Season 2010–2011
A Showcase of Talent
The 2010–11 season of the Peabody Opera Theatre is unusual in that both its productions are of French operas, although these touch on a variety of styles from the intense romanticism of Massenet’s Manon to the off-beat satire of Poulenc’s Les mamelles de Tirésias. Ravel’s L’enfant et les sortilèges, which accompanies the Poulenc, contains elements of both styles, combining music from the dance-hall and cabaret with the lush impressionism which gives the concluding garden scene the shimmering richness of Monet’s waterlilies. French is a most graceful language in which to sing, and will bring out the special talents of these young artists.
Indeed, the primary purpose of the Peabody Opera presentations is to showcase the talented student singers studying for a career on the professional stage. It is no accident, though also unusual, that all but one of our major programs are double-bills of one-act operas; the variety offers more chances to more people. In addition to the Opera Theatre program of Ravel and Poulenc, the opening production of the Opera Workshop will most probably pair two Puccini operas, Gianni Schicchi and Suor Angelica. The annual production of the Peabody Chamber Opera at Theatre Project will combine two contrasting American operas by Leonard Bernstein and Lee Hoiby. And even the performance of Melissa Dunphy's The Gonzales Cantata which Peabody is mounting in collaboration with the American Opera Theatre, will form the first half of a double-bill with Purcell᾿s Dido and Aeneas.
Links to other pages will be added as they become available.
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Puccini Plus
Friedberg Hall, October 25A complete performance of Puccini’s one-act comic masterpiece Gianni Schicchi, in an updated production by Garnett Bruce. In this hilarious farce, based on a story by Dante, a Florentine trickster disguises himself as a dying man to help his rapacious relatives circumvent the real man's will, but in the end he tricks the relatives too in order to enable his daughter to marry the man she loves. Depending on cast availability, this will be prefaced either by its companion piece Suor Angelica, about a nun yearning to be reunited with her infant son, or by shorter scenes by Puccini and his contemporaries. In Italian, with piano accompaniment. Eileen Cornett, music director. Admission is free.
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Jules Massenet’s
Manon
Friedberg Hall, November 18–21From the time of her creation in Abbé Prévost’s novel of 1731, the character of Manon Lescaut has fascinated readers and theatergoers alike. As a teenager on her way to a convent, she meets the young Chevalier des Grieux and escapes with him to Paris. But life in poverty soon palls and she is tempted by the possibilities of the haute monde. But at the height of her celebrity, she thinks again, and recaptures des Grieux as he is about to enter holy orders. Although her brief life ends in tragedy, its intense romanticism inspired numerous composers, and gave Massenet his first great success in 1884. The opera is directed by Roger Brunyate, and designed by guest artist Sofya Karash. The conductor is another guest artist, Ken Lam, a returning Peabody alumnus currently working with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, Cincinnati Opera, and Brevard Music Festival. Musical preparation is by JoAnn Kulesza.
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in association with American Opera Theatre
Melissa Dunphy’s
The Gonzales Cantata
Theatre Project, February 4–12Composer Melissa Dunphy wrote of the 2009 premiere of her one-act Opera: “The Gonzales Cantata is a musical setting of the drama and politics of the events leading up to the resignation of disgraced Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. In 2007, NPR news ran several stories featuring electrifying audio excerpts from the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings. As Gonzales was mercilessly grilled, I was reminded of Orpheus, alone and defenseless, facing the terrifying and all-powerful Furies of the Underworld. The doomed Orpheus in this modern tale, however, lacks the noble cause and incredible talent of the mythical Orpheus. This is the account of a man who has risen to the level of his own incompetence and must face the terrible consequences without hope of escape or redemption. In protest of the continued male domination of American politics, made obvious by the near-exclusivity of male voices in this drama, the genders of the soloists in the cantata have been reversed in relation to the characters they portray.” The Peabody Chamber Opera performance will serve as curtain-raiser to American Opera Theatre’s acclaimed production of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas. Both works are directed by Timothy Nelson and conducted by Melinda O'Neal.
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Remember the Fifties?
Trouble in Tahiti by Leonard Bernstein
This is the Rill Speaking by Lee Hoiby
Theatre Project, February 24–27
This double bill of one-act operas is offered as a tribute to the nineteen-fifties, an age when America was settling down to hopes of peace and prosperity. We contrast an urban vision with a rural idyll, the one showing anxiety about an edgy future, the other nostalgia for a simpler past. Leonard Bernstein wrote Trouble in Tahiti to his own text in 1952. Its setting is an affluent city suburb anywhere, introduced by a close harmony trio that offer indefatigably upbeat commentary throughout. Sam and Dinah are a typical married couple; he has a good job in business; she has a nice house and normal children. But they are not happy, and their difficulties give rise to a show that is alternately hilarious and sad. Lee Hoiby wrote This is the Rill Speaking in 1992, based on a play by Lanford Wilson, a montage of scenes from country life somewhat like Dylan Thomas’ Under Milk Wood or Thornton Wilder’s Our Town. We glimpse farmers, their wives, their teenage children, little everyday dramas of little significance except in capturing the richness of ordinary life. The production will be directed by Jennifer Blades, with chamber orchestra accompaniment. Musical preparation is by JoAnn Kulesza.
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French Fantasy
Les mamelles de Tirésias (Poulenc)
L’enfant et les sortilèges (Ravel)
Friedberg Hall, March 16–19
Les mamelles de Tirésias (the breasts of Tiresias) is a satirical play by Guillaume Apollinaire, performed in the shadow of one war in 1917; Francis Poulenc’s setting of it emerged from the shadows of another, in 1947. Tired of her life as a housewife, Thérèse gets rid of her breasts (they turn into balloons and float away) and turns herself into a man, compounding the insult by dressing her husband as a woman. But the husband proves so successful at raising babies that a population crisis erupts which can only be resolved by a return to normal gender roles. The libretto for L’enfant et les sortilèges (1925) is by the novelist Colette. It tells of a naughty boy who is locked up in his room by his mother, but wrecks the place in a tantrum, only to be punished when the various objects come to life. Outside in the twilight, there are other creatures to reprove the child – but the garden is also filled with the richness of life, enabling the boy to redeem himself and seek forgiveness. The production, in a collaboration with Temple University in Philadelphia, will have sets by Dirk Durossette. The stage director is Garnett Bruce and Hajime Teri Murai conducts. Musical preparation is by Eileen Cornett.
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Handel’s Legacy
Friedberg Hall, May 2The forty-two operas that Handel wrote between 1705 and 1741 contain some of the most expressive music ever written for the human voice. Individual arias exploring almost every possible emotion – love, jealousy, anger, despair, yearning, contentment – follow one another in dramatic sequences whose theatrical power is once again being appreciated today after more than two centuries of neglect. This performance will include scenes from several Handel operas with an instrumental ensembles under the musical direction of Adam Pearl. The scenes will be directed in a variety of ways, updated and otherwise, by the talented students of the Opera Directing Seminar taught by Roger Brunyate. Admission is free.