrassed to say that I don’t know their names. But they’re a lovely family run business that I recall from my childhood in the neighbourhood, on Avenue Road north of Lawrence Ave.
The Mozartkugeln are the gift from Ararat’s kind owners. There’s a bar of marzipan covered in chocolate for each of the kids (aka my siblings) above left.
And next week I have an anniversary of my own that I’m planning to celebrate with her, because it happens to be a day when I’m taking her lunch.
I’ll bring something sweet and something bubbly.
My mom on her 100th (photo: Constance Adorno Barcza)
Gustav Holst’s one act chamber opera Savitri is available from Against the Grain theatre (aka “AtG”) as an online film. They offer it free of charge from their website, while inviting you to make an optional contribution to the company.
For AtG, who embody the idea that small is beautiful, Savitri is ideal, employing a chamber ensemble instead of a full orchestra, with a modest length of roughly a half-hour, (plus extra content for the film), its cast of three principals with a wordless chorus.
On their website, the company says: “Against the Grain Theatre is an award-winning Canadian opera collective that presents classical music in innovative ways and in unusual venues.”
They began with la boheme presented in a bar, later an outdoor Pelléas et Mélisande¸ and A Little Too Cozy set in a TV studio. Their adaptations are fascinating, culminating in their recent film Messiah/Complex. Savitri too is a film given that live performance is not yet permitted in the Toronto area, filmed entirely outside.
AtG say that they want to attract a diverse audience, making Savitri a perfect choice in setting an episode of the Mahabharata. I saw the work before sung by Caucasian performers but AtG give us persons of colour.
Directed by Miriam Khalil plus Associate Director Simran Claire, Savitri stars Meher Pavri in the title role, Vartan Gabrielian as Yama, God of Death, and Andrew Haji as Satyavān, Savitri’s beloved.
Meher Pavri plays Savitri
This is a beautiful little film, telling a lovely story. At times I couldn’t quite discern the words when Pavri or Gabrielian were singing, but the story is easy enough to follow. If you need it, these Hyperion liner notes give you the libretto of the short work.
As with Messiah / Complex it doesn’t matter whether a singer is lip synched with the singing. If we hear the words and see the personage, we imagine that perhaps the words are in their head, perhaps just in our own head. Either way, it works quite well, especially in an opera concerned with the world of illusion or Maya. Beautiful images accompany beautiful sounds & stirring ideas.
It’s comforting to hear a wordless chorus from Holst, who would later use the same device for the planet Neptune at the conclusion of his great orchestral suite The Planets, again with metaphysical implications.
We have an elaborate credit sequence at the end that might be my favorite part of the film, reminding me of the quirky way Wes Anderson ends his films, giving us additional perspectives on the project and the participants. I don’t know about you, but I love this sort of thing.
The opera is available online until Sunday July 11th here, and I recommend it.
The Metropolitan Opera feed of free streaming performances celebrate American composers the week of July 4th Independence Day.
I was especially excited to get another look at John Adams’s Nixon in China, that we saw both via a production by the Canadian Opera Company and another production seen in the Metropolitan Opera series of High Definition broadcasts back in 2011. Although I recall being blown away by both, I’m surprised that I haven’t heard of anyone producing Adams’s opera since that time. The Met presented two videos of Adams operas this week (Nixon as well as Dr Atomic). A quick look at operabase.com suggests that other American composers (Glass, Previn, Weill, Muhly, Floyd, Menotti, Heggie) are doing better in the years since. I recall the fuss over John Corigliano’s The Ghost of Versailles when it appeared around 1980 with its clever references to other operas, but that work doesn’t seem to be on the radar these days. And while Thomas Hampson, host of the broadcast, lauded Nixon (the creation by composer John Adams and librettist Alice Goodman) as the “most important opera of the last quarter century” (a view I share), opera companies seem to have forgotten it when programming their seasons.
John Adams, Janis Kelly & Russell Braun during the curtain call
What a powerful video this is. Much of the time we’re in close-ups that never compromise a performer, a brilliant starring cast of Russell Braun as Chou En-Lai, James Maddalena as Richard Nixon, Janis Kelly as Pat Nixon, Richard Paul Fink as Henry Kissinger, Robert Brubaker as Mao and Kathleen Kim as Chiang Ch’ing (Madame Mao Tse-tung). When we watch the overpowering drama of Madame Mao’s da capo aria that ends Act II (an excerpt from the production, available on youtube), much of the drama is in horrified reactions from Kelly & Maddalena (the Nixons), the robotic chorus and the dancers, especially soloists Haruno Yamazaki and Kanji Segawa.
Has anyone written anything as powerful or relevant since? I’ve watched the complete opera twice, have watched this shattering excerpt at least 7 times in the past few days, usually ending up in tears, sometimes sobbing,,, Be warned it’s powerful. I was prompted by Facebook, who reminded me of a status I posted in July 2011, an ironic phrase we hear early in the aria: “When I appear the people hang… When I appear the people hang upon my words.”
In 1987 when composer Adams and librettist Goodman collaborated with Director Peter Sellars to create the work, Nixon was largely a discredited former president, not forgotten but remembered for his corruption & his ignominious departure. We get a believably human portrait, that still seemed accurate in 2011 when this performance was made, and hasn’t been negated since.
What’s especially intriguing as of 2021 are changes in our understanding of China. Where we seemed to be in a place resembling friendship if not détente in 2011, as of 2021 America & China have been bristling at one another since the presidency of Donald Trump. The opening lines of the chorus gave me the shivers: “The people are the heroes now Behemoth pulls the peasants’ plow”.
In 1987, Adams & Goodman were creating a work of art that occasionally touches upon historical fact. Did the Chinese people (if we could imagine them all singing together in English) ever believe such things, or is this a Marxist / Maoist fantasy? The scene you see on video above –where the Nixons watch Madame Mao admonish dancers, spurring a group with Maoist dogma from the “little red book” of quotations from Chairman Mao—is not real, nothing like this would have been permitted to happen. It’s like allegory, showing us the encounter of the Nixons with Madame Mao, complete with the final posture of confrontation between Madame Mao and a resolute Chou En-Lai.
Goodman’s libretto is full of brilliant little gems. When in the second scene Nixon speaks of wanting to “bring our armies home”, Mao replies “our armies do not go abroad.” In this scene Nixon the pragmatist American encounters a philosopher in Mao, accompanied by a trio of women echoing his words as though they were oracular epigrams.
In the last scene of the opera, Mao says the following: “ We recoil from victory and all its works. What do you think of that Karl Marx? Speak up!”
The very last lines of the opera are given to the principal we saw first, namely Chou En-Lai, sung by Russell Braun, a wonderfully lyrical ending after the conflict & bombast you saw above at the conclusion of Act II.
“I am old & cannot sleep forever like the young No hope that death will be a novelty but endless wakefulness when I put down my work and go to bed. How much of what we did was good? Everything seems to move beyond our remedy. Come, heal this wound At this hour nothing can be done Just before dawn the birds begin the warblers who prefer the dark the cage-birds answering To work! Outside this room the chill of grace lies heavy on the morning grass.”
The opera ends in this gentle poetic speculation.
I found an intimate performance from Russell Braun singing this same music in 2020, accompanied by Carolyn Maule at the piano.
What is the point posting a review when the run is over? My motto is borrowed from the Hippocratic Oath, namely “above all do no harm,” if that tells you anything.
Some of the voices sounded better than others, some singers were a pleasant & unexpected surprise.
But even so I want to ask Voicebox aka Opera In Concert to remember their name & their origins.
“Opera in concert” for me entails getting a bunch of people to do the show in formal attire, either with a piano or (if we’re lucky) with an orchestra. There’s a great deal to recommend this, even if we lose some, perhaps most of the theatre. By concentrating on the music, we can realize ideal performances, at least the best of those voices.
I watched Adriana Lecouvreur filmed by Ryan Harper for Voicebox’s online presentation. You’ve seen me rave about my love for his tenor voice, and alas alack, he was the best thing about this show. Alas because uh oh he was not singing, only filming.
We’re watching a very inconsistent group of performers working in a broad array of dramatic styles. Some are completely believable in close-up, while others seem to think they’re on a huge stage.
I think the singers, the opera, the composer, would all have been better served by a performance in tuxes & dresses, standing & delivering from music stands, rather than attempting & failing utterly to create the necessary illusion.
It’s funny, I was teased with references to Bajazet (the Racine play) and Roxanne (the temptress in his play), in the opera. I remember seeing a student production of Bajazet more than 25 years ago. How ironic that what I saw captured so elegantly by Harper’s camera work also resembled a student production. There is ambition here, to be sure, but I wish they had been more modest in simply offering the opera in concert. It doesn’t work for me in this version.
The pandemic is coming to its end, hopefully live theatre will be back before too long. Whenever it returns, I hope Voicebox – Opera in Concert remember their mandate.
barczablog 