Voice

The last time the Dirty Projectors played in Los Angeles was on Halloween at the Jensen Recreation Center in Echo Park, where frontman David Longstreth wore a ten-gallon foam cowboy hat and his upside-down guitar with the confidence of a newly minted visionary. Fans of the Projectors’ odd, brilliant, shimmering music had been waiting for the band to play at Disney Hall since November, anticipating their breakout hit, 2009’s Bitte Orca, amplified by a lush string section.

But on Saturday night, Longstreth looked small and befuddled on the Disney Hall stage, fiddling with the tuning of his guitars for a half an hour during intermission. Longstreth is 28, with the refractory brain of a brilliant twelve-year-old with attention deficit disorder and the composing abilities of Mozart on mushrooms in Africa. After Saturday night, the audience learned his musical influences include Ligeti, Wagner, Ravel, and Don Henley.

Don Henley might seem like an odd choice. The program notes include an earnest letter Longstreth sent Henley in 2005, accompanying a free copy of The Getty Address, Longstreth’s 2005 opera about materialism, the homogenization of FM radio, and Sacagewea, or something like that. “I have included a copy of it here for you,” Longstreth wrote to Henley. “The album examines the question of what is wilderness in a world completely circumscribed by highways, once Manifest Destiny has no place to go- but in the end it is a love story.” Clearly, this makes sense to only one person: Longstreth himself.

The program was divided into three parts: the Philharmonic playing alone, the Projectors playing The Getty Address along with the ensemble Alarm Will Sound, and the Projectors playing alone. The program began with selections Longstreth hand-picked for the Philharmonic. Highlights included Ligeti’s Etude No. 13, played by gray-haired John Orge, who lingered on the piano keys after the last high notes for a long, indulgent silence, and Ravel’s beautifully orchestrated Mother Goose Suite. After a long intermission, the Projectors emerged, wearing color-coordinated hooded jackets, to play The Getty Address in its entirety. And here is where the problems began.

Truthfully, the opera is an indulgent college project from a very, very talented student, with glimpses of the Projectors’ current, much more successful musical incarnation nestled in like raisins studded into a very wobbly gray oatmeal. In the first song (er, movement), “I Sit on the Ridge at Dusk,” the beat kicked in, and the Projectorettes (Amber Coffman, Haley Dekle, and Angel Deradoorian) wailed “got a world of trouble on my mind,” in an indistinct language, moving very slightly from side to side, like shy sirens. But momentum was lost on the second song, and the album is so complex, the time signatures so twisted, it seemed that no amount of practice could have nailed it down. It didn’t help that Alarm Will Sound had some spotty synchronicity and tuning moments. The long, drifting passages on “But in the Headlights” and “Gilt Gold Scabs” sounded misguided and naked, as though a player were missing. Some members played on wine bottles, and a base flute was involved, as well as lots of gratuitous hand-clapping, which sounded messy at times, perhaps on purpose. Many in the audience began to get restless, but the ensemble soldiered on to no avail.

After the opera finally ended, the Projectors (minus their drummer) took the stage for three songs: a very slow cover of Dylan’s “I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine,” as well as their own “Temecula Sunrise” and “Cannibal Resource” from Bitte Orca. They sounded good, and Longstreth’s singing sounded much more comfortable, but the band would have sounded much better with a whole orchestra backing them up. None of the women got to sing lead on any song, though Angel Deradoorian singing “Two Doves” would have sounded lovely in this acoustic setting.

All in all, the event demonstrated what the Projectors are capable of musically. It also showed that some misguided musical experiments are better laid to rest, no matter how brilliant their 23-year-old composer may be. As the Eagles said, “And I don’t want to hear any more/ No, no, baby/ I don’t want to hear any more.” Here’s hoping the Projectors stick to Bitte Orca from now on.

By Cassandra McGrath of CWG Magazine

The Walt Disney Concert Hall is located at 111 South Grand Avenue in Downtown Los Angeles.  For more information on upcoming shows, please call (213) 972-7211, or visit www.laphil.com.

American composer Robert Kurka’s only opera, Good Soldier Schweik, began life in 1956 as a six movement suite based on characters from the popular Czech antiwar novel of the same name, by Jaroslav Hask. New York City Opera became interested in turning the suite into an opera and Kurka expanded the orchestra from his original scoring for 7 woodwinds, to 16, plus brass and percussion, and began working with librettist Lewis Allan – a songwriter known for the celebrated anti-lynching song, “Strange Fruit,” and the Frank Sinatra hit, “The House I Live In,” but chiefly, as the adoptive father of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg’s sons after the couple had been convicted of espionage and executed.

Kurka died in 1957 at the age of 35, four months before the opera’s successful NYCO premiere. Within the next 40 years, Good Soldier Schweik had seen over one hundred productions throughout the world, and been translated into 12 languages.

The work combines elements of American musical theatre, jazz, and Czech folk music, to underscore an explicitly anti-war story. The Long Beach Opera company’s cast of singing and dancing actors – led by tenor Matthew DiBattista in a powerhouse performance – delivered the goods in director Ken Roht’s dazzling multi-media production at Barnum Hall in Santa Monica. The orchestra – well, band, in this case – played with stylish pizzazz under Conductor/Artistic Director Andreas Mitisek.

Ably realized through Dan Weingarten’s inspired lighting and Justin Jorgensen’s novel set design, the production utilized scrims, projections, choreography, and outlandish props to whisk the plot from scene to scene at a breakneck pace, so that the audience was as disoriented as Schweik by the experience.

The house – mostly all long-time Long Beach Opera fans, and mostly very elderly – was packed, attesting to their pleasure at not having to endure a schlep to Long Beach. This brings me to my only gripe with this enterprise: somehow, LBO’s marketing missed the mark, hugely. Where was the large, 20-to-30-something demographic that would have been enraptured – and captured – by this stunning example of what opera has become in the 21st century?

- By Penny Orloff

To see Long Beach Opera’s full calendar, please click here.

This week marked an emergency situation for LA Opera – they needed a $14 million bailout from the city on Tuesday in order to even stay afloat through the middle of next year.  Stephen Rountree (CEO of both LA Opera and Music Center), as reported by the LA Times said the company is “$20 million in debt,” and since LA Opera is “by far the most important tenant at the Dorothy Chandler, its failure could set off a chain of events that takes down the Music Center.”  Disaster was narrowly averted when the city agreed to loan the money, which will be repaid in one lump sum in January 2013.  It’s not hard to imagine that this debt largely came from LA Opera’s somewhat controversial decision to stage an avante-garde and severely expensive production of Wagner’s Ring Cycle – both the individual productions during the last and current seasons as well as the full Ring Cycle Festival, set to include over 100 artists and institutions next summer.  They’ve spent $32 million staging the Ring Cycle.  County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky said, rightly, that the LA Opera is a significantly important artistic organization for LA county continuing to say, “For all they have built up… this is almost no price for us to pay… we’ll save the opera.”  [LA Times]

Given how rare it is to hear of money being given to artists in non-emergency situations, you’ll be glad to hear that a new prize awarding $100,000 to artists under 35 has been announced by the Victor Pinchuk Foundation.  A Ukrainian billionaire and art collector, Victor Pinchuk will present his Future Generation Art Prize every two years to artists who can apply online and artists that have been nominated by professionals in the art world.  The international jury set to decide the winner is said to include Elton John, Miuccia Prada, and in some small way, the public.  Winners can’t have just made one great piece and then run off with the money, however – the New York Times reports that “$40,000 of the purse must go into the production of art.”  General Director of the Pinchuk Art Center Eckhard Schneider said, “We also wanted to make sure that an older generation of artists helps the younger.” [NY Times]

Figaro had a life before he got married, you know.  He was the kind of man that men wanted to be and that ladies wanted to be with – a barber to the stars, if you will, roaming around Seville singing his own praises.  In Rossini’s The Barber of Seville, on now at LA Opera, Figaro happens upon Count Almaviva who’s cleverness has been trumped only by his hopeless love for Rosina, who is the ward of the tyrannical Doctor Bartolo.  Almaviva convinces Figaro, with the promise of “gold in abundance” to help him win his heart’s affection.

What follows is a phenomenally witty opera filled with comic nuances that are only enhanced by this production’s stellar cast.  Nathan Gunn returns to LA Opera as the arrogant, but not without reason, Figaro – his polka dot vest and coiffed brown locks both proof of his status as premiere “barihunk.”  Renowned tenor Juan Diego Florez makes his LA Opera debut as the love-struck, earnest Count Almaviva.  These two have a George-Clooney-and-Brad-Pitt-in-Ocean’s-Eleven dynamic right from the start; their planning and plotting makes for fantastic comic fodder and both men go far beyond impressing the audience with their abundant solos.  Where Gunn’s clear, skillful baritone strikes just the right note in Act I’s “Largo al Factotum,” Florez’ sweet songs in Act II captivated and held the audience with his strong and multifaceted voice.

It’s quite clear why Florez’ Count Almaviva is so enamored with Rosina.  Played by Joyce DiDonato, it almost seemed like the audience wanted to clamor up on stage and serenade her themselves.  When she sang, I believe no one in the audience could even fidget – she has such control over her voice that her girly, giggling, and somehow manipulative character still left room to hear a masterful performance.  The three of them together, Florez, Gunn, and DiDonato, make for a powerful trio – their wily chemistry on stage was not only hysterical, but beautiful.

The rest of the cast is certainly not to be overlooked.  The genius of Don Basilio, played by the overwhelmingly large and deep voiced Andrea Silvestrelli, is matched perfectly with the bumbling, gullible, and simply cruel Doctor Bartolo, played by Bruno Pratico.  Both of their voices are suited so well to their roles it’s hard to imagine them playing anyone else.

I can’t say enough about the set design – it starts out in an entirely white and black palate only to be transformed in the second act to a striking (and typical to Seville) set of fantastic colors.  And that includes the costumes – Florez’ all hot pink suit at the end of Act II is nothing short of a miracle.  From the Overture, you may be surprised as to how recognizable this music is – if you’ve never listened to The Barber of Seville on purpose, you definitely have without knowing it.  And it’s always an added treat to attend the opera when you’re familiar with the music.

I only wish there was a more eloquent way of saying: see this opera.  Doesn’t matter where you sit, just go.

The Barber of Seville is playing at LA Opera through December 19, 2009.  Please call (213) 972-8001 or click here for more information.

Listen to “Una Voce Poco Fa” (Rosina’s famous aria) here:

‘Tis the season not only for holidays, but museum birthdays as well.  MOCA turned the big 3-0 recently and we wanted to remind you in case you forgot — the GRAMMY Museum is turning a year old on December 6th.  Our favorite GRAMMY Museum is growing up right before our eyes!

Instead of the ol’ cake and candles routine, the GRAMMY Museum is making it memorable with the one, the only critically acclaimed soul singer Maxwell.

He won us over with his debut album Urban Hang Suite, which he released at the tender age of 23.  And making his way up the charts, we have heard his smooth sound develop into its latest and fourth incarnation: BLACKsummers’ night.

The party is on December 2nd.  The night begins with the kick-off to the entire GRAMMY season – the televised The GRAMMY Nominations Concert Live!!: Countdown to Music’s Biggest Night, with Maxwell making an appearance and showing us a taste of what he’s got.  And then Maxwell will take the stage over at Club Nokia L.A. LIVE, baring all his soul and talents.

We’re just not sure our birthday present can top Maxwell’s live performance…

For more information about The GRAMMY Museum Presents: Maxwell, call 213.765.6800 or click here.

There’s something a little scary about experiencing the best of something.  First, there are expectations you’re worried won’t be met, then you realize that you’ll doubtfully be satiated by anything less from that moment on, and finally it’s scary to think of how much work went into anything being that great – some start to feel inadequate.

Time to face your fears.  Renee Fleming is making a one-night-only appearance at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion and to make this even more of a pulse-quickening event, she’ll be signing copies of her new CD Verismo after the performance.  Fleming is, in case you haven’t thrown her name around in an opera conversation before, one of the most widely acclaimed and loved sopranos of recent memory.  In terms of international status, think Maria Callas without the notorious temper and in terms of voice, well, she’s not like anyone.

Saturday, December 12 at 7:30pm, lucky ticket holders will be treated to songs by Richard Strauss, Olivier Messiaen, Henri Dutileux’s Le temps l’horloge, which was written specifically for her, as well as selections from her latest CD.  It will be difficult to listen to anything less from December 13th on.

Luckily, Nathan Gunn is performing in LA Opera’s The Barber of Seville through December 19.  After that? We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.

Renee Fleming will perform on December 12, 2009 at 7:30pm at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.  For more information, please call (213) 972-8001 or click here.

Before you go, have a listen:

There are only four days before Thanksgiving.  Heaven knows Fine Arts LA has plenty to be thankful for.  Let us count the ways!

The Surging Number of Food Trucks — These bad boys (and girls) are making a presence at practically every art event in Los Angeles through Twitter-based campaigns.  With delicious cuisine ranging from Indian food to gastro pub food to dessert, we want to thank you for saving us on many Saturday nights after downing one too many Grolsch beers.  Thank you, food trucks!

LACMA Film Program – You never fully appreciate something until it’s gone, or until it’s hanging on by a thread just waiting to be cut by the budget police.  Thanks to the wonderful people at Save Film at LACMA, we are fortunate to have the rich film program of classic and international films at LACMA away from its grave.  And we couldn’t be more thrilled by the fact that through this grassroots effort, we will be sitting pretty watching all of our favorite films, at least until June 2010.  Thank you, Save Film at LACMA!

MOCA’s Comeback – One year ago, we were all shocked by the reports that revealed MOCA was teetering on the brink of financial disaster.  And look at ‘em now!  They are keeping their doors open with the help of philanthropist Eli Broad and the work of countless others.  Taking it all in last night at MOCA’s 30th Birthday Party, I was fortunate enough to enjoy a Lemonade red velvet cupcake with the best of them all while catching a preview of their latest show.  Collection: MOCA’s First Thirty Years reveals the best of MOCA’s inventory, the tastes of chief curator Paul Schimmel, and the vision of curators before.  Thank you, MOCA and Eli Broad!

The Broad Stage — Speaking of Eli Broad, there is a lovely contemporary gem on the horizon in Santa Monica – The Eli and Edythe Broad Stage.  The home of dance, theatre, voice, chamber music, film, and spoken word, it is as if the Walt Disney Concert Hall’s little sister is making its claim on the Westside bringing home the best talents without a trip on the 10 freeway. Thank you, Broad Stage!

Gustavo Dudamel – Even before he arrived, this city was crazed about this talented, young man from Venezuela.  As the music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Gustavo Dudamel’s personality, playfulness, and passion have been infused into every portion of his program.  Making grown women (and men) behave like children and professing their crush at any given moment, Mr. Dudamel has taken this city by storm one concert at a time and has caught the attention of everyone including those unfamiliar with classical music. Bienvenido, Gustavo, y mil gracis!

And finally, we are most thankful for you, dear readers…  Without you to check us out daily, to recommend us to your friends, and to Google image search the most oddest things to find our website, we would cease to exist.  So thank you!!

What are you most thankful for?

Image: David Rex Ketchum

Opera lovers tend to fall in a number of different camps.  There are staunch Wagner lovers who sit for three hours just to get to “Leibestod,” the final aria from Tristan und Isolde.  There are those who swear by Puccini for life and who don’t speak Italian, but can say, “Yes, they call me Mimi, but my real name is Lucia” with a perfect accent. Everyone can agree, however, that love triangles, revenge plots, and small vials of poison will never go out of style – especially not at the opera.  We can also agree that opera singers all have this thrilling ability to steal you from your everyday and throw you into a world of daggers and betrothals.

Baroque composer extraordinaire George Handel’s Tamerlano is in good company. A three-act opera in Italian that follows the story of Bajazet, his daughter Asteria, the evil Emperor Tamerlano, love-struck Andronico, and the confused Irene; it’s more than just a love triangle.

LA Opera’s Tamerlano, which opens November 21, will feature General Director Placido Domingo in the role of Turkish Sultan Bajazet – the gallant father trying to prevent his daughter’s marriage to the malicious Tamerlano. Audiences will undoubtedly be listening for every note that leaves Placido’s famous lips – he has bridged the gap between famous opera singer and household name.  The title character will be played by countertenor Bejun Mehta who has performed at the Royal Opera House in London, the Opera National de Paris, and who marks his return to LA Opera with this role.  Asteria, played by Sarah Coburn, is a part that features some of opera’s most enticing, electric, and technically challenging singing.

While Bajazet sits in chains in Tamerlano’s court, the emperor devises a plan to marry Asteria – he asks Andronico (also in love with Asteria) to relay his message to Bajazet: give me your daughter’s hand in marriage in return for your freedom.  He sweetens the deal by promising his own fiancée, Irene, to Andronico for his trouble.  When Tamerlano reveals his scheme to Asteria, she is shocked and dismayed – mostly by Andronico’s seeming betrayal.  What follows is an operatic series of suicide notes, changes of mind and heart, and a healthy amount of poison.  Handel proves again that it’s not the Italian that can trip you up at the opera, it’s the story itself!

LA Opera’s Tamerlano runs November 21 through December 1.  We recommend getting your tickets early – Placido’s in this one, it will sell out!  Please call (213) 972-8001 or click here for more information.

It’s hard to imagine anybody writing good poetry in Los Angeles.  There’s too much smog, too much traffic, too much sun (great poems are never written on nice days).  It seems like if there are—or ever were—any true poets working and living in the City of Angels, they’re either piss-drunk like Bukowski or busy crafting the perfect scene descriptions for their latest screenplay.

But of course I’m wrong, deliberately  and happily so.  Los Angeles, just like any other city in the world, has poetry floating in the air—it’s just hard to see it past all the exhaust fumes.  This Sunday, October 25 at 7:00 PM, the Hammer Museum “hammers” the point home by hosting the 3rd Annual Festival of California Poets.  On hand to introduce and read their own poems, as well as some from the California canon, are three acclaimed, contemporary bards of the Sunshine State: Laurel Ann Bogen reading from Eloise Lein Healy; B.H. Fairchild on Henri Coulette and Robert Mezey; and Ron Koertge reciting from the works of Steve Kowit.

The program is free and co-sponsored by the Hammer Museum, PEN Center USA, Pasadena Public Library, and the UCLA English Department.  I suppose this is the reason, after all, why Los Angeles has so many great museums: to point us in the direction of all the poetry we thought we were missing.  Even if it is only found with the help of GPS.

The 3rd Annual Festival of California Poets will take place at the Hammer Museum at 7:00 PM.  For more information, please visit www.hammer.ucla.edu, or call (310) 443-7000.

Gaetano Donizetti’s The Elixir of Love makes light of the fact that sometimes love comes easier with a little liquid courage.  Known best for Lucia di Lamermoor, Donizetti was one of the most highly regarded bel canto opera composers.  Literally meaning “beautiful singing,” bel canto is a somewhat ambiguous term that refers to a style of singing developed in 18th century Italy.  Originally the term defined the coveted sound of a gorgeous vocalist singing a beautiful melody.  It then took on a more technical meaning that is widely accepted today, referring to those singers who are able to create smooth transitions and a balance of tone when shifting from one melody to the next.  With this in mind, LA Opera’s casting department deserves a gold star for their work in bringing together a collection of singers who, many making their LA Opera debut, would have made Donizetti proud.

An opera whose music and story are simple, witty, and beautiful, Elixir is a charming start to LA Opera’s 2009/2010 season.  Any operagoer intimidated by the Wagner-heavy season will find solace in this production – the sets and costumes are modest, but there is no lack of talent on stage.  Unlike those of Puccini and Verdi, none of Donizetti’s characters die for lack of love, nobody is exiled, and nobody drinks anything heavier than a bottle of wine, or should I say elixir. 

When Nemorino, played by Giuseppe Filianoti, sings Donizetti’s famed aria “Una Furtiva Lagrima,” you figure that any man who can sing like that shouldn’t need any elixir to make a woman fall for him.  Making his LA Opera debut, Filianoti is known for his bel canto technique and has performed Elixir with various opera companies throughout the world.  Popular (and handsome) American vocalist Nathan Gunn plays the arrogant ladies’ man Sergeant Belcore, but is appropriately upstaged by his rival Nemorino both vocally and within the narrative. 

Equal only to Filianoti is his love interest, Adina, who is played by yet another vocalist performing with LA Opera for the first time: Nino Machaidze.  Hailing from Georgia (the country, not the state), she’s made quite an opera world splash with debuts traversing the globe.  In the past year alone, she’s debuted at the Teatro Regio in Parma, the Teatre Royale de la Monnaie in Brussels, and will perform as Fiorilla in Il Turco in Italia at the Theater an der Wien in Vienna.

One character, essential to the story’s twists and turns (manageable though they are), is il Dottore Dulcamara.  A sincerely funny and conniving Giorgio Caoduro, who also makes his first appearance with LA Opera, plays Dulcamara, a traveling doctor who acts more like a salesman than a PhD.  He provides Nemorino with an “elixir” that will make him irresistible to women and to one in particular, Nemorino’s one and only – Adina.

Claiming to the hard working peasants that his “elixir” will cure any ill from clearing wrinkles to spicing up your love life, Dulcamara sells off as many bottles of Bordeaux as he and his assistant can carry.  After the opera, I took a page from his book and enjoyed a glass – just in case he was right!

LA Opera’s The Elixir of Love is playing at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion through September 30, 2009.   For more information, please call (213) 972-8001 or click here.