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OPERAzzi: DMMO's E-Newsletter
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February 15, 2007
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Welcome to OPERAzzi...Des Moines Metro Opera's monthly e-newsletter.
We love to hear from you, so send any comments or suggestions to McB Smith.
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The Wine & Food Showcase is just around the corner! Join us at the Downtown Des Moines Marriott on February 23 for unlimited samples from almost 50 different restaurants, wineries, caterers, breweries and distributors. Tickets for The Grand Tasting are just $50 per person or $45 each for groups of six or more. Tickets for The Maestro's Tasting are $125 and include admission to The Grand Tasting. Call (515) 961-6221 for reservations.
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Wine & Food Showcase: February 23
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Get your tickets now for the Wine & Food Showcase--a great event for a great cause!
Just call DMMO's box office at (515) 961-6221 or download a ticket order form!
5:30 pm - THE MAESTRO'S TASTING
$125 per person,
includes admission to The Grand Tasting
Start
your evening with The Maestro's Tasting and enjoy premium wines in the
elegant Iowa Ballroom. Donated by private collectors, these wines will
tempt your palate and whet your appetite! Finish your culinary journey
at The Grand Tasting.
6:00 pm - THE GRAND TASTING
$50 per person or $45 per person in groups of 6 or more
The
Wine and Food Showcase Grand Tasting takes you on a tour of cuisines
and beverages from around the world and right here at home! You'll feast on sumptuous fare from Iowa's best chefs,
restaurants and caterers plus hundreds of wines from renowned local,
national and international wine makers, as well as microbrewed beers,
gourmet coffees and teas. This is an unlimited sampling extravaganza
and it's always a fantastic event--gather your friends and enjoy an
evening of great tastes! At The Grand Tasting you can indulge in
gourmet offerings from: Canteen Refreshment Services, Cedar Ridge Vineyards, Court Avenue Brewing Company, Dimitri Wine & Spirits, Glazer's Distributors, Gong Fu Tea, Granite City Food & Brewery, Iowa Beverage Systems, Iowa Wine & Beverage, John Ernest Vineyard & Winery, Johnson Brothers of Iowa, JT's Fine Wine & Spirits, La Vida Loca Winery, Little Swan Lake Winery, MJ Wines, Rock Bottom Restaurants & Brewery, Romance Wines,
Southern Hills Winery, Summerset Winery, Tassel Ridge Winery, The Village Bean Co., 801 Steak and Chop House, Bravo Cucina Italiana, Café di Scala, Carefree Patisserie, The Continental, Cool Basil Thai Restaurant, Crave Bar, Grill & Fondue, Des Moines Embassy Club, Edible Arrangements, Godiva Chocolatier, Great Harvest Bread, InPlay & Forte Banquet, Lucca Restaurant, Maggie Moo's Ice Cream & Treatery, Maytag Dairy Farms, Mezzodi's, Mosaix Restaurant & Wine Bar, Palmer's Deli & Market, PF Chang's China Bistro, Riverwalk Café, Rock River Grill, Romano's Macaroni Grill, Splash Seafood, Sweet Binney's, Tandoor Authentic Indian Cuisine, Trostel's Dish, Underground Inc.
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Thoughts on the 35th Anniversary Season from Dr. Robert Larsen
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Dr. Robert L. Larsen
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February, 2007
Dear Friends,
I hope that when you read this the cold of late January and February will just be a memory, but it's very real this morning. However, winter is definitely tempered for me by the warm and inviting prospects of the summer ahead. Our 35th Anniversary Season offers such rich and exciting fare that no amount of wind chill can dampen my excitement.
I normally say that the opera I'm working on currently is my favorite, but I have to admit that "Carmen", "Otello", and "A Midsummer Night's Dream" are very near the top of my all-time favorite list. Too often perhaps I have mentioned that after what seemed like an aeon of pleading with my parents to go to operas, at the age of 10 I saw my first, and it was "Carmen" with the San Carlo Opera touring company in Omaha.
I know the tenor was overweight and Mother insisted that the hems of the chorus costumes were awfully dirty, but I thought that it had to be the most splendid event the world could possibly contain. I guess I've always kept a little of that childlike wonder in my approach to opera, and I remain confident that there could be no better first opera than "Carmen" with its glorious melodies, its color, its sweep and its final tragedy.
It has it all - and yet it's never the same. "Oh, I've seen 'Carmen'" is not appropriate. Every production is a new adventure, and I promise that ours will be a brilliant one with our homegrown diva Janara Kellerman, now emerging on opera stages throughout the country, in the title role; tenor Scott Piper as Don José, who I saw in the role at New York City Opera in the fall and watched the audience "bravo" and rise to their feet in response to his work; bass-baritone Brandon Mayberry fresh from his singing with the Chicago Lyric Opera as a dashing Escamillo.
Every opera afficionado utters Verdi's "Otello" with a certain reverence because here is the greatest 19th century master of them all at the peak of his inspiration and brilliance. He never planned to write another opera, but his friend, poet and fellow opera composer, Arrigo Boito, tempted him with Shakespeare and the result was tempestuous, lyric and powerful - composed with a craft and concern for every conceivable detail of the stage work that even the great Verdi had never before achieved.
From the Moor's cry of "Esultate!" in his first entrance onto the stage to the final desolate moments in holding the body of his Desdemona and kissing her for the last time, this is music and drama that soars to the highest of artistic pinnacles. Our Otello is Allan Glassman of the Metropolitan Opera and regional opera throughout America who could well become one of the greatest Otellos of our time. His Iago is Todd Thomas who we came to know and love as Rigoletto last summer and will now reveal his villainous qualities in one of opera's most sinister roles. We auditioned many Desdemonas but the rich, spinto voice and elegant characterization of Dana Beth Miller, who was once an apprentice artist with us and subsequently sang Giorgetta in our "Il Tabarro" a few years ago, was clearly the perfect Verdi heroine. Artist and friend Gwen Jones, who most recently triumphed as Queen Elizabeth in our "Gloriana, will return as Iago's wife, Emilia.
"A Midsummer Night's Dream" is for me the ultimate in operatic settings of Shakespeare. Here the bard finds his true operatic voice through the music of Benjamin Britten. Gossamer strings, a boys' chorus of fairy-world henchmen, a counter tenor in the role of Oberon (Randall Scotting), a glimmering soprano Tytania (our own Jane Redding), Queen of the Fairies, and a cast of lovers and rustics that entertain with elegant lyricism and some of the wildest buffo comedy in the world of opera.
This group abounds with former apprentice artists who are now mature and polished performers: Craig Irvin, Marc Schreiner, Daniel Cilli and Kimberly Roberts. This is a kind of opera that belongs in the Pote Theatre where the audience can virtually inhabit the forest too, and where the irrepressible Puck (singer, actor, dancer, acrobat Adam Alexander) can work his magic with the entire audience.
Do I sound excited? I am. Come and see again (or perhaps for the first time) the intense, vital and remarkable wonders of music and theatre with the Des Moines Metro Opera Summer Festival of Opera.
Sincerely,
Robert L. Larsen
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DMMO Guild Update
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All three chapters of the Guild will swing into high gear in March with a full slate of opera previews! It's easy to learn more about this summer's productions...there are Guild meetings in Ames, Des Moines and Indianola.
Here is a brief list of the Guild's upcoming events:
AMES
March 13, Thomas Smith will preview Otello by Giuseppe Verdi
April 10, Jean Meek will preview A Midsummer Night's Dream by Benjamin Britten
May 8, Wayne Beal will give a presentation entitled "Carmen: Was It Murder Or Was It Suicide?"
All
previews will be held at 7:30 p.m. at St. John's Episcopal Center, located at 2338 Lincoln Way in Ames.
Refreshments and conversation will follow the presentations.
DES MOINES
March 5, Dr. Larsen will preview Otello by Giuseppe Verdi
April 9, Michael Egel will preview Carmen by Georges Bizet
May 14, Professor Eric A. Saylor of Drake University will preview A Midsummer Night's Dream by Benjamin Britten
All previews will be held at 7:00 p.m. in the Fellowship Hall of Central Presbyterian Church, located at 3829 Grand Avenue in Des Moines.
Refreshments and conversation will follow the presentations.
INDIANOLA
March 1, Maria DiPalma will preview A Midsummer Night's Dream by Benjamin Britten at 7 pm in her home at 411 W Ashland.
April 10, Michael Egel will preview Carmen by Georges Bizet at 7 pm in Julia Hagen's home at 709 Scott Felton Road.
May 3, Michael Egel will preview Otello by Giuseppe Verdi at 7 pm in the DMMO offices at 106 W Boston Avenue.
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Getting To Know You: Todd Thomas
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Todd Thomas
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by McB Smith
This month I talked with Todd Thomas, a gifted baritone who will be singing the role of Iago in our Otello this summer. Todd made his debut with DMMO as Rigoletto last year and he brought the house down. We are very excited that he'll be joining us again!
McB: What brings you back to DMMO?
Todd: I am thrilled to be returning in another of Verdi's fabulous baritone roles. This time I will be the personification of evil, Iago. Actors have always been drawn to the villains and the heavies much more, simply because they are more interesting, more colorful, more range etc. Shakespeare gave us an incredible story and such engaging characters, but with Verdi's score these bring the story and drama directly to our heart and our consciousness.
McB: What can you tell us about your preparation for this season and this role?
Todd: I have sung this role twice before. I find it challenging on several levels. Vocally it is, of course, very rangy. Verdi asks the baritone to practically whisper in Otello's ear, as well as to roar out that "All of heaven is only a folly" at the end of his famed Credo.
The libretto is very difficult. Don't forget it is Shakespeare. I hope I will be able to work with a native Italian speaker on the text. I will try to listen to as many recordings of this role performed by singers from the Golden Age of Opera as I can find.
Success in this career comes from learning from many different sources. I will coach it with my most knowledgeable coaches to be as well-prepared as I can with many different ideas from which Dr. Larsen and I can work.
McB: What was your worst moment in the theater?
Todd: Although not an opera, it was in an oratorio performance of Faure Requiem in Philadelphia. The soloists were standing on a platform in front of the orchestra and chorus on the same plane as the conductor. The platform was elevated about three feet from the floor without any kind of ledge or lip around the edge of the platform. Did I mention the soloists were sitting on flimsy, plastic, collapsible, folding chairs? This was ideal for the 110 pound soprano to my right, but less ideal ..... well you understand. I had just finished the Libera me domine movement. The text can be translated as "deliver me O God from the abyss of Hell." Through my solo I occasionally checked if I could feel my (flimsy) chair on the back of my leg. Evidently in checking my chair, I had pushed the said chair right to the edge of the platform. Ending the movement, I was secure that I had created and established a wonderful mood. The conductor had not put his hands down as he wanted the next movement from the chorus In paradisium ("in paradise I prepare a place for you") to follow dramatically after the baritone solo. We had a dramatic moment alright. As I confidently sat on my chair I had this unearthly feeling that the earth was swallowing me up. The entire chair and I fell completely backwards into a two foot space between the risers of the string section and my platform. There was an audible gasp of disbelief from the audience. I struggled to get up, but discovered I was stuck. My large frame in a two-by-two foot crevice. I shall never forget the look on the Maestro's face with his arms in a preparatory position for the chorus to sing "In paradise I prepare a place for you." He motioned to me to get up, but with my music scattered and my chin somewhere around my stomach, I could not move. He and four men form the first row came to my rescue and hoisted me form the abyss... It was terribly embarrassing to sit there for the last movement and I began bean to sweat profusely from an anxiety attack....
The performance was recounted in the Philadelphia Inquirer the next morning when the observant critic noted, "Mr. Thomas deserves a Purple Heart for surviving the collapse of his chair in the final moment of the Faure Requiem to return with a stirring performance of Vaughn Williams' Five Mystical Songs."
McB: How awful! If you weren't a singer, what do you think you would do?
Todd: I really don't know...... It would definitely involve performing..... My younger daughter, Gabriela, asked me this recently and she wasn't satisfied until I really gave her an answer.... I am a news junkie... I love CNN and all those morning news shows. So if I had to pick a non-singing career, you would see me each morning along with Al, Meredith, Anne and Matt on the Today Show.
McB: What is your dream role?
Todd: Well, I think Rigoletto (which I sang here last season) and Iago are both fabulous roles. I love all the Verdi roles. I have looked at Simon Boccanegra. That would be wonderful one day soon. Shortly after this project I will put on Falstaff's fat suit (I hope I will need it). But some of my fondest memories have been in the boots of Scarpia in Tosca, like Iago, he is a villain you will love to hate.
McB: What is your biggest pet peeve?
Todd: Do I have one? I really don't think I do.
McB: Finish this thought: I cannot go onstage without ...
Todd: PRAYING... I am terribly thankful for my career and this opportunity I have. God has been incredibly good to me. Whatever success I may attain I give Him the glory. I am doing what I love to do, and what I believe is God's plan for me. He has blessed me with three wonderful children and with one more due at the end of May, and a wife, Lisa, without whose support and love through the past 17 years this adventure would not have been possible nor nearly as much fun.
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