AS ONE

Kelly Markgraf and Sasha Cooke (photo by Ken Howard)

What a unique and brave subject for an opera--the struggle of a transgendered individual for self-acceptance.  The concept came to composer Laura Kaminsky who found willing associates Mark Campbell and Kimberly Reed to co-write the libretto.  The work certainly held our interest from start to finish--words such as TRANScendent and TRANSformation kept popping into our brain.

In a casting coup, married couple Sasha Cooke and Kelly Markgraf shared the role of the protagonist--a likable and sensitive individual born male but feeling very much like a woman. Forty years ago such individuals were thought of as having a mental disorder and the surgeons who dared to perform sex-reassignment surgery were attacked by their medical brethren. Nowadays, the condition is readily treated by hormonal manipulation and surgery.

One might think that the story of one such individual would be difficult to relate to; on the contrary, most people are in touch with parts of themselves that they feel are unacceptable and therefore repressed and denied.  Thus, we may feel a kinship, compassion and understanding.  If we are open to it, we may even feel better integrated ourselves by bearing witness to this story.

Mr. Markgraf performed the role of Hannah "before".  Although his physique and forceful baritone are completely masculine, his skillful interpretation allowed us to witness the woman within.  Ms. Cooke's gleaming mezzo and soft appearance was tinged at appropriate moments with the called-for masculine quality as she portrayed Hannah "after".  The roles could not have been better acted or sung.

A remarkable feature of the work is the way the various artists were called upon to cross artistic boundaries.  At times, the singers were called upon to dance and used their entire bodies to express their emotions.  The superb conductor Steven Osgood was called upon once to lay down his baton and assume the role of a schoolteacher.  (He exhibited a fine commanding voice.) The members of the Fry Street Quartet (violinists Robert Waters and Rebecca McFaul, violist Bradley Ottesen and cellist Anne Francis Bayless) not only played Ms. Kaminsky's music with consummate artistry but also participated in the drama just a bit.

One must give ample credit to Stage Director Ken Cazan who created the magic of having us see in our mind's eye what was not onstage. Although there were videos projected onto four asymmetrical screens, we found them distracting and preferred to use our imagination under Mr. Cazan's meaningful direction.  Although there were titles projected, they were unnecessary since the pair of singers exercised exemplary diction.

Since this was called a chamber opera, let us consider Ms. Kaminsky's music.  Her writing for the string quartet was nothing short of thrilling with interesting motives operating on a semi-conscious level.   There was ample melody and attractive harmonies.  There was nothing disagreeable to the ear, save for the scene when Hannah escapes a man with evil intentions.  There were snippets of Grieg when Hannah retreats to Norway.  The music created a portrait of a sensitive protagonist, someone we would want to get to know, someone we could care about.

We cannot express such enthusiasm for her writing for the voice. We understand that the librettists wanted the writing to be direct and colloquial, a task at which they succeeded admirably.  But, and this is a big but, such direct lines in English do not lend themselves to melody.  One could hear the potential beauty of the vocal lines only during short periods of melismatic singing when there was no dialogue to interfere.  And there were some thrilling moments when Ms. Cooke and Mr. Markgraf sang in gorgeous harmony (symbolic!) and in unison (even more symbolic!).

This problem is not unique to Ms. Kaminsky.  Most contemporary operas in English seem like plays with music rather than operas in the sense that one usually thinks of as opera.

Scenic and lighting design by David Martin Jacques was spare. Costume design by Sara Jean Tosetti consisted of jeans for both Hannahs and bare feet all around.

The work was commissioned and developed by American Opera Projects and will have two more performances on Saturday and Sunday at BAM Fisher.  If you are fortunate enough to get a ticket, don't be surprised if you walk out TRANSformed.

(c) meche kroop

COURAGE BEATS TRADITION

Kamala Sankaram (photo by Carl Skutsch)

Presented by Prototype for their second annual festival of new chamber works, Thumbprint is a profoundly moving work dealing with social justice for women.  An illiterate peasant woman named Mukhtar converted a tragic event into an advantage for herself and other young women; composer Kamala Sankaram (performing the lead role herself) and librettist Susan Yankowitz have converted her story into a most effective work that is musically and dramatically valid.  If dramatic liberties were taken it matters not.  There is such a thing as dramatic truth and Thumbprint has it in spades.

Mukhtar is a Pakistani woman from a small village who does what women do in that culture.  She stays indoors with her mother and sister, embroidering and cooking.  The women discuss finding a good husband who won't beat them; mama tells them that they cannot expect a man to be attractive or young since they have no dowry.

Bad news arrives; their 12-year old brother has been accused by a girl from a wealthy powerful family of "touching" her.  That this is a falsehood is of no consequence.  As is said so poetically in the libretto "Truth dies in the mouth of power".  He will be whipped perhaps until death.  The family is told that their only recourse is for a woman of his family to go to the girl's family and beg for forgiveness.  This is apparently a trick.  Her pleas are ridiculed and she is raped by four men of the powerful family.  She survives by detachment in a heart-breaking aria "This is me; this is not me".  The consequence is that she is disgraced and shamed; the only avenue left to her is suicide, which is something such victims are encouraged to do.

But Mukhtar's mother will not accept this.  She reminds her daughter that Mukhtar means courage.  The girl goes where none of her kind have gone before, having also been encouraged by the local imam.  She goes to the police and the case is brought to trial.  The wealthy family defends their position as one of tradition.  If someone dishonors your daughter, you dishonor theirs!  It is difficult for us 21st c.  Westerners to believe that people still live by such archaic codes.

Mukhtar wins the case and decides to get educated so she doesn't have to rely on a thumbprint in place of her signature.  She becomes an advocate for other women and promotes their education.

Ms. Sankaram's music is haunting and original.  Conducted by Steven Osgood, piano, harmonium, violin, viola, bass, flute and percussion are employed to create an Eastern-Western soundscape of memorable beauty.  The eminently singable vocal lines, marked by melismatic singing, are perfectly handled by the composer, by mezzo Theodora Hanslowe as the mother and soprano Leela Subramaniam as the sister.  The father was sympathetically portrayed by Steve Gokool and the other male roles by Kannan Vasudevan and Manu Narayan who were convincing in their arrogance.

Rachel Dickstein directed with a fine hand, emphasizing the concept of the heroine being on a pathway.  Kate Fry's costumes were appropriate; set design by Susan Zeeman Rogers was minimalistic.  Full attention was focused on the dilemma of the individuals.  There were video projections which we found innocuous when they were not distracting; the screen might have been put to better use for surtitles.

Anyone who reads or goes to the cinema is aware of the dreadful indignities and crimes to which women are subjected under sharia.  Can these tribal customs be fought?  Can those battles be won?  This work gives us hope.  Clearly this work earns its place by virtue of its storytelling and artistry but one cannot deny the superimposed political value of exposing evil and illuminating the courage to overcome it.

© meche kroop

THE MOTHER OF US ALL

Political Rally in Virgil Thomson's The Mother of Us All
Photo by Carol Rosegg

How Dona D. Vaughn, Artistic Director of the Manhattan School of Music Opera Theater, took Gertrude Stein's incomprehensible word salad and made a dramatically valid production out of it was a source of great amazement to us; our curiosity was rewarded by Ms. Vaughn herself who shared the secret with us. She first staged the work as a play, asking each singer to create a valid character with a backstory and motivation and to perform off the book.  It was only then that the music was added.  This device worked wonders; the stage was filled with a plethora of interesting characters interacting with one another such that the characters  overwhelmed any need for plot.

There's the composer of The Mother of Us All, Virgil Thomson (portrayed by Chad Sonka) onstage with Gertrude Stein, the poet and librettist (portrayed by Megan Gillis); they are narrating the opening scene of the opera in a "she said" format as if they were doing the creating right on the spot.  The audience is immediately drawn into the story.  But there isn't much of a story.  Susan B. Anthony, convincingly portrayed by mezzo Noragh Devlin, was a feminist who fought valiantly for women's right to vote; it was a long uphill battle which she eventually won in spite of overwhelming male resistance.

There were two Civil War soldiers, Jo the Loiterer, sung by winning tenor Alexander Frankel and his sidekick Chris the Citizen (baritone Cameron Johnson).  There was the spunky Indiana Elliot (mezzo Gina Perregrino) who marries Jo but won't take his name until he takes hers.  There was the proud John Adams (tenor Carlton Moe) who is in love with the nearly blind Constance Fletcher (soprano Addison Hamilton)  but will not get down on his knee for her, until he does.  There is Daniel Webster (bass Scott Russell) who is infatuated with a ghost Angel More (soprano Kasia Borowiec).  There are the embattled pair Andrew Johnson and Thaddeus Stevens (tenors Thomas Mulder and James Ludlum); and wasn't that Ulysses S. Grant (bass-baritone Kim Johansen)  and bass-baritone Nicholas Smith as the severe Anthony Comstock.  Swanning around the stage in a gorgeous gold satin gown and huge hat was none other than Lillian Russell (soprano Margaret Newcomb).  And that's only half the cast!
Ms. Stein peopled the opera with historical characters from different periods, fictional characters, and people she knew as well--feminists and intellectuals.

That this all worked so well was due to the incredible amount of effort put into forming the ensemble and to the fine production values.  Erhard Rom designed the simple set--classical columns, an American flag, a desk, a chair, a table, a Picasso portrait of Ms. Stein.  Tracy Dorman designed the effective and colorful costumes. Francis Patrelle was the choreographer.

But this is, after all, an opera so what about the musical values?  Mr. Thomson's music was given a frisky performance by the Manhattan School of Music Orchestra conducted by the esteemed Steven Osgood.  The music is nothing if not tuneful and such accessibility is uncommon in 20th c. opera; we heard a lot of "Americana"--folk tunes and dance music, much of it seeming to come from an earlier time as befit the story.  The voices were excellent and were used to limn the characters.  There is not a thing about the production to fault.

There is one performance left on Sunday at 2:30.  Snag a ticket if you can.  This is opera as entertainnment!

© meche kroop

A TOAST TO THE GHOSTS

Let us raise our glasses to the ambitious folks at Manhattan School of Music Opera Theater who have given us a dazzling production of John Corigliano's The Ghosts of Versailles.  Having missed the production at the Met in 1991 we were most eager to see what a contemporary librettist (William M. Hoffman) could do with the Beaumarchais characters so beloved in Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia and Mozart's Nozze di Figaro.  To our knowledge, no one had previously created an opera from the final play of the Beaumarchais trilogy entitled La Mère Coupable.

In the play, Count Almaviva and the Countess are living in Paris.  The Countess, twenty years earlier, had an affair with Cherubino and has a son named Léon whom the Count has never accepted.  Never mind that he himself had an affair with a noblewoman and has a daughter named Florestine!  The goose is sauced while the gander goes free, unwilling to forgive his wife.  Naturally these two young people fall in love and wish to marry, which the Count opposes.

This plot is used by Hoffman in a most unusual way.  He layers the story with an invention--Beaumarchais is enamored of Marie-Antoinette, here called Antonia and wants to rewrite history and save her from the guillotine.  When Figaro rebels against what is written for him, Beaumarchais must enter the opera within the opera and thereby loses his creative powers.

MSM has spared no expense or effort in mounting a production that works on every level.  In the opening scene the ghosts of the aristocracy are asleep and look very much like statues of alabaster but they soon come to life and sing.  The stage is often filled with the ghosts, including Antonia herself, observing Beaumarchais' play, and later figures of the revolution bent on convicting and beheading the aristocracy.

Astute direction by renowned director Jay Lesenger makes this confusing tale work seamlessly.  Steven Osgood on the podium elicited some fine playing of Mr. Corigliano's unusual music which is, stylistically, all over the map.  Sufficient credit must be given to set designer Steven Capone and costume designer Daniel James Cole , to hair and makeup coordinator Amy Jean Wright as well as to choreographer Francis Patrelle.

Master's degree candidates performed their roles with uniform excellence.  We especially enjoyed the Figaro of baritone Nickoli Strummer who had a great aria in Act I, soprano Cree Carrico's equally great aria as Antonia, tenor Aaron Short's performance as the hypocritical villain Bégearss, baritone Gideon Dabi as Beaumarchais, tenor Brett Sprague as Almaviva, soprano Rebecca Krynski as the Countess and Kaitlyn Costello-Fain as Susanna. 

Some special moments stood out: simultaneous duets between Antonia and Beaumarchais alongside the Countess and (long dead) Cherubino, the latter sung by countertenor Anthony Bucci; an amusing duel (choreographed by Rod Kinter) between ghosts who realize they can't die; and an hilarious scene at the Turkish embassy with a Pasha and a dancing girl named Samira, sung by Rachelle Pike whose rich mezzo was well used in a faux folk song that had us in stitches.  Florestine was sung by Nicole Haslett and Léon by Mingjie Lei.  They did make a handsome couple.

The amount of care invested in this production was evident and the result can be considered an unqualified success.  The Met could not have done it better.

(c) meche kroop