English Touring Opera are delighted to announce a season of lyric monodramas to tour nationally from October to December. The season features music for solo singer and piano by Argento, Britten, Tippett and Shostakovich with a bold and inventive approach to making opera during social distancing.
This tenth of ten Live from London concerts was in fact a recorded live performance from California. It was no less enjoyable for that, and it was also uplifting to learn that this wasn’t in fact the ‘last’ LfL event that we will be able to enjoy, courtesy of VOCES8 and their fellow vocal ensembles (more below …).
Ever since Wigmore Hall announced their superb series of autumn concerts, all streamed live and available free of charge, I’d been looking forward to this song recital by Ian Bostridge and Imogen Cooper.
Although Stile Antico’s programme article for their Live from London recital introduced their selection from the many treasures of the English Renaissance in the context of the theological debates and upheavals of the Tudor and Elizabethan years, their performance was more evocative of private chamber music than of public liturgy.
Evidently, face masks don’t stifle appreciative “Bravo!”s. And, reducing audience numbers doesn’t lower the volume of such acclamations. For, the audience at Wigmore Hall gave soprano Elizabeth Llewellyn and pianist Simon Lepper a greatly deserved warm reception and hearty response following this lunchtime recital of late-Romantic song.
For this week’s Live from London vocal recital we moved from the home of VOCES8, St Anne and St Agnes in the City of London, to Kings Place, where The Sixteen - who have been associate artists at the venue for some time - presented a programme of music and words bound together by the theme of ‘reflection’.
'Such is your divine Disposation that both you excellently understand, and royally entertaine the Exercise of Musicke.’
‘And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels, And prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven … that old serpent … Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.’
There was never any doubt that the fifth of the twelve Met Stars Live in Concert broadcasts was going to be a palpably intense and vivid event, as well as a musically stunning and theatrically enervating experience.
‘Love’ was the theme for this Live from London performance by Apollo5. Given the complexity and diversity of that human emotion, and Apollo5’s reputation for versatility and diverse repertoire, ranging from Renaissance choral music to jazz, from contemporary classical works to popular song, it was no surprise that their programme spanned 500 years and several musical styles.
The Academy of St Martin in the Fields have titled their autumn series of eight concerts - which are taking place at 5pm and 7.30pm on two Saturdays each month at their home venue in Trafalgar Square, and being filmed for streaming the following Thursday - ‘re:connect’.
The London Symphony Orchestra opened their Autumn 2020 season with a homage to Oliver Knussen, who died at the age of 66 in July 2018. The programme traced a national musical lineage through the twentieth century, from Britten to Knussen, on to Mark-Anthony Turnage, and entwining the LSO and Rattle too.
With the Live from London digital vocal festival entering the second half of the series, the festival’s host, VOCES8, returned to their home at St Annes and St Agnes in the City of London to present a sequence of ‘Choral Dances’ - vocal music inspired by dance, embracing diverse genres from the Renaissance madrigal to swing jazz.
Just a few unison string wriggles from the opening of Mozart’s overture to Le nozze di Figaro are enough to make any opera-lover perch on the edge of their seat, in excited anticipation of the drama in music to come, so there could be no other curtain-raiser for this Gala Concert at the Royal Opera House, the latest instalment from ‘their House’ to ‘our houses’.
"Before the ending of the day, creator of all things, we pray that, with your accustomed mercy, you may watch over us."
The doors at The Metropolitan Opera will not open to live audiences until 2021 at the earliest, and the likelihood of normal operatic life resuming in cities around the world looks but a distant dream at present. But, while we may not be invited from our homes into the opera house for some time yet, with its free daily screenings of past productions and its pay-per-view Met Stars Live in Concert series, the Met continues to bring opera into our homes.
Music-making at this year’s Grange Festival Opera may have fallen silent in June and July, but the country house and extensive grounds of The Grange provided an ideal setting for a weekend of twelve specially conceived ‘promenade’ performances encompassing music and dance.
There’s a “slide of harmony” and “all the bones leave your body at that moment and you collapse to the floor, it’s so extraordinary.”
“Music for a while, shall all your cares beguile.”
The hum of bees rising from myriad scented blooms; gentle strains of birdsong; the cheerful chatter of picnickers beside a still lake; decorous thwacks of leather on willow; song and music floating through the warm evening air.
![Ashraf Seweilam as Alì Babà [Photo by Todos Juntos]](http://www.operatoday.com/LWO_191017_33561-Edit-Edit.png)
On Friday evening October 25, 2019, Opera Southwest opened its 47th season with composer Giovanni Bottesini and librettist Emilio Taddei’s Alì Babà in a version reconstructed from the original manuscript score by Conductor Anthony Barrese.
For the libretto, Bottesini and Taddei used the text of a French opera by Luigi Cherubini based on the famous story from French orientalist and archaeologist Antoine Galland’s version of The Thousand and One Nights. Taddei translated it into Italian and shortened it considerably. Bottesini premiered the opera in 1871. The 2019 version directed by Foad Faridzadeh was an uproarious comedy set in the 1940s. His clever, wickedly amusing production had the Southwest Opera audience laughing out loud on numerous occasions.
What this opera needed was a star to carry the show, and Opera Southwest presented a perfect answer in the sensational bass-baritone, comic actor and all around showman, Ashraf Seweilam as Alì Babà. He celebrated his character’s riches by dancing nimbly across the stage but cowered in terror when threatened by thieves. His presence filled the stage as his resonant, bronzed tones flowed throughout the National Hispanic Cultural Center’s moderate-sized Journal Theater.
Monica Yunus as Delia, Ashraf Seweilam as Alì Babà, and Christopher Bozeka as her lover, Nadir.
Richard Hogles’ scenery consisted mainly of neon-lit arches crowned by a circle. The back of each scene was a projected wall, building, or cave designed by Media Vision that denoted the area in which the action took place. Daniel Chapman’s lighting created the appropriate ambiance for each setting. Carmella Lynn Lauer’s costumes, colors for female soloists but black and white for everyone else, established the time period as the forties.
Monica Yunus was a sweet, loving Delia who commanded attention as she sang with lustrous tones, an occasional trill, and some surprisingly hefty soprano sonorities. Her tenor was the lyrically gifted Christopher Bozeka whose smooth but warm and hefty legato immediately won the audience over to his side of the argument. They made a delightful young couple and they succeeded in making the audience want them to be together. Laurel Semerdjian was a conniving Morgiana who fascinated onlookers with her hijinks and comic timing. She sang with excellent diction and strong tones.
As the Head of Customs Aboul Hassan, Kevin Thompson had an imposing physique and a voice with a nasal tone that made him a fine villain. It was no wonder that Delia did not want to marry him. One of the most interesting voices in the show belonged to Darren Stokes, the bass-baritone who sang Orsocane (Beardog). While acting a “tough guy” part, he sang with rich, resonant dark tones.
Kevin Thompson as Aboul Hassan and Ashraf Seweilam as Alì Babà with chorus.
Three members of the 2019 Opera Southwest Young Artist Program: Matthew Soibelman as the Treasurer, Jonathan Walker-VanKuren as Orsocane’s Adjutant, and Kameron Ghanavati as Alì Babà’s Slave Faor, impressed me with both their vocal abilities and their stagecraft. Chorus Master Aaron Howe’ s women’s ensemble sang with light, mellifluous harmony as they moved across the stage. His men’s group portrayed believable cut-throat thieves and thugs while singing with strong masculine sounds.
Conductor Anthony Barrese put together the score for this production, the first in nearly a century. He gave a rousing, propulsive rendition of this rarely-heard work that allowed the singers enough space to breathe comfortably and interpret their characters, but never let the tension lag. He commanded a fifty-piece orchestra that gave listeners all the tunes and sonorities of this wonderful piece. The composer, who was an orchestra player and conductor, knew how to color the events and situations of this complicated story. Alì Babà was a fabulous evening’s entertainment and I’m glad I traveled to Albuquerque to see it.
Maria Nockin
Cast and Production Information:
Alì Babà, Ashraf Sewailam; Delia, Monica Yunus; Nadir, Christopher Bozeka; Aboul Hassan, Kevin Thompson; Orsocane, Darren Stokes; Morgiana, Laurel Semerdjian. Calaf, Thamar, and Faor, young artist program members: Matthew Soibelman, Jonathan Walker-VanKuren and Kameron Ghanavati. Conductor, Anthony Barrese; Director, Foad Faridzadeh; Costume Designer, Carmella Lynn Lauer; Scenic Designer, Richard Hogle; Lighting Designer, Daniel Chapman; Projection Designer, Media Vision; Chorus Master, Aaron Howe. Journal Theater, National Hispanic Cultural Center, Albuquerque, New Mexico, October 25, 2019.