Opera For Everyone

One of the world’s most formidable generals and one of history’s most beguiling politicians are joined by two frustrated young men and an irresistible widow in Handel’s Baroque masterpiece, Giulio Cesare in Egitto.  Join Pat, Kathleen, and Grant for a journey through history, literature, and myth in exploring the influences and meaning of this enduring opera.

For more cultural and arts commentary by Kathleen Van De Wille, visit Constructive Criticism on Substack.

One of the world’s most beloved operas, Mozart’s  Le Nozze di Figaro, is not only the focus of this episode, but also the inspiration for Elly Uncomposed: A Novel Opera, a magical realist novel by author and retired opera singer, Valerie Niemerg.  Like the opera Figaro, some truly serious and important topics are addressed in Elly Uncomposed, but with a charmingly comical touch.

Join Valerie and Pat for a wide-ranging conversation about her delightful book, stories about her time in professional opera, and an exploration of Le Nozze di Figaro.

A people yearns for freedom.  The power of their prayers, set to Verdi’s incomparable music, have stirred audiences ever since the première of Nabucco in 1842.  The impact of this opera may relate to Verdi’s own struggle to overcome personal tragedies preceding the composition the music.  It also resonates with the passions of the Italian people of his day, and their desire to free themselves from foreign domination.  Drawing inspiration from scripture, Verdi and his librettist created an opera that tells a timeless story, and gave Italians one of their great anthems, Va pensiero.

Hosted by Pat and Grant

Handel’s beloved Messiah, known for its thrilling Hallelujah Chorus, is a long-standing favorite during the Christmas season.  Neither an opera, nor Christmas music, this English-language oratorio was composed for the Easter Season and premièred in Dublin in 1842.  The magnificent text was crafted from the King James Bible by Handel’s friend, Charles Jennens.  Join Pat and Grant for their newly remastered conversation about this enduring Baroque masterpiece.

Have you ever asked what might be going on backstage at an opera house?  Or wondered about what secrets hide behind those glittering stages?  Drawing on 21 years as a violinist in the Metropolitan Opera, Erica Miner guides her readers through a dramatized version of the opera world in her mystery novel, Aria for Murder, the first in the “Julia Kogan Opera Mystery” series. Join Pat for a conversation with Erica about her experiences in professional opera and the work of crafting them into thrilling works of fiction.

Find Erica at: ericaminer.com

Glittering and gloriously tuneful, Die Fledermaus (“The Bat”) is the most enduring operetta of Vienna’s famous “Waltz King,” Johann Strauss II.  Its plot features revenge, infidelity, disguised identities, and a glamorous ball at its center, given by a wealthy host who requires his guests to keep the party lively.  Toasting “King Champagne,” the characters of this “spirited” operetta recognize the royalty of sparkling wine: the beverage that motivates, infuriates, and ultimately exonerates them. 

Hosted by Pat and Rosie

(www.rosiebrooks.com)

Masks, both literal and figurative, abound in Verdi’s Un Ballo in Maschera, “A Masked Ball.”  Conspirators feign support of a leader they despise.  A noblewoman must veil both her face and her feelings from her husband.  The governor must put on a disguise to understand his subjects, and his beloved.  The governor’s chief councilor dons a mask to take murderous revenge on him for an imagined betrayal.  Even the setting itself, colonial Boston, is a thin disguise for the original setting, Sweden under Gustav III.

Hosted by Pat and guest co-host Michael Severance, long-serving bassoonist and contrabassoonist with the San Francisco Opera Orchestra.

A beloved king becomes reviled by his family and his people as previously hidden dark deeds come to light.  A young woman loses her innocence and freedom through the machinations of the lord of the underworld.  The timeless ancient Greek stories of King Oedipus and Persephone captured the imagination of Igor Stravinsky, a composer unafraid to present drama in new and unexpected formats.  Join Opera for Everyone as we explore the characters, and the powerful music of these two short operas.

Hosted by Pat and Kathleen Van De Wille

There is no secular story nearly so important to the Western tradition as the Odyssey, a timeless tale of heroism, achievement, and loss.  The subject matter of this epic poem has found its way into many works of art, and likely the earliest opera adaptation was Monteverdi’s Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria, first performed in 1639 in the city of Venice.  Monteverdi’s opera tells one of the oldest remembered human stories through the new form of art of which he was one of the pioneers, the opera.  His reimaginings of Greek myth often fused Christian and pagan elements into a beautiful and complex melange, and this is no exception.  At once philosophical and lyrical, Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria comes to us from a very different time from our own, but continues to thrill through its inventiveness and beauty.

Hosted by Pat and Grant

We all know that feeling when we want to marry one rebel leader, but our father wants us to marry the chief rebel leader, but then one day a wandering king disguised as a huntsman starts chatting us up on the moors. With this timeless and relatable set-up (based on a poem by Sir Walter Scott that is credited with starting the Scottish Romantic movement) Rossini crafts an opera that blends romance and political intrigue.  Featuring a druid chorus, a major character unceremoniously killed offstage, and an unexpectedly happy ending, La Donna del Lago (“The Lady of the Lake”) is a wonderful example not only of Rossini's beautiful music, but also of Sir Walter Scott's seldom-read masterpiece.

Hosted by Pat Wright and Kathleen van de Wille

For more of Kathleen's musings on the power and possibilities of story, read and subscribe to Constructive Criticism on Substack.  (Discussed at 1:44:01 on this podcast.)

Meet Maestro Joseph Rescigno–gentleman, author, and opera conductor extraordinaire.  The Maestro joins OFE for this wide-ranging discussion of the how, what, and why of conducting opera.  Drawing on material from his book, Conducting Opera: Where Theater Meets Music, and a lifetime of conducting opera around the world, Maestro Rescigno brings a unique perspective to the theory and practice of operatic composition and performance.  In the second half, we explore Richard Strauss’ unusual and fascinating Ariadne auf Naxos, which hybridizes myth and psychodrama, opera and commedia dell'arte. 

Hosted by Pat

Leos Janacek’s opera about a clever little fox living in the worlds of both animals and humans has many of the charming and amusing elements expected of traditional children’s stories.  However, don’t let this Cunning Little Vixen fool you.  Her story, and the story of the forester who pursues her, are richly layered with issues that may glide over the heads of young opera-goers while leaving the adults in the room pondering as they smile at the sly references. 
 

Hosted by Pat and Rosie Brooks

Beatrice and Benedick often steal the show in Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing with their sharp-tongued banter, and a romance that is as unlikely as it is inevitable.  Composer Hector Berlioz was captivated by these characters, and turned their story into an operatic romantic comedy in his final completed opera, Béatrice et Bénédict.  As the music soars and sparkles, join us for this “merry war!”

Hosted by Pat, and Kathleen Van De Wille

What does Salvador Dali have in common with opera?  Listen to this episode to find out!

This episode features special guests soprano Elizaveta Ulakhovich and baritone Perry Sook talking about their work and lives as an operatic couple.  Their newest project is a YouTube series that connects their love of opera and their exploration of the visual arts.  Join us for a unique episode featuring romance, creativity, and adventure.

Hosted by Pat and Grant

All things must come to an end, but few approach endings with such grace as Marschallin Marie-Therese, the iconic character of Der Rosenkavalier.  At once epic and intimate in scope, Strauss’s masterwork resists characterization, at various points telling the story of the end of a romance, the end of adolescence, and the end of an empire.  Published on the eve of the First World War, this opera masterfully intertwines traditional and modern subjects to produce an epic story of nobility, violence, and the achievement of wisdom. Working together, Strauss and playwright-librettist Hugo von Hofmannsthal created one of the finest stories ever told.

Hosted by Pat and Grant

Riding high on the tide of their smash success, H.M.S. Pinafore, W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan enjoyed celebrity on both sides of the Atlantic.  While engaged in defending the integrity of their work against inferior pirated versions, they hastily completed and premiered a show about a group of inferior pirates.  Pirates of Penzance is almost certainly Gilbert and Sullivan’s most enduringly popular collaboration, giving us memorable tunes and characters such as the steadfast Mabel, the swashbuckling Pirate King, and the Very Model of a Modern Major General.  By turns hilarious, incisive, and thrilling, this masterful operetta is a joy to experience.

Furthermore, in keeping with the spirit of a Gilbert and Sullivan presentation, we have a one-act “opener,” Cox and Box.  This show, though comic and tuneful, pre-dates the famous partnership, and pairs Sullivan’s compositions with a libretto by F.C. Burnand.  It’s a charming farce, with a most unusual lullabye!

Hosted by Pat and Rosie

This extended version of our William Tell show includes everything from the regular length show, plus more history, more music, more explication, and more fun!

Imperial soldiers, determined rebels, a martyred elder, a plucky youth, a noble princess, a cruel oppressor… it’s not Star Wars; it’s Rossini’s final opera, William Tell!  First performed in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Era and inspired by much earlier legends of a medieval Swiss folk hero, this opera is a masterwork of everything we love about opera.  It tells a story that is at once personal, specific in time and place, and yet universal at its core.  Join host Pat, who, with the help of co-hosts Kathleen and Grant, takes a deep dive into this Bel Canto masterpiece which is both utterly Romantic, and yet completely clear-eyed about the struggle of freedom versus oppression and oppression, shaped by the all-important power of love.

Imperial soldiers, determined rebels, a martyred elder, a plucky youth, a noble princess, a cruel oppressor… it’s not Star Wars; it’s Rossini’s final opera, William Tell!  First performed in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Era and inspired by much earlier legends of a medieval Swiss folk hero, this opera is a masterwork of everything we love about opera.  It tells a story that is at once personal, specific in time and place, and yet universal at its core.  Join host Pat, who, with the help of co-hosts Kathleen and Grant, takes a deep dive into this Bel Canto masterpiece which is both utterly Romantic, and yet completely clear-eyed about the struggle of freedom versus oppression and oppression, shaped by the all-important power of love.

An adventurous Renaissance artist’s action-packed autobiography provided compelling inspiration for Hector Berlioz’s first completed opera, Benvenuto Cellini.  Berlioz strongly identified with the notorious Cellini, seeing in him a mirror of his own bravado, skill, and passion… and uses this identification to add to the story.  The result is a relentlessly entertaining opera that is by turns comic, poignant, farcical, political, and romantic.

Hosted by Pat and Kathleen Van De Wille

How do you get from The Opera to The Musical?  Any answer to that question would have to include the powerhouse Victorian English duo of Gilbert and Sullivan and their ground-breaking form of “light opera.”  Hilarious, cheerful, and energetic, they innovated both in opera and satirical comedy.  Not only were they beloved by theater-goers of the late nineteenth century, they remain popular to this day, influencing the creators of drama, film, and musical theater.

This episode of Opera For Everyone focuses on two of Gilbert and Sullivan’s earliest successes, Trial by Jury and H.M.S. Pinafore.  Join us for a close look at these two delightful shows.

Hosted by Pat and Rosie.

Although only included in some versions of the biblical book of Daniel, the story of “Susanna and the Elders” has long been a favorite artistic subject thanks to its risqué content and virtuous heroine, Susanna.  Inspired by this story of lechery, slander, and condemnation, American composer Carlisle Floyd wrote Susannah, a poignant opera about the consequences of people’s judgement of one another.

On this special episode, Pat is joined by two opera singers, Mariah Wilcox and Evan Dunn, who share some of their performance experiences, as well as take a close look at the opera Susannah. Evan and Mariah also host Take the Stage: The Opera Podcast, which provides encouragement and support to singers as they develop their careers.  takethestageopera.com

This episode hosted by Pat with guest co-hosts Evan Dunn and Mariah Wilcox

A beautiful young woman with long golden hair; a charming young prince who lives in a castle in the fantastic land of Allemonde… While these may be the ingredients for a classic fairy-tale, this story subverts all expectations.  First performed in the opening decade of the twentieth century, Pelléas et Mélisande is the only opera ever completed by the famed composer Claude Debussy.  Based on a symbolist play, Pelléas et Mélisande marked the debut of a new kind of story-telling... and a new kind of opera. The characters may not live “happily ever after,” but this opera is unmissable, not least for Debussy’s unique and exquisite music.

Hosted by Pat and Kathleen Van De Wille