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Stuart Canin may have helped end WW II, but he was
most definitely the catalyst for the beginning of a historic feud, albeit one
confined to the radio airwaves. Stuart, born in
Stuart auditioned, playing a work of Kreisler ----
which impressed the show's producer, but also elicited a request to play
something shorter. Stuart settled on a number by Francois (Yes, that is
Francois and not Franz!) Schubert: "The Bee". It usually times out
at around one minute, but Stuart, taking no chances, practiced until he had
it down to 45 seconds.
Stuart won that night, pocketing the $75 winner's award --- a sum three times
what Stuart's father took home each week! Fred Allen, after expressing his
admiration for Stuart's performance, ad-libbed a caustic barb directed at
Jack Benny, contrasting this young performer's art with that of: "That
thirty-nine-year-old would-be violinist, whose playing brings to mind a she
wildcat defending her young. Benny can't even play on the linoleum."
...... A more eloquent declaration of war has never been framed.
Benny, whose own radio program aired on Sunday evenings and armed with three
days of creative work from his own team of writers, replied in kind, and the
"feud" was on!
Jack Benny Fred Allen
It wasn't exactly the Capulets vs. the Montagues, but it did "rage" over the airwaves
for four years, with Stuart making guest appearances on both radio shows.
Just one example --- Allen, describing a Benny performance: "Benny was
doing a monologue with a pig on the stage. The pig was out there to eat the
garbage that the audience threw at Benny. ...... Some nights he needed two
pigs."
With "The" Feud finally wearing a little thin, Benny and Allen
made, in 1940, a motion picture, "Love Thy Neighbor", in which
these two real-life friends sort-of patch up their differences. Stuart was
presented with a $1,000 check onstage at the Paramount Theatre at
intermission of the premiere of this very forgettable film. Using this then
magnificent sum of $1,000, Stuart used this award to further his continuing
musical education, studying with the revered and legendary Ivan Galamian at the
Stuart Canin, in addition to accumulating a catalog
of musical careers whose number is legion, has visited us here in Los Angeles
often enough to work producing the musical background for over 650 motion
pictures, serving as concertmaster for such big-name Hollywood films as
Forrest Gump and Schindler's List. For the film Titanic he contributed a
violin track: you can hear him during the climactic "and the band played
on"scene.
Stuart, thank you. We are awed and can only ask of you: Play on ..... Please,
play on.
Volume 1 Number 2
A Team
Player
When you
saw the second pair of operas for our season, perhaps you reviewed the
cast and staff information for both Tosca and Parsifal and saw, of course, that
Music Director Kent Nagano conducted both operas. Did you wonder:
How was Maestro able to simultaneously prepare two operas for their
respective production runs? How could he have rehearsed the casts and
choruses for two operas, and then still have had any time and energy left to
integrate the orchestra into the mix in time for each opening night?
The answer, of course, is: He couldn't. ……… not without help, at least.
The help came in the form of a supporting staff that was comprised of a combination of members of the permanent staff of LAO and some outside artists, contracted specifically for the productions at hand. Tosca had a cast of ten and a chorus of forty-eight. To help prepare for Tosca’s production run, LAO utilized two Assistant Conductors: Staff member Paul Floyd, and Kostis Protopapas, a part-time Assistant Conductor and Chorus Master with the Lyric Opera of Chicago. This revival of Tosca, substantial though it was, at least found almost all of the principals and chorus ---- and even the Supers ---- very familiar with their respective roles.
In contrast, the preparation for Parsifal required rehearsal effort that was at least as heroic as the opera itself. Parsifal had a cast of nineteen and a chorus of eighty-three (That included eleven “Auxiliary Tenors” that never appeared onstage, but nevertheless sang). The preparation for Parsifal involved three Assistant Conductors: Brad Moore, an Assistant Conductor from the MET; Pedro Yanez, a Voice Coach from the Santa Fe Opera; and Paul Harris, part-time with the San Francisco Opera and recently LAO’s Assistant Conductor for Aida. These three conductors basically functioned as rehearsal pianists for Parsifal.
Completing the team of conductors that worked under Maestro Nagano for Parsifal was Associate Conductor Walter Althammer. As an example of the strength of the Parsifal conducting team, one may examine the person of Maestro Althammer and the role he played in the preparation for this opera.
Maestro Althammer is no stranger to LAO, having previously worked here, first sharing the baton with Hartmut Haenchen for Orfeo ed Euridice in 2003, and then as Associate Conductor for LAO’s production of Idomeneo in 2004. Maestro Althammer, age forty-three, bears some resemblance (at least in these photos) to Gustav Mahler.
Althammer Mahler
He is thankful, though, that his wife, Dr. Maria Hafner-Althammer, a pediatrician, is much more of an ideal life partner for
him than
Maestro Althammer arrived here on October 23, just under five weeks before the first performance, and began rehearsals the very next day, first with the Flower Maidens (as they arrived), then with the covers for the principals, the chorus, and, of course, ultimately, the principals themselves. Singers and musicians have their respective unions to ensure that they are not called to rehearse more than twice per day, but conductors have no such constraint. So Maestro’s rehearsal schedule quickly evolved into a regular routine of three-per-day rehearsals (that's 9-10 hours per day) for six-to-seven days per week. Just as with his work in Idomeneo, Maestro’s responsibility was largely limited to work with singers and piano only.
Details that the average opera-goer would not think of had to be addressed. For example, in the processionals in Acts 1 and 3 one heard low-frequency chimes, mimicking the measured tread of the knights. Here at LAO, a synthesizer generated these chimes. A special listening/coordination session was held to settle on the synthesizer's controls, so that the desired tone and timbre of the chimes could be established.
The rare day off either found Maestro, for example,
sitting in on the Sitzprobe for Tosca or, as
often as possible, camped out in LAO’s Music
Library. Maestro, soon to conduct his first Lucia in
Although this tour of duty with LAO allowed Maestro close to zero time for visiting points of interest in our community, his earlier visits here have found him in such varied cultural and historic venues as the Schoenberg Villa in Brentwood (where he was the dinner guest of Ronald, Arnold’s son), the Heroes Garden high up at the Drescher Campus of Pepperdine University in Malibu (a site honoring the heroes of UAL Flight # 93 on 9/11), and Canter’s Deli on Fairfax (where he inhaled his very first pastrami sandwich).
In a way, much of Maestro Althammer’s
career to date served as preparation for this project. Twenty years ago, in
one of his first professional jobs, he worked as Assistant Conductor, a.k.a.
rehearsal pianist, under the direction of Wolfgang Sawallisch
for a production of Parsifal. Since then his career has progressed, as
he has assisted renowned conductors such as Bernard Haitink,
Riccardo Chailly, and Hartmut Haenchen in the
preparation for concerts, operas, and off-stage orchestras. His own work as
principal conductor has largely been confined to lower-echelon houses in
locales such as
Occasionally the opportunity to conduct a performance at a
major house presents itself. Such was the case two years ago here in
Getting to work with both singers and orchestra, plus
conducting actual performances has been the ‘Best Of Times’.
However, as satisfying as it was to be a central cog in the creation of
this Parsifal production, there remained some frustration in, once
again, being constrained to work almost exclusively with singers, chorus, and
piano. In fact, Maestro Althammer was unable
to linger here for Parsifal’s opening night: he had a commitment
to conduct a concert in
An unspoken ambition of Maestro Althammer is to establish a career as principal/resident conductor at a major opera house, and many of the “apprenticeships” as Associate Conductor have been accepted, no doubt, with that goal in mind. Still, as an additional consideration, Maestro now also strives for balance between his professional and private life. Besides his wife Maria, he has two children: Katharina, just beginning formal schooling, and Maximilian, age four. His professional obligations often require him to be absent from them for long periods of time, and, when that happens, he misses them dearly.
Maestro
Although Figaro will be the final opera here in
combination,
we shouldn’t be surprised, given the circumstances of past experience
and future commitment, if this collaboration is renewed in
Maestro Walter Althammer: you
didn't see him on the podium for Parsifal; you probably didn't even
find his name in the program; but you wouldn't have enjoyed a
polished performance without his contributions to the rehearsals. Away from
us in
Photos: Robert Millard &
HGO Photo
Montage: May Wang of OLLA
Inside Opera
Volume 1 Number 3
Propping Up
It was Sunday evening, January 15, and the end of Act 1,
Scene 2 of Twilight of the Gods at Long Beach Opera’s production
of Wagner’s Ring was in sight. Siegfried had drunk that
amnesia-rendering potion and the time was fast approaching for Siegfried and
Gunter to drink their “Blood Toast”.
The staging called for the wine
goblet to be setting on an anvil in mid-stage. The anvil was to be a
convenient, dramatic prop for the goblet to rest on. Then, as each man made a
cut on his hand, a few drops of blood would fall into the
goblet, there to mix with the wine.
Only one problem loomed on the
horizon: There was no anvil on stage!
Dean Elzinga,
singing
Kirk Graves, Production Properties Coordinator for LA
Opera for the past eighteen seasons, had nothing to do with this
(temporarily) missing anvil, but he did, in the Spring of 2002, obtain
an anvil for LA Opera. Kirk secured an honest-to-goodness anvil from The Sisters
Of Charity of Rolling Hills, a benevolent organization that accepts used
household goods and either sells these items or redirects them to the Needy.
Sister Angela Breeden, one of the Catholic Nuns at this
Foraging is one of Kirk’s major
functions as Properties Coordinator. As the opportunities present themselves
Mr. Graves frequents garage sales, estate sales, and otherwise responds to
ads in local newspapers that promise to be a source for potential stage
props.
Kirk’s office reflects his
duties as a collector of things. The photo below shows Kirk holding a remnant
of LAO’s own ‘Phantom of the
Opera’ (actually, just one of the alternate skull designs considered
for last season’s Der Rosenkavalier).
The Native American figure to his right is Pocahantes,
a prop unlikely to ever make an appearance on the stage of the
Kirk --- with Pocahantes and Rosenkavalier artifac
Having a ready supply of used furniture has proven
fortuitous on many occasions, one being just two years ago when the
soon-to-be-revived production of Le nozze
di Figaro was put together. In the early Spring
of 2004, the Creative Team headed by Jürgen Flimm canceled its commitment to LAO for this (then) new
production. So, starting from scratch, a new team of Ian Judge, Tim Goodchild, and Deirdre Clancy --- indispensably served by
Kirk Graves --- put together this present production in only ten weeks,
easily the record for anything of this nature that LAO has ever done.
Although almost all of Figaro’s
props are medium-to-small pieces of furniture (four full sets of furniture
are needed), it is the concluding fireworks which is the most memorable of the
production’s stage props. For this display, fifteen sets of floor
mortars are used, with each canister having both a lifting charge and an
aerial charge in its construction. Interestingly, the local fire marshal gave
his (supervised, to be sure) blessing to this exciting-looking fireworks, but
forbad the use of sparklers.
Another display of raw firepower was used in LAO’s 1997 production of Monteverdi’s Il
Ritorno d'Ulisse
in Patria (The Return of Ulysses to his Homeland). In the
course of the story, Ulysses returns and, in a rage, fights and kills the
suitors that have been pestering his faithful wife Penelope. The scene
emphasized Ulysses’ rage and fierceness of the battle with a wall of
fire that erupted, coinciding with Ulysses’ firing an arrow to the back
wall of the set: The propane was planned to ignite just as the arrow crossed
the jets’ plane of reference. This ignition was not triggered by the
arrow, of course, but rather by a timed musical cue: Ulysses simply had
to get that arrow to the rear wall right on time, else the scene’s
effectiveness would be lost
Photo by Ken Howard for LAO Il Ritorno d'Ulisse in
Patria ---
1997
Sir Thomas Allen was this production’s Ulysses and often had trouble loading the arrow and drawing the bow. He never really ‘got the hang’ of slipping the bowstring into the arrow notch in an expeditious manner: some nights it looked as though he might have to throw the arrow, in order for it to get to the back wall on cue!
Usually, Kirk is not required to be in attendance for
performances, but Ulysses was an exception. This production was unique
in that it used a live prop: Marimba, a South African Martial Eagle (Polemaetus Bellicosus)
, accompanied by its trainer, served as the incarnation of the god
Jupiter. The eagle, when it chose to show off its nine-foot wingspan, was
what lawyers call an “attractive nuisance”. Backstage, with
Marimba secured on a short tether, LAO established a seven foot radial
"no-fly" zone, and it was Kirk’s job to keep Lookie-Lous away from Big Bird and its trainer.
Kirk, proving himself adept at human psychology, accomplished this by surreptitiously initiating two rumors:
1) That Marimba, when in the wild, was known to bring down 150 lb. Thomson Gazelles
2)
That, when Marimba followed you about the set with his eyes, he
was routinely evaluating where exactly your place in the Food Chain lay
When these rumors got back to Kirk, he would, as you might
guess, decline to deny them.
Of course, there are fires and
there are fireworks, but there are also firearms, and LAO uses real
weapons: real swords, real spears, and real guns that fire real
…….. blanks. The weapons
are stored in a super-secret room in the bowels of the
Kirk --- in The Armory
Besides the medium size props (furniture), there are BIG
props and little props. An example of a BIG prop was the set
LAO rented from the Netherlands Opera for Pelleas
et Melisande. This set, a model of a
three-story home, was suspended from the ceiling of the theater, with each
floor being cantilevered out from stage rear. That meant that the suspended
set had to be engineered, with safe net load weights established for each
floor, all furniture weighed and even every singer’s body weight taken
into consideration.
An
example of a little prop is a candle; say, for example, that pair of candles so
ceremoniously repositioned by Tosca, after causing Scarpia
to assume room temperature. First of all: Yes, the candles are real, and,
yes, Tosca’s shawl is made out of flame retardant material. Now, the
candles, remember, are sitting on a stage that slopes front-to-back. So, in
order to have each flame burn in a line coincident with its respective
candle stem, the base of each candleholder must include a wedge that
“takes out” the slope of the stage. No way would we want to drip
melted candle wax onto Scarpia’s furniture!
That anvil which Kirk obtained
from Sister Angela has yet to be used. To the surprise of some, anvils were
not used when LAO last revived our production of Il Trovatore in 2004, Stage Director Stephen Lawless
reasoning that the famous Anvil Chorus is not really about anvils, but
about gypsies, celebrating and talking about how sexy women enrich
their lives [ Ed. Note: Just like Happy Hour in our
contemporary society! ].
But, perhaps, when LAO produces the Wagner Ring Cycle in a few years, we will finally see Siegfried and Gunter, primed for a “Blood Toast”, setting their communal goblet on that anvil Kirk Graves obtained back in 2002 from Sister Angela.
Acknowledgments:
1) Thanks to Kirk Graves, for taking time away from what has to be the most fun job in all of the Fine Arts, to share his experiences with us
2) Thanks to Doris Koplik, LBO Media/Publicity Liaison, for providing the photo of the Blood Toast from LBO's Dress Rehearsal
3) Thanks to Bob Cable, LAO Public Relations Manager, for his cooperation and perseverance in tracking down that photo of Marimba with his Trainer (costumed photo)
4)
Thanks to Mary Corrigan, LAO Office Manager, whose power of recollection
regarding past productions dwarfs my own
Inside
Opera
Volume 1 Number 4
A Rose by Any Other
Name, etc.
Maestro
Maestro
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The
family name is, historically, Eto, with a long
"o" (It could be spelled Etoh or Etou, in order to get the long vowel sound).
His
grandfather, born in
a)
It would not be feasible to divide the family farm six ways.
b)
The younger five brothers were not of a mind to (ultimately) work as servants
for their oldest brother.
An
initial, partial solution to this problem was to give
away Maestro's grandfather to another family which lacked sons ---- and
part and parcel of this arrangement was for grandfather to assume the name of
this adopted family, the name being (you guessed it): "
It happened
that, more-or-less concurrent with the disenchantment of Maestro
Nagano's grandfather with the silkworm industry, an additional attempt
to reduce the family oversupply of sons was now settled upon: the
intermediate four brothers would emigrate to
Because
one of the four brothers became ill prior to sailing, only three of
the Eto brothers departed Japan for the New World
...... that is, until ten days into the voyage (in the vicinity of
Hawaii), when grandfather "miraculously" appeared! (Yes! ---
A stowaway!) [Ed.note: This
recounting evoked thoughts of the movie A Night
at the Opera, only imagining
Zeppo appearing during that cross-Atlantic voyage
to join up with Groucho,
The
brothers became
Because
of hard work, diligence, and good fortune the four brothers prospered and,
ultimately, spread out over
The two
brothers in the Central Coastal area continued to prosper, so much so
that, very often, market orders for one brother's business would be confused
with the other brother's business. In order to put an end to the confusion
between the two Eto businesses, Maestro's
grandfather changed his name ---- again. He, undoubtedly recalling the prior
precedent in
So it is,
whenever someone asks Maestro, "Are you related to ________
Acknowledgment:
OLLA Member
Kimiyo Sasaki organized the event in Little Tokyo
and graciously corrected my notes with respect to the spelling
of Japanese surnames, and also reviewed my notes for general
accuracy. I especially appreciated Kimiyo's
not laughing too overtly at my pronunciation of Numajiri,
Eto, etc.
Inside Opera
Volume 1 Number 5
Garnering More Backstage Magic
Many of
us in the Opera League began the current season, 'way back last summer, by
attending a league-sponsored showing of the award-winning Zeffirelli
film of Pagliacci,
featuring Placido Domingo and Teresa Stratas.
In the
scene where the character of the misshapen clown Tonio
sings of his love for Nedda (Subito
ho l'incanto; M'ha vinto l'amor), Zeffirelli staged the scene so as to have Nedda bathing a young, naked boy, the youngster standing
in a tub of water. Filmed as it was and using a sufficiently discrete camera
angle, the scene was a charming portrayal of a bit of rustic life
and, in the context of the opera, reinforced Tonio's
growing affection for Nedda.
This same
basic Zeffirelli production was the one used here
by LAO, but it was not feasible, of course, for LAO to have a naked child on
stage. Instead, for the dress rehearsal, the young boy wore a pair of
shorts for the bathing scene. While now modest, the scene
lacked credibility: one just doesn't take a bath while wearing shorts.
Stanley M. Garner, the Assistant Stage Director for Pagliacci, had a better
idea.
Mr.
Garner replaced the boy with a young girl, and, instead of being bathed,
the girl had her hair being combed by Nedda. Now we
had a scene that both preserved the spirit of down-home, rural life and had
no distracting inconsistencies in its staging.
Mr.
Garner 'called the shots' on this change because Zeffirelli
didn't make it here for this revival of his design, and Associate Director
Marco Gandini departed our city on September 10,
prior to opening night. So it was Mr. Garner who supervised all of
the regular stage performances of this spectacular, multilevel creation of
the teeming streets and crowded tenements of the on-stage city and
applied his special touches of stage intelligence to the existing design.
.
LAO Photo
This is something that Stanley Garner has become known throughout the operatic world as being an expert in doing. As an Assistant Director (or Restage Director, as some opera companies prefer) he can take a particular creation's Production Book, an amalgam of stage directions, lighting cues, etc., and convert these "cold" words into a perfectly timed reproduction of the original stage concept, often making good-sense modifications along the way.
LAO has benefited from Mr. Garner's expertise in times past for many productions, his working between 1-4 productions per season, ever since 1994. Included in these productions were those of Xerxes, Die Zauberflöte, La boheme, and, of course, this same production of Pagliacci in 1996. His strongest memories, quite naturally, remain with the productions of La boheme and Die Zauberflöte for which he got 'top billing' as the Stage Director.
For his La boheme in 2004, Stan worked to make the production more true-to-life and to alter those bits of stagecraft that might distract from the primary storyline. For example: In Act Two he had the chorus remain on stage, thus avoiding the distraction of a large number of people reiteratively entering and exiting; In Act Four he deleted the bicycles (Think about it: what is the likelihood of people riding bicycles about on a rooftop, anyhow?) and gave the painter Marcello a real-life female model, posing for a portrait (topless for the evening performances, but wearing a shirt for the student matinees)
It was his adaptation of Sir Peter Hall's production of Die Zauberflöte which has proved to be, so far, the most lasting of his creations. Stan took the production we saw here at LAO in 1998 and streamlined it --- eliminating much dialogue and having the scenes flow into one another rapidly (much as we've seen him do with the just-completed Figaro performance run). A major convert to (and advocate of) Stan's re-creation was Gerald Scarfe, Set and Costume Designer of the original production.
His
creation was first performed for the Seattle Opera in 1999 and then reprised
for LAO in 2002, the cast, if you recall, including Michael Schade, Rod Gilfry, Sumi Jo, and the never-to-be-forgotten, pulse-quickening Andrea
Rost as Pamina. Since
then it has been used by several other opera houses. Stan refers to it as the
"gift that keeps giving". [Ed Note: One gathers that
royalties are a factor here.]
Andrea
Rost as Pamina Sumi Jo as Die Königin der Nacht
Photos by Ken Howard for LAO
An examination
of Mr. Garner's career affirms the
natural suspicion that one must typically follow a devious
route when developing a career in stage direction. Stan's
parents encouraged him to persevere through piano lessons in his youth,
succeeding to the extent that he largely bankrolled his way through
Graduating with a degree in (and a dislike for!) piano, Stan eased into the world of perpetual auditions, working as an actor of primarily classical orientation (Shakespeare and the like). After ten years of this, it was the "crossover" role of Pasha Selim for the L'Opera de Montreal's production of Die Entfuhrung aus dem Serail that built the bridge for Stan to migrate over into the field of opera. Connecticut Opera, after seeing him as Pasha Selim, offered him a contract to direct its 1990 production of Le Nozze di Figaro.
Mr. Garner admits to being the most nervous of any time in his professional life when the curtain rose on his Connecticut Opera Figaro. For the first time ever, he realized that matters were now out of his personal, hands-on control. Heretofore he had been an actor, accountable only for his own performance on stage, and now he was dependent upon others whom he had trained. To his delight, the singers followed his directions and the audience laughed and applauded just as reliably as any preprogrammed sound track for one of Gary Marshall's TV programs. A career in stage direction had begun.
Mr.
Garner has left his mark on opera companies throughout the
It was at
the Seattle Opera in 1998 that Stanley Garner helped create and choreograph a
scene, which devotees of Wagner still enjoy ..... In fact,
some fortunate ones of our number witnessed it once again last
summer. I speak of the Seattle Opera's production of Das Rheingold. In the opening scene, Wagner's original concept
calls for the three Rhine Daughters to simultaneously "swim" and
sing throughout the twenty minute scene.
Mr.
Garner, working with Director Steven Wadsworth, put together what is still
seen on the stage to this day. His planning began thus: "On his
computer, Garner made a grid of five horizontal divisions and three vertical
divisions, like a three-by-five tic-tac-toe. He then created small ovals for
a bird's-eye view and stick figures for a straight-on view. These he dragged
around his screen until he had the whole scene mapped out, complete with Alberich the dwarf scuttling around the reefs at ground
level."
Photo by Rozarii
Lynch for
The
entire creative process for the above is chronicled and may be read via this
hyperlink:
You
can read for yourself that, compared to this effort, directing our
revival of Pagliacci
must have seemed like 'child's play'.
And, speaking of Child's Play, those of us with either small children or small grandchildren may have enjoyed Mr. Garner's expertise on Saturday mornings, as well as Saturday evenings: Twice Stan has directed (for school children and their lucky parents) "The Magic Dream", LAO's hour-long adaptation of the Mozart classic. In this production, Stan, harking back to his own childhood experiences in watching Saturday morning television, has the operatic principals breaking the "third wall" and speaking directly to the children in the audience.
Stan, with the Figaro performance run going well, was able to spend some earnest time prepping for LAO's 20th Anniversary Gala on April 19. Once again, Stan is the Stage Director, and, keeping true to his goal to 'never leave anything to the inspiration of the moment', he has been preparing himself for this time-critical task of readying a wave of singers to perform well for this celebratory event.
Here we see him, illuminated by one of the chandeliers from Prince Orlovsky's Palace, looking for insights into Die Fledermaus:
Stanley
M. Garner, a sometimes Stage Director for LAO ..... Someone who
puts a human face and an artistic touch to the words of a Production Book.
Inside Opera
Volume 1 Number 6
A Straight-Shooter From
f you
were in
If you were in the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion on either the afternoon of November 29 or December 5 of 2005 for either of LAO's two student matinee performances of Tosca, you heard this same real-life tenor, now a bit more world-wise, sing, not only that particular aria, but also the entire opera in the role of Mario Cavaradossi.
The tenor, on both occasions: Jay Hunter Morris.
Jay Hunter Morris; Zoe Caldwell
Master Class
Photo from Jay Hunter
Morris’ Website
An enduring memory of Morris' is that of him, with Ms. Caldwell on his arm, regularly patronizing (what was then) Otto’s Restaurant after performances and schmoozing with the likes of Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau.
So it was, in a novel bit of “luxury casting”, LAO contracted for Mr. Morris to sing both these two student performances and to cover the role of Mario for the first six regular performances of Tosca. Interestingly enough, Mr. Morris had never sung the complete opera until he returned here for the revival of this old LAO favorite. For those two performances of Tosca, those lucky students who, most probably, had never had the opportunity to listen to it before, heard an impassioned declaration of Mario Cavaradossi’s love for the beautiful Floria Tosca.
It has been just this sort of role that has been favored by Mr. Morris in his career so far: Werther, Pinkerton, Canio, Rodolfo, the Drum Major (in Wozzeck), etc. For those of you who wonder, the answer is: Yes, Cheryl Barker is the most beautiful soprano that Jay Hunter has had the pleasure of embracing on stage.
In Wozzeck @ Santa Fe in 2001 With the luscious Cheryl Barker in
Photos from Jay Hunter Morris’ Website
For this production of Tosca, Jay Hunter, ever mindful of the volumes of operatic lore associated with various on-stage anomalous happenings during performances (the springy trampoline, the suicidal firing squad, etc.), took all of the necessary precautions that he could think of to assure that nothing untoward happened to him. In Tosca the firing squad is typically composed of six to eight supers. In LAO's production, some of the firing squad fire loud blanks; the rest fire wads of material that go, “Poof!” On our opening night, one or two of the “Poofers” pulled their respective triggers prematurely, and emitted a rather “tame” report that the audience heard. Salvatore Licitra, the Cavaradossi for the occasion, had the good sense to sort-of stagger in response to this early discharge and then to fall when the “real blanks” were fired.
Jay Hunter recognized that, given the rather close quarters separating Cavaradossi from the Firing Squad and observing the high exit velocity of the Poofing material, realized that, if the Poofing material hit him below the waist, there was a finite possibility of an accidental impact transmogrifying him (at least on a temporary basis) from voice type tenor to that of countertenor. So, during rehearsals, Jay Hunter gave firm instructions to his Firing Squad, “Aim high, fellas!”
Jay Hunter & His Tosca, Susan Foster
Photo by Bob Bernard
Both Susan and Jay joined the other principals in going up the balcony immediately following each Student Matinee and engaging those seated there in a "up close and personal" Q & A session that more than compensated these students for not being seated down below in better seats.
Although a native of Paris, Texas, Jay Hunter has
yet to see the film of the same name [Tip: This is a marvelous
film, starring Harry Dean Stanton and Nastassja Kinski, an engrossing meditation on loneliness,
alienation, family, and redemption]. Jay admits that
The
Photo from
Jay Hunter’s undergraduate work was done at Baylor
University and, later on, he studied under the same voice coach at Southern
Methodist University as did another Texas tenor, Gary Lakes (Recall Gary as
Samson and then as Aeneas (in Les Troyens).
Jay Hunter could have joined the faculty at Baylor, but
The years since his Tony in Master Class have affected Jay Hunter in predictable ways. Each of the last six years have found him traveling and working for eleven months out of twelve, and this, combined with his girl friend’s stay-at-home job (She is a Broadway dancer, doing eight shows per week), finally brought about the termination of what had been a fine relationship.
Over the years, he has acquired his own bag of stage tricks, one of the most essential being the art of on-stage vocal chord lubrication. The need for this first manifested itself during a performance of Die Meistersinger. Jay Hunter, singing the role of Walter opposite the magnificent Hans Sachs of James Morris, had loaded up on a big jug of Gatorade, the idea being to give him enough energy to last the duration for this marathon of an opera. A problem developed near the end of Scene 1 of the third act when the high concentration of sodium in the Gatorade began to dry out Jay’s throat. The cotton buildup in his mouth got so bad that Jay was almost driven to extemporize an emergency lube job by snatching away from James Morris the beer stein (containing water) that the senior Mr. Morris held on stage.
The above experience so traumatized him that Jay Hunter
went to a small wad of chewing gum, secreted in the recesses of a cheek, as
an insurance policy and peace-of-mind guarantor for those occasional
lubrication needs. Of course, if one puts something in one’s mouth,
there is always the chance that that something just might migrate downhill
into the throat. This happened once in
Jay Hunter now uses tic-tacs for his emergency lubrication needs.
At age forty-two, Jay Hunter Morris has made the sort of career self-assessment that almost all professionals must make at one time or another. We quote from the Introduction section of his website:
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“I
try not to put my self-worth up for public debate. My Mom once told me I was
just fishin' for compliments when I read reviews,
so now I don't. I go out there and try. I've worked my way up to the lower
middle echelon of my field, but I am not finished.
I've
learned that for me, there probably won't be some big break, some new
production or role or voice lesson or coaching that just brings it all
together and everything will suddenly just click, and I'll be a great tenor
and in great demand and will possess a flawless technique and I will behave
properly and have panache and be clever and artsy and thin and everyone will
love me. I just have to do the work. I have to study hard and practice wisely
and passionately, and I should either be smart, or find an agent who is
…….. Think I'll go with the smart agent.”
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Jay Hunter has joined us again for LAO’s world premiere of Grendel.
Jay will sing the role of Unferth, a hero-type
thane as depicted in the John Gardner book. As Unferth,
he will be costumed in personalized body armor designed by the Schmitthenner Armory of
As both
an example of the Armory's product and an indication of what we may
expect Jay Hunter to wear on stage, we see below a suitably equipped Gerald
Butler (as Beowulf) that the Armory provided the battleware for
in the 2005 film Beowulf & Grendel
Gerald Butler in Beowulf & Grendel
The Schmitthenner Armory, if nothing else, is authentic. A
family business, going back five centuries,it has
served royalty, tracing its lineage to both 'Philip the Handsome' of
Spain (1478 - 1506) and Philip's son, Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor
(1503 - 1564), Ferdinand having once ruled over Austria, Germany, Bohemia,
and Hungary. The Armory belongs to the SCA (Society for Creative
Anachronism), and their motto is: " A Nobleman's Selection at a
Peasant's Price".
Jay Hunter Morris is not finished. Maybe this will be the new production that ‘brings it all together’. Jay is studying hard, practicing wisely, and we should never, never doubt his passion for his art.
Jay Hunter Morris
[Ed. Note: I don't
care what the libretto calls for, I'll be rooting for Jay Hunter when Unferth fights Grendel!]
Inside
Opera
Volume 1
Number 7
Setting The Scene
and
I hope that, when you saw LAO’s recent revival of Robert Wilson’s Madama Butterfly, you didn't linger too long over intermission refreshments, talking with friends, but rather returned to your seat early enough for you to settle back and allow the carefully crafted ambiance of the stage, as it was projected out into the theater, envelope you and prepare you for what was to come.
Long before the house lights dimmed and Maestro Dan Ettinger returned to the podium, there was much for the audience to absorb. What we saw was a scrim, the initial impression of which for almost everyone being, undoubtedly, that of a collection of black, horizontally oriented swatches of amorphous shapes, all on a white background. The color of black, of course, having the connotation of death.
The basic construction of the scrim was conventional, it being made of white honeycomb cotton. The lighting was also conventional: The stage was lit from behind, with no lighting directly striking the scrim (This would have reduced its translucency). The sparse set, with its rock and chair, was clearly visible.
Photo by Maiko Nezu, Design Assistant at LAO
What was not conventional was the design painted on the scrim.
The images on the scrim, random in appearance, 'set the scene' most dramatically. Using a technique reminiscent of traditional Japanese Sumi-E line brush drawings, images had been painted on the scrim with dry, ruff, uneven strokes --- strokes largely devoid of energy. They conveyed feelings of uneasiness and turmoil. One could not help but feel disturbed while looking at them. They set the scene for the tragedy that was to come.
For a close-up view of this scrim, both its genesis and its construction particulars, we had a conversation with Stephanie Engeln, Set Designer for both Parsifal and Madama Butterfly and a frequent collaborator with Robert Wilson.
The original design image for the scrim was created by
Robert Wilson himself in
Image courtesy of Stephanie Engeln
And the following photograph shows LAO's
scrim being painted in Mr. Wilson's
Photo courtesy of Stephanie Engeln
From lithograph design ... to graphic design .... to workshop painting ....... to transport and installation in the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion: A product of many minds and many skills, plus a journey of thousands of miles. Quite a story for a scrim used at intermission time.
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