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OPERAzzi
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November 7, 2007
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Welcome to November's OPERAzzi There's a chill in the air and our thoughts begin to turn from backyard barbecues to holiday celebrations. With the change in the weather, at Des Moines Metro Opera we find ourselves in a bustle of activity. Our "busy season" is now upon us and we'll keep hopping until next summer. Join us on our wild ride to the Summer Festival! This month's OPERAzzi has plenty of great information. Enjoy!
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Save the Date:
March 1--The Mascheranda Ball, DMMO's gala fundraiser for 2008, will be held at the elegant Scottish Rite Consistory in downtown Des Moines. Buy your tickets online now!
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Season Subscriptions On Sale Now
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Season tickets are now available to all patrons so they can join the family of subscribers and take advantage of the many benefits of being a season ticket holder. Subscribers have the ability to exchange their dates if a conflict arises. Subscribers also now have the right to renew their seats earlier than the general public, thus securing their favorite seats from year to year! That means that they won't be left on a waiting list if the performances sell out. In addition, purchasing a season ticket saves you money (as much as 13%!) over buying single tickets and says to the world that you support Des Moines Metro Opera. The 2008 productions of A Masked Ball, Regina and The Elixir of Love promise all the drama and pageantry that you have come to expect from DMMO! You won't want to miss a moment of the opera magic. Click here to order your subscription online!
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DMMO's Book Goes To Press In November
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Des Moines Metro Opera A 35 Year Retrospective will be sent to the printer in the coming days! This hard-bound, 140-page, coffee table book includes photos from each of the Company's productions and memories from scores of individuals who have been a part of DMMO's journey over the last 35 years. This book will make the perfect gift for all the opera lovers in your life. And at just $50 (plus shipping and handling), you can buy a copy for yourself! To pre-order, contact McB Smith at (515) 961-6221 or just send an email with your name, phone number, address and the number of copies you want. We will ship the books out as soon as they are printed.
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End-of-Year Giving
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The end of the calendar year is a wonderful time, filled with family gatherings and celebrations of giving. It is also a time when many of us are looking for ways to express our gratitude. It is the perfect time of year to make a gift to Des Moines Metro Opera in honor of a special friend or in memory of a cherished loved one. Now is also the time to give yourself the gift of a tax deduction! Supporting DMMO is easy! You can make your donation quickly and securely through our website. Click here to donate now.
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All About DMMO Auditions
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by Michael Egel, Artistic Administrator Robert Larsen, Thomas Smith and I have recently returned from a series of stops on our annual audition trail. This is one of my favorite times of the year and I look forward to it each year like a child waiting for the holidays! We have already heard singers in Baton Rouge, Chicago and New York City with local and recorded auditions yet to come. These auditions are for both principal artists on the mainstage and applicants to the James M. Collier Apprentice Artist Program. So far this year, we have heard approximately 500 auditions (two arias each!) with many more to come. That is 63 mezzo sopranos, 77 baritones, 26 basses, 4 contraltos, 101 tenors, and over 200 sopranos. Our audition days are long, beginning with the first singer at 9:00 in the morning and finishing with the last between 5:00 and 6:00 each day. In Chicago, we rent a hall from the Chicago Youth Symphony and in New York, we rent a hall from NOLA Sound Studios. NOLA is a hub of the New York musical scene, situated on the 10th and 11th floors of a building just around the corner from The Ed Sullivan Theater (where Late Night with David Letterman is taped) in midtown Manhattan. With several audition halls and one common lobby, it is not unusual for Des Moines Metro Opera to be holding auditions right next door to auditions for something like Phantom of the Opera, a dance ensemble or even Mel Brooks' new musical The Young Frankenstein, as we did last season. DMMO provides a pianist to accompany each singer. We do this because we know we can depend on the quality of pianist for each singer and because we have a great pianist in Joseph Smith. Joe has played for DMMO's auditions for well over fifteen years and knows every obscure corner of the repertory like the back of his hand. It is rare for a singer to bring in a piece that he does not already have at least passing familiarty with. In those rare instances, he is able to read it at first sight. Not only does he sit through every audition that we do, he spends the majority of the day seated on a hard piano bench with few bathroom breaks! In addition to spending all day listening to singers, we spend time in the evenings attending performances and keeping abreast of major productions being mounted at the Met, New York City Opera and even Broadway. This year, Dr. Larsen, Tom and I saw The Magic Flute and Macbeth at the Met, Carmen, Agrippina and Vanessa at City Opera and we even made the journey to Broadway to see last year's Tony winner for best musical, Spring Awakening. From these auditions we can finish casting the mainstage roles and continue to populate the Apprentice Artist Program. It is always exciting for us to sit down after the trip and go through our detailed notes on each singer. For the Apprentice Program we create a sort of listing of those talents that stood out to us as a group and then make decisions from there as to contracts and acceptances. While not all of the Apprentice auditions are finished, we will begin to make some offers right away. These trips are always quite remarkable and the door is always open if you happen to be in New York at the same time and want to sample a bit of "audition season" with us.
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Updates From DMMO's Guild
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Des Moines Metro Opera's three Guild chapters (based in Ames, Des Moines and Indianola) are dedicated to supporting the Company, learning more about opera and having fun with other opera lovers. Each chapter has great programs, events and fundraisers lined up for the coming year! Click here to learn more about joining the Guild. The Ames Chapter will meet on November 13 at 7:30 pm at St. John's Episcopal Center. The program will be selection of arias and art songs presented by soprano Kimberly Roberts and accompanied by Dr. Robert Larsen on the piano. The chapter will be having a Mardi Gras party on February 1, 2008. The Des Moines Chapter cordially invites you to attend the next meeting on Monday, November 12. Simpson's own Maria Di Palma will talk to us about hair, wigs and make-up for opera. Social hour begins at 5:30 at the home of Joan Burke: 3811 Greenwood Drive in Des Moines. Wine and hors d'oeuvres will be served. The cost for the evening is $10. Please RSVP to Joan at 274-3473 if you plan to attend. Current members, please note that the 2008 DMMO Guild directory will be printed soon, so if you haven't yet paid your dues, now is the time to do so. Contact Joan Burke if you have any questions. The Indianola Chapter will be gathering at the home of Chuck and Roberta Kerr at 7:00pm on November 15. We will have a preview of the opera Regina presented by Michael Egel. We will also have some time to socialize.
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DMMO Wins Tourism and the Arts Award
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DMMO's Executive Director, Tom Smith (center), receives the award from Tim Waddell and Julie Allesee.
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At the 2007 Iowa Tourism Conference Des Moines Metro Opera received the Tourism and the Arts Award. The Company's nomination was judged on several criteria and was selected for showing an outstanding partnership between tourism and the arts, an outstanding economic impact and effective marketing.
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My First Opera
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by Jim Johnson Remember when the Met used to go on tour? I had finished my classes for the day at the New England Conservatory. Upon returning to the dormitory, we found a gentleman begging for students to appear as supernumeraries in that night's performance of Aïda. What a fun idea! There followed a hectic few hours of being transported to the theater--transported to a different world, then fed a ham sandwich to distract us from having our clothing removed and our bodies painted all over with a healthy Egyptian sun-tan, ending with five minutes of instructions before being shoved in front of the footlights. As students at NEC, we were used to performing, often on a moment's notice. But this experience was of a different order altogether. After the frenetic hustle from dorm to stage, I found myself looking toward the conductor, only to find that the glorious Leontyne Price was standing not ten feet away. What an incredible first live opera!
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We hope you enjoyed the inaugural "My First Opera" article! We'd love to share your story. Do you remember your first opera? Was it a live performance? Was it on the radio? What do you remember about it? Who were the singers who stand out in your mind? How did you know that this art form was special? Share your story with us by sending it to msmith@dmmo.org and maybe you'll see your story in a future issue of OPERAzzi!
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