Epiphanies

Six New Operas

by

Brian Lloyd Christian

Charles Halka

Joshua William Mills

Bryan Reis

Nicholas Werner

Chris Whittaker

JoAnn Kulesza, music director

Jennifer Blades & Roger Brunyate, stage directors

Tuesday, April 29, 2008, at 7:30 p.m.

Miriam A. Friedberg Concert Hall

Admission free

Peabody Opera home

This is a program of six new operas by student composers at Peabody, written specifically for the singers who will perform them. The overall theme is Epiphanies. Each piece contains at least one moment when the characters come to a sudden understanding of something that had been waiting under the surface for some time. Other than that, the subjects are varied. We go back to Greek antiquity and to the time of Christ. We visit a contemporary living-room, an airport lounge, a bar. We even visit the White House in a political satire about something that may (or may not) happen later this year.

These operas are part of a unique program at Peabody called opera études. Started in 1985, it has been repeated roughly every other year since then, for a total of well over fifty works. All the operas are short – études, not symphonies – but the length frees the composer from having to write a lengthy exposition or tie up everything up neatly at the end; the études can be merely a snapshot of a relationship or situation. And most importantly, they are written not only for but also with the singers who appear in them.

Typically, the process is this: I propose an overall theme; each composer suggests a take on it which he or she presents to the singers; they then improvise upon it, acting it out in various ways until a workable idea is found. These improvisations form the basis for the libretto, although the composer may bring in a separate writer to help shape it. The material keeps going back to the singers for their response throughout the composition period and staging. The process of trying the dramatic material out on the singers serves as a reality check, and helps the composers think beyond their first ideas. It also gives the singers a sense of ownership, which can be transferred to pre-existent pieces in turn; none of the singers will ever approach even a Violetta or Susanna in the same way again, without remembering that she too started as somebody’s imaginings into the feelings and responses of a real person. Roger Brunyate.

	Eva

	Brian Christian	Clara Campbell

Eva is an opera is about family relationships, especially those cases in which people feel threatened by their dependence on one another and resort instead to antagonism. Rachel is a single mother with a sixteen-year old daughter, Eva. Recently diagnosed with cancer, Rachel has tried to protect her daughter from the news, but this has only increased the tension between them. Eva’s accidental discovery of a letter from the hospital brings matters to a head, eventually leading their realization of how much they need one another.

	Layover

	Charles Halka	Katherine Krueger

The setting of Layover is an airport departure lounge. Autumn and Caroline are two very different women leading very different lives. On the surface, they would appear to share absolutely nothing in common: Autumn is an idealistic dreamer with an obsession with arts and crafts, while Caroline is a high-maintenance social climber with ambitions of bagging a wealthy husband. But when the two women meet by chance while waiting for their flights, not only do they discover the one thing they never imagined they would have in common, but they are also forced to re-examine the values which made them so different in the first place.

	Yehuda

	Joshua Mills	Ben Walker

Yehuda is an imaginative extension of the incident in the Gospels where Mary of Bethany anoints the feet of Jesus Christ shortly before his final entry into Jerusalem and just after he raised her brother Lazarus from the dead. But this takes place offstage in the opera. The setting is the kitchen, where Mary’s sister Martha is washing dishes and preparing food. The young zealot Yehuda, a follower of Jesus from the beginning, and a friend of Martha’s, expresses his frustration with Jesus’ unwillingness to confront the Roman occupiers. Yehuda is shocked when Mary anoints Jesus with an entire jar of precious perfume usually reserved for anointing the dead for burial. This extravagance provides the catalyst for a scene between the three where they begin to realize how the week will end.

	Koré

	Bryan Reis	Katherine Krueger

Koré is set in ancient Greece, around 400 BCE. On the side of a mountain near the city of Delphi, in the basement of a stone temple built over a toxic underground spring, the Pythian oracle for Apollo gave cryptic prophecies for almost a thousand years. We have evidence that the women who served there – always women – spoke unintelligibly, moved erratically, lost all consciousness and memory, and did not live long. Koré, the girl who arrives in this scene does not know this, however. She does not know that the woman running the temple is her real mother, that her life had been planned before she was born, or that she is about to see how she will spend the rest of her life, and observe how she will most likely die. Her epiphany is one of destiny, and the possibility of her complete possession by a god. Portions of the text of this opera are actual prophecies by the oracle, sung in classical Greek.

	One

	Nicholas Werner	Lexi K. Hubb

The composer writes about One: “This scene is about the struggle to recognize and deal with one’s emotions and feelings and what happens when they are ignored.” A woman in a bar is joined by another. The newcomer seems to know a lot about the other, making the first woman increasingly disturbed. As the relationship between the two women shifts, we get more insight as to who the second woman really is, though this epiphany comes too late for the first character to avert tragedy.

	George Bush: The Last One Hundred Days

	Chris Whittaker

George Bush: the Last One Hundred Days offers a complete change of tone. The premise is that President George W. Bush decides that he can, and will, change his mind. Overhearing a rather energized press conference sparks a bout of soul-searching from our usually stalwart protagonist. After Bush interrupts the conference to announce ironic shifts in White House policy, the Press Secretary and Reporter realize their own epiphanies. The scene, which even includes some dance numbers, makes an upbeat conclusion for the entire program.

Eva
Eva		Ashley St. Martin
Rachel		Lisbet Klockars

Layover
Autumn		Stephanie Miller
Caroline		Lena Leson

Yehuda
Martha		Sarah Hershamn
Mary		Sara Woodward
Yehuda		Gabriel Henriques

Koré
Mother		Lauren Maxwell
Daughter (Koré)		Joanna Baeah Lee
Pythia		Adriana Gonzalez Kerri Lynn Slominski

One
Woman		Sarah Mahon
Alter Ego		Britt Olsen-Ecker

George Bush
Reporter		Jessica Abel
Perino		Lydia Beasley
Bush		William Schaller