Some scattered thoughts about this past weekend’s Opera Workshop performances of Giacomo Puccini’s tender-hearted “Suor Angelica” with the world premiere of “Black September,” the one act opera I composed to a libretto by colleague Matt Boresi.
MATT & ME ….. There is no question that Matt and I were really nervous as opening night approached- although most of the way it was a very positive, excited sort of nervousness. We knew that “Suor Angelica” was in tip top shape, and we just wanted our cast to execute it to the best of their ability – and we were hoping that a couple of the big surprises (our “statue” of the Virgin Mary – and the appearance of Angelica’s tiny son at the end) would be effective. We knew it could be stunning. Would it be stunning? As for “Black September,” it felt to us like we had created something really special, but we ultimately had to wait for our audiences to render the verdict. I have to say that for as close as I have felt to Matt over the last few weeks as we made this journey together, I have never felt closer to him than at that moment right after intermission when he and I stepped before the audience to introduce them to “Black September.” It underscored for me that this would either be a dual triumph or a dual failure (or something in between) but whatever happened, we would be in it together. Fortunately, I’m thrilled to say that it was a tremendous success in just about every way it could be. I had some sense of it already mid-performance because I could just sense the audience’s exceptional attentiveness and responsiveness, but it was still a sweet relief to reach the end and have Siebert Chapel erupt in thunderous applause (as they did for the Puccini.) At that moment, I found myself awash in feelings of relief and gratitude and sheer wonder that I could be part of something so special. And to share it with Matt made it even better.
HABIT FORMING …. The audience saw the seven women in “Suor Angelica” and the eleven men in “Black September” – plus Matt and me – but there were all kinds of people behind the scenes who helped make this success possible. I suppose part of it was that the exceptional challenges involved in this particular double-bill made it necessary for us to reach out and ask for help like we never had before – and it was given freely and generously. I am especially grateful to Sharon Molina and Cynthy McCrory, two devoted volunteers in the Racine Theater Guild’s costume shop, who had to go foraging in order to find the elusive box that contained the nun’s habits used for their “Sound of Music” production. And once the elusive habits were found, they had to take out the various pieces and give me a tutorial on how all of those pieces were to be together in order to construct a proper-looking habit. I still remember feeling such profound gratitude that they would so cheerfully take the time to help me out with this – and thanks to their help, our Suor Angelica “nuns” looked great.
PAPER TRAIL ….. In almost all of our opera workshop productions, I end up typing the program because I don’t manage to get the information to someone else in a timely fashion – which often leaves me rushing off to Office Max the day of the first performance when ideally I should be thinking about other things. This time around, I made sure to pass off that responsibility to people who could do it really well- and I am so glad I did. Macee Mueller, one of the student workers in the office, did such a great job – and she even managed to incorporate the beautiful artwork that Pattie Kelley Fuller (the mother of one of our cast members) created for us. Of course, thanks to my own procrastination I got to have the fun of preparing the insert with the singers’s biographies. (Some things never change.) And because we had such a big crowd on Friday night, I spent part of Saturday at Office Max, xeroxing more programs. But as problems go, that’s one of the very best you could possibly have.
GENTLY DOWN THE STREAM ….. One of the smartest things I did in the whole project was when I inquired about the possibility of our performances being live-streamed, so that interested people across the country could still share in the experience of what we were doing. (None of my siblings or my dad were going to be there, and the live stream would be their only way of taking it in.) I thought that it would be a matter of just setting up a camera in the balcony that would just capture one static view of the entire stage (much the way the Lyric Opera of Chicago records each and every performance) – far from ideal but better than nothing. Imagine my surprise when I walked into Siebert on Friday to see cameras set up in all three balconies- and then to find Carthage’s Mike Murphy manning an impressive control board with which he would combine the various camera angles into a very compelling document of the performance. I had no idea that all of this would be involved, and I couldn’t have been more delighted.
Of course, I wasn’t watching the live stream. (I was a little busy playing piano for both performances.) But when I got home Friday night, I was delighted to see stills from it that my brother Steve had posted on Facebook. (He and Scott watched the whole thing.) And one of these days, when time allows it, I look forward to going to Carthage’s private Youtube channel and watch these streams in their entirety. And as I do, I will again be thanking Mike Murphy, Mike Love, and everyone else who helped make it possible.
LET THERE BE LIGHT ….. If there’s any one thing that I would change about either of the performances, it’s the carelessness with which I managed one very important matter- light to play by. For balance reasons, I decided to place the piano far upstage (and off to the side) for the Puccini – and it wasn’t until the actual performance began that I realized that I would be playing in almost total darkness. Part of the reason I had never realized it was that all of our final rehearsals for “Suor Angelica” happened in mid-afternoon. At night, with no sunlight streaming through the large skylight in the ceiling, I was in big trouble. Add my cataracts into the mix and you can well understand how stressful a performance it was! I actually did surprisingly well except for one place in the score where we had cut about one page worth of music- but in the dark, I missed the edit mark and kept playing on. I realized pretty quickly that MeriKatherine Bock (our Angelica) had stopped singing – but it took me four or five seconds before I realized the mistake I had made. Fortunately, she just kept her cool – and I managed to resist the urge to shout out “Sorry about that!” and we eventually were back on the same page with nobody in the audience ever knowing that anything had gone amiss. By the second performance, I had a stand light and was a much happier camper.
I HEARD THE BELLS ….. The score for “Suor Angelica” opens with a simple opening melody written for orchestral bells – and much as I tried, I could not get those notes on the piano to sound even a little bit like chimes- so I decided to ask one of our finest student percussionists, Eric Wright, if he would be interested in doing some playing in the score. He was delighted I asked- and thrilled to be part of it- and he ended up falling in love with the score. And because he was so good at adapting to everything I asked for, I ended up using him throughout the score on tubular bells, glockenspiel, wind chimes, triangle …. and it added a wonderful sheen of colors that otherwise would not have been there. Someday before too long, we may be able to have Carthage’s chamber orchestra accompany the opera- but this felt like a nice step in the right direction. What a pleasure to make music with this fine young musician.
LET’S TALK ….. For as thrilled as I was about how well the performances went, I was almost just as excited about how well the Talk Backs went. We had good turnouts for both, and the folks who chose to stay had a sincere interest in learning much more about what they had just seen and heard. The first night only the Black September guys came out – but for Saturday I made sure that the women of Suor Angelica knew that they were welcome to be part of it as well. And I’m glad that they were because a third of the questions from the audience were about various aspects of the Puccini. It was during the Saturday night Talk Back that I finally got to say something publicly that I hadn’t yet shared with the anyone before: that we never could have had the huge success we did with Black September if the Suor Angelica women hadn’t done a truly spectacular job of mastering their music at a recording setting pace. Having them be so far ahead of schedule almost all of the way meant that in the last week of the term, Matt and I no longer had to split our rehearsal time half and half, but instead could do just one hour of “Angelica” and devote the rest of the hour to “Black September.” And as I finished saying that, the guys on the stage with me gave the Angelica women a standing ovation of their own. I’m glad I had the chance to spell out what was always perfectly clear to me: that this Opera Workshop was One Gigantic Success thanks to the great work of both casts.
And it was great to field some very perceptive and insightful questions, such as: “what was the easiest part of creating Black September- and what was most difficult?” or “what are you going to do with it now?” And among my very favorite comments shared after the show was one from the mother of Nick Gonzales, one of our singers, who said that she hoped that we would someday find a way to reach out to the families of the victims and let them know that we had created this work in memory of their loved ones’ memory. To a shameful extent, the Olympic Committee remains resistant to properly acknowledging this tragedy – but maybe those most personally impacted by the tragedy would derive comfort from knowing that the courage of these 11 athletes is not forgotten at Carthage College. Matt and I were also thrilled t speak with MeriKatherine’s grandfather, a military veteran who has actually done extensive work with hostage situations. He said that Matt’s libretto did a beautiful job of capturing much of what the experience of the typical hostage is, and that was a tremendously gratifying compliment to receive.
SEEKING OUT SORROW ….. What we offered to our audiences – and experienced ourselves in the preparatory process – was an evening of heartbreaking loss. But not once but twice, the audience was on its feet, cheering. It was a good reminder for me that we don’t need to be as fearful as we often are of taking people into painful places. It’s in those moments that we gain the most powerful sense of what it means to be alive and human.
MINUS MATT …… Saturday night, we were without Matt Boresi – who had to be out of town. It was really disconcerting for me in all kinds of ways – maybe chiefly because I worried that something on the technical side of things would go wrong and I would have absolutely no idea what to do about it. But he assured me that our two stage managers were consummate pros and fully prepared- and he was right. As far as I know, Saturday night’s performance went off without the slightest hitch- and if anything, it was an even finer musical performance than Friday night. But as I stood there at the end of “Black September,” waiting for my turn to bow, it felt so wrong for Matt not to be there to share in that moment of triumph. And it underscored the injustice that most librettists face of getting second billing for such works, well below the composer of the music. The fact is that this opera would not exist at all without Matt- and to whatever extent my music was any good at all had very little to do with me and everything to do with Matt’s wonderfully crafted libretto.
I’m sure I speak for Matt when I say THANK YOU to everyone who came to the opera. THANK YOU to everyone who helped us behind the scenes. THANK YOU to our wives for your encouragement and support. and THANK YOU to the extraordinary students who made us so proud.
