Thanks to you, your support, and your belief in chamber opera, this has been a great year for our company. In calendar 2011, we:

• Received $250,000 USD from the Annenberg Foundation / Explore of Los Angeles. This supports the creation of a remarkable new opera set at Fallujah and NYC in 2004. Music by Canadian Tobin Stokes, libretto by American Heather Raffo, based on a scenario by Christian Ellis, USMC (ret’d).
• It is the largest commissioning grant in Canadian history. There have been three workshops to date: 15 and 16 May, actors only, text only; 13 and 14 September, singers and piano, Act 1; 13 and 14 November, singers and piano, Act 1 (revised) and Act 2. Coming: April 2012, first rehearsal of 11-piece orchestra. May 2012, final workshop, with orchestra, at Frederic Wood Theatre.
• It was the subject of a half-page feature by Marsha Lederman in the Globe & Mail.
• Signed an agreement to bring the world premiere of Brokeback Mountain as chamber opera, this to Vancouver in the spring of 2015. This is, of course, based on the eponymous short story (1997) and film (2005), both of which earned enormous praise.
• Continued work on Margaret Atwood’s first opera, Pauline, set at Vancouver in March 1913, and starring the great Judith Forst as Pauline Johnson. The text workshops have been concluded. Johnson was an important Canadian artist whose life ended in a rooming house at Bute x Alberni, where our opera is set. Pauline Johnson named Lost Lagoon, and is buried in Stanley Park.
• Saw the formal launch of Canadian Classics. It is a new series first proposed by City Opera and is now managed and distributed by Naxos, the world’s largest classical recording company. The first recording, Jeff Ryan’s Fugitive Colours, was released with Bramwell Tovey and the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra in September.
• Gave concerts and recitals at Minoru Chapel in Richmond (twice; November 2 concert pictured above), Roedde House, the DTES, Carnegie Centre, Italian Days on Commercial Drive, MacMillan Planetarium, Granville Island (three times), and more. These many concerts and recitals derive from our mission statement: “Our goal is to bring chamber opera to a wide audience.”
• Launched a project to expand — carefully and meticulously — our extraordinary Board of Directors. Building from strength, and taking the long view.

Above: ‘Fallujah’ workshop No. 3 at the Tom Lee Music Hall,
and the Carnegie Centre, November 13 and 14

Supporting City Opera

Gifts to City Opera are tax-deductible in Canada, and in the United States. We are now able to receive tax-deductible gifts of bonds and securities in Canada.

If you like what we do, we ask your help.

To produce the operas we create, and re-create, and to continue to bring opera in concert across Metro, we ask your help.

We have also created a Commissioning Fund, and a Production Fund, to allow supporters to nominate gifts for work that you may feel particularly important. Anything you might contribute would be incredibly helpful.

• ONLINE THROUGH CANADA HELPS
  Donate any time via the City Opera page at CanadaHelps.org.
• DONATING SECURITIES THROUGH CANADA HELPS
  http://mycharityconnects.org/donatingsecurities
• BY CHEQUE
  City Opera Vancouver
  PO Box 88393
  Vancouver BC V6A 4A6
  CANADA
• IN THE UNITED STATES
  We are now able to issue valid tax receipts for gifts originating in the United States. How? Please contact City Opera Treasurer Hazel Currie: info@cityoperavancouver.com.

2012 will be an exciting year for chamber opera in Metro Vancouver. Your help makes it possible. Thanks for considering us.

Khaos In Nelson

We believe in mutual aid. City Opera was delighted this year to be asked to serve as outside advisor in the creation of an important new opera, KHAOS, being produced by our colleagues at Nelson Community Opera and the Amy Ferguson Institute.

The Nelson premiere will be given at the Capitol Theatre on 8, 9 and 10 March 2012, with a possible held-over performance on March 13. KHAOS will tour thereafter. Music by Don Macdonald, and libretto by Nicola Harwood. www.khaosopera.com Contact: mar-lena@shaw.ca.

Carlos Kleiber

Our artistic director knew and studied with the legendary conductor Carlos Kleiber for 15 years. He has written a book about him. Corresponding With Carlos: A Biography of Carlos Kleiber, was released in NYC on 25 November.

Here, a small exemplar of unsurpassed elegance and phrase: Carlos Kleiber leading the Vienna Philharmonic in 1989.

And A Final Thanks…

to our wonderful Board, advisors, staff, stage and creative artists, our production partners, our business and community partners, our coaches and singers – and above all to you, whose generosity is helping build Canada’s leading chamber opera company.

Happy Holidays to all, and thanks for all. A great year lies ahead.

“Practice like it means everything in the world to you. Perform like you don’t give a damn.”

The triumphs of Jascha Heifetz are well known: public debut in his home­town of Vilnius, Russia, at the age of 5; Berlin Philharmonic debut at the age of 11; one of the most memorable debuts in the annals of Carnegie Hall at the age of 16; followed by tours, long before the ease of air travel, to the far reaches of the world: Japan, Australia, South America, India, the Middle East, and beyond—conquering audiences wherever he went. In all, he had a public career lasting almost 65 years.

Heifetz was already “Heifetz” from a startlingly early age. Sascha Lasserson, who studied violin alongside the young Jascha in Leopold Auer’s fabled class at the St. Petersburg Conservatory was asked years later what Heifetz’s playing was like as a child. Lasserson thought for a moment and said simply, “He hasn’t improved a bit.”

Fritz Kreisler—Heifetz’s idol—heard the 11-year-old Jascha play the Mendelssohn Concerto and then accompanied him at the piano in his own Schön Rosmarin at a private concert in Berlin in April 1912. When Heifetz finished, Kreisler famously turned to the other violinists present and said, “We might as well take our fiddles and smash them across our knees.” Primitive home recordings of Heifetz made in Berlin a few months later prove that the accolades of crit­ics and fellow violinists were not mere hyperbole.

Kreisler’s admiration of Heifetz never waned—nor did Heifetz’s admiration of Kreisler. The two often attended each other’s concerts. At one such Carnegie Hall recital in March 1953, Heifetz played Kreisler’s Recitativo and Scherzo in honor of the aging composer who sat in the second row. When he finished playing, Heifetz motioned for Kreisler to stand, to thunderous applause.

In his final years, Heifetz kept a signed Kreisler program on the wall of his studio at the Univer­sity of Southern California. Daniel Mason, one of Heifetz’s students, told us that Heifetz made it clear that Kreisler was still his big love. “He didn’t play Kreisler’s pieces much in public, out of respect to Kreisler,” Mason said, “but he played them often in class. And when he played them in class he imitated Kreisler perfectly. He could sound exactly like Kreisler.”

Even Kreisler was once fooled by Heifetz’s playing of one of his own compositions. At a tribute held for Kreisler by fellow musicians in 1940, the American violinist Albert Spalding dressed up like Kreisler. He put soap on his bow so that it wouldn’t sound when he drew it across the strings. Behind a curtain Heifetz played one of Kreisler’s compositions while Spalding pretended to be Kreisler performing. Afterwards, Kreisler went up to Spalding and, assuming it was a phonograph behind the curtain instead of Heifetz, said, “It was so nice to hear one of my old records!” Heifetz beamed when he heard what Kreisler said. Years later, Heifetz recounted the story to his students, and Daniel Mason said it was the only time he could recall when Heifetz seemed genuinely proud of his own playing.

Heifetz also had a talent for a different type of mimicry. Another one of his pupils, Elaine Skorodin, recalls a dinner party she attended at Heifetz’s home. Before dinner, he announced that he and his accompanist, Brooks Smith, wanted to play a short recital. The guests were pleasantly sur­prised and took their seats in his studio. But when Heifetz started to play, everyone froze. His rhythm and intonation were off. How could this be? Heifetz’s face was expressionless, as usual, but he was looking at his guests out of the corner of his eye and, despite a gallant effort, Brooks Smith could not contain a smile. Heifetz was engaging in one of his old party tricks: imitating, perfectly, a bad student.

Of course, Heifetz’s own sound on the violin was entirely unique. He played with gut D and A strings, but produced an intense tone with a finger­tip vibrato that he would adjust to create impeccable nuances. His technique was, to put it mildly, amazing, but he was no mere technician. Instead, he used his technique to further his art. It gave him the flexibility to sculpt every phrase, no matter its difficulty. His tonal palette was vast, and always perfectly coordinated and controlled.

Heifetz believed that any obstacle on the violin could be overcome. If his students’ strings went out of tune while they were playing, he would not allow them to stop and retune the violin. One time, when a student complained that it was impossible to continue under such conditions, Heifetz picked up his violin, put it radically out tune, and proceeded to play Paganini’s 16th Caprice flawlessly. When he had to substitute a finger for a note that would ordinarily have been an open string, he did it automatically and perfectly. The entire class was dumbfounded.

Daniel Mason, who witnessed that feat, came away convinced that there was absolutely no physical barrier between what Heifetz heard in his head and what he was able to produce on the violin. On another occasion, a student was playing the Schubert Duo in A Major on a violin that was badly out of adjustment. A difficult octave passage in the slow movement proved to be problematic on the instrument. Heifetz took the violin and, uncharacteristically, also had trouble in the octave passage. He made a face and was just about to say something, when Grant Beglarian, Dean of the University of Southern California’s School of Music, unexpectedly walked into the studio for a ceremonial visit.

After introductions and pleasantries, Heifetz said, “Now, where were we?” He still had the student’s violin in his hands. All the students waited to see what he would do. He could have simply returned the violin, but by doing so he would have lost face in front of the students. So he stepped up to the moment. He put the violin back under his chin and did the only thing he could do under the circumstances: he played the passage perfectly despite the limitations of the violin. Beglarian was oblivious to the significance of this, but it made a strong impression on the class. Heifetz handed back the violin and said simply, “Mind over matter.”

Though Heifetz is known best as a violinist, he also had an extraordinary talent for the art of arranging and transcribing works for the violin. He transformed everything from keyboard works by Chopin and Poulenc to songs by Ponce and Gershwin into little masterpieces that sounded like they were meant to be played on the violin. One, Hora Staccato, transcended the world of classical music and became a bona fide sensation. Many of these transcriptions can be heard in this set and have entered the standard repertoire of today’s violinists.

Heifetz could also improvise beautifully. One time while teaching he asked the class pianist to play the accompaniment to the Mendelssohn concerto. He then proceeded to make up an entirely new violin part on the spot. His original compositions were limited to popular songs written under the pseudonym Jim Hoyl. One, ‘When You Make Love to Me (Don’t Make Believe)’ became a hit in 1946. Among those who recorded it were Bing Crosby, Helen Ward and Margaret Whiting. Once the song had made it on its own, Heifetz confessed to writing it.

Over the years, Jim Hoyl became some­thing of an alter ego to Jascha Heifetz. The name Heifetz was a difficult one to live up to. As “Heifetz,” he was a legend: on display, judged, unable to let down his guard. At the height of his career, Heifetz was a household name—one synonymous with perfection. For this shy and intensely private man, being Heifetz must have been a difficult burden. And so “Jim Hoyl” became the antithesis of “Jascha Heifetz”: relaxed, anonymous, tin pan alley. Heifetz’s fishing licenses bear the name Jim Hoyl, and at parties—when he really let his hair down—Heifetz asked others to call him Jim.

A story recounted by Daniel Mason is a revealing and moving one. In 1976, the University of Southern California wanted to celebrate Heifetz’s 75th birthday with a gala event. Characteristically, Heifetz refused. He did not like public celebrations of birthdays and anniversaries, and he shunned tributes. When his manager, Arthur Judson, suggested a silver anniversary commemoration of his 1917 U.S. debut, Heifetz refused. Late in life he also refused to be honored by the President of the United States at the annual Kennedy Center Honors in Washington, D.C.

Aware of all this, Heifetz’s students nonetheless wanted to celebrate his birthday. So, they decided to hold a surprise birth­day party for him in class. They knew that hijack­ing a class for such a pur­pose was perilous, but they came up with an idea that they thought Heifetz might like. He always insisted that in order to be good all-around musicians, his students must be able to play another instrument beside the violin. Thus, he required them all to take piano lessons [from a member of the USC piano faculty] and to accompany one of the other students in class once a semester. (Heifetz, himself, was a very accomplished pianist).

So, the students decided that they would surprise Heifetz with a performance of a tango. But, they would all play instruments that they really didn’t know how to play. The result was a very dismal sounding ensemble, but one that they hoped Heifetz would appreciate. In order to execute the surprise, they had to enter Heifetz’s studio at USC before he arrived—something they had never done before. The plan was for them to start to play as soon as he entered the room. When finished they would serve cake and other food and refreshments to their surprised teacher.

On the day of the surprise, the students were terrified. No one knew how Heifetz would react. When he walked into the studio, the students launched into a performance of their ragtag tango. Heifetz was carrying his violin case in one hand, a black bag in the other, and he wore a hat. At first he just stood in the middle of the room and didn’t move. More nervous than ever, the students pushed onward with their tango, glancing to see what Heifetz would do. Very slowly, he put down his violin case, and then very slowly he put down his bag. With a grand gesture he lifted off his hat and, in a magical moment, began a solo dance around the room.

“It was magical because we knew the joke was okay with him, but also because he was a great dancer, so it was really beautiful to watch him,” Mason told us. When they finished playing, the students rushed to the next room and brought in the cake and began to sing, “Happy Birthday, Mr. Heifetz”—it was always Mister Heifetz. But he quickly interrupted them: “You’ve got the wrong guy,” he said. “You don’t want me. You want a friend of mine. I think he’s nearby. I’ll go get him.” He then left the room as Jascha Heifetz and returned a few seconds later as Jim Hoyl. “He said ‘Jim’s here,’ and then we were calling him Jim, and he was a totally different persona.”

Heifetz’s reserve has often been mistaken for coldness, or worse. He was formal. He was a man of few words, highly organized, deeply patriotic, and extraordinarily disciplined. Immaculate in everything he did, he expected the same from those around him. But, in the end, he was more demanding of himself than of anyone else.

When the pianist Milton Kaye auditioned to be his accompanist in 1944, Heifetz warned him that he expected only the best from him. “If you are an artist, you do things correctly,” Heifetz explained. “Not half way – fully.” He paused and looked at Kaye. “Do you want to be an artist?” he asked. Kaye nodded. “Then no approximation,” Heifetz said. The blood must have drained from Kaye’s face, because Heifetz then offered some revealing words of comfort: “If you think I am tough on you, remember, I am twice as tough on myself.”

Beneath Heifetz’s formal exterior was a boyish sense of humor. He loved games and parties. Especially in his early years he would participate in elaborate skits—often written by his brother-in-law and onetime accompanist, Samuel Chotzinoff. The pianist Jacob Lateiner, who collaborated in chamber music concerts with Heifetz and cellist Gregor Piatigorsky in the 1960s, and who can be heard in several of the chamber music recordings in this set, later wrote that Heifetz was “probably the best host I have ever met in my life.”

Lateiner would rehearse daily with Heifetz and Piatigorsky from 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. with a break for lunch. Heifetz never dominated the rehearsals, according to Lateiner, but they worked very hard. “Our preparation was such that by the time we got to the performance there was room for spontaneity.” This preparation reflected a maxim that Heifetz passed on to his students: “Practice like it means everything in the world to you. Perform like you don’t give a damn.”

Leonard Pennario, another pianist who participated in chamber music concerts and recordings had similar recollections of Heifetz as both host and collaborator. He said that he learned more from Heifetz during their rehearsals than from any teacher he ever had, and he spoke of the great camaraderie fostered by Heifetz when they played together. Interspersed between the hours of rehearsals were meals, afternoon swims, and games of ping-pong and gin rummy.

Heifetz was generous with others in ways that often defy common wisdom. For example, he quietly gave fine violins and bows to his students, helped them with rent money, and insisted on visiting each of them at their own home—but always with the understanding that they not talk about it to others. Late in life, these students became a second family to Heifetz. He invited them several times a year to his home in Beverly Hills or his beach house in Malibu. Thanksgiv­ing at the beach became a time-honored tradition. Erick Friedman, with whom Heifetz recorded the Bach Double Concerto, once said that “Heifetz’s consideration and tact for others he cares about is beyond most people’s imagination.”

Heifetz gave his last public recital at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles on October 23, 1972—a benefit concert that was recorded and is included in this set. We were both in the audience. Just ahead of us, tears streamed down the face of an elderly woman as Heifetz played the slow movement of the Strauss Sonata, and just down the row from us sat the great comedian and better-than-he-let-on violinist Jack Benny, who was a long­time admirer of Heifetz. Together the two had per­formed a comedy skit and a duet for U.S. troops during World War II—part of Heifetz’s tireless (and often dangerous) service for the USO during the war.

No one knew this would be Heifetz’s last recital, but Brooks Smith later said that he sensed it. Heifetz was very tired. He played only one short encore, Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s Sea Murmurs, and gave a brief curtain speech. Saying he was “pretty much pooped,” he apologized for not being able to attend a post concert party. He then retreated to his dressing room and, uncharacteristically, refused to see anyone. It was the end of his formal public career.

Heifetz continued to teach and made his last, unannounced, public performance at a student concert on the campus of USC on April 28, 1974. Piatigorsky’s pupils were sched­uled to play the Bachianias Brasileiras No. 5 for Cellos and Soprano by Hector Villa-Lobos. At another concert not long before that one, Beverly Sills had sung the soprano part with them. This time, Piatigorsky strode on stage to introduce the work: “We can’t have Miss Sills today,” he told the audience, “so we’ve looked within our own family and have found a very talented boy soprano. We won’t have cleavage or décolletage, but we will have talent.” With that, Heifetz walked on stage and performed the soprano solo on the violin. He played the entire piece on one string, using just one finger on his left hand to imitate the sound of a human voice.

Not long afterward, the muscles in Heifetz’s right shoulder hemorrhaged. Surgery and physical therapy did not repair the damage, leaving him unable to raise his right arm. Nonetheless, he still managed to play in class, tilting and contorting the violin in order to accommodate the limitations of his arm. If he wanted to play on the G string he would sometimes ask a student to hold up his arm. In that condition, he played the entire Tchaikovsky Piano Trio in class. It was yet another example of “mind over matter.”

Luckily, we have a vast collection of recorded performances of Heifetz chronicling almost his entire career—from his first recordings made in St. Petersburg at the age of 10, to his final recordings made late in his 71st year. Included in this set are several concertos that Heifetz commissioned: the Korngold, Walton, Rózsa, Gruenberg, and Castelnuovo-Tedesco 2nd, as well as world premiere recordings of concertos he championed, such as the Sibelius and Prokofiev 2nd.

As a boy, Heifetz performed the Glazounov Concerto with the composer conducting, and he was an early champion of the Elgar Concerto—learning it under Auer’s tutelage shortly after its premiere and meeting Elgar in 1920. You can hear both, as well as the sonatas of Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms, lesser known ones by Bloch, Ferguson, and Karen Khachaturian, and a wealth of chamber music that runs the gamut from Mozart and Schubert to Turina and Toch. Of special interest are several previously un-issued studio recordings.

The list of Heifetz’s collaborators on these recordings is a long and distinguished one that can easily be gleaned from the accompanying discography. Less obvious are the extraordinary musicians who perf­ormed in the pickup orchestras billed as the RCA Victor Sym­phony Orchestra. For example, it included such violin­ists as Sol Babitz, Israel Baker, Anatol Kaminsky, Peter Meremblum, Lou Raderman, Eudice Shapiro (who often served as concertmaster), and Felix Slatkin. None other than Toscha Seidel played in the violin section for such recordings as the Conus and Spohr concer­tos, Lalo’s Symphonie Espagnole, and the 1952 recordings of Saint-Saëns’ Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso and Sarasate’s Zigeunerweisen.

Seidel, of course, had been one of Auer’s great prodigies, studying in the same class as Heifetz. He and Heifetz had concertized together as boys, playing the Bach Double Concerto, and Seidel had made a very successful Carnegie Hall debut in 1918, just one year after Heifetz. He was—along with Heifetz, Mischa Elman, and Sascha Jacobsen—the inspiration behind the Gershwin song, “Mischa, Jascha, Toscha, Sascha.” (Jacobsen led the Musical Art Quartet in Heifetz’s recording of the Chausson Concerto for Violin, Piano, and String Quartet.) Seidel eventually abandoned his solo career for a very successful one as a studio musician in Hollywood, thus ending up in the orchestra for Heifetz.

For much of his career, Heifetz had to contend with the claim that his playing was “cold.” The cellist Laurence Lesser, who performed in the recordings of Spohr’s Double Quartet and Tchaikovsky’s Souvenir de Florence, strongly contests that claim. “He was a hot player,” Lesser insists. “Nobody has ever played with more passion.” Many others agree. Why, then, did the claim stick? No doubt it was because people listened with their eyes, and Heifetz’s stage presence was impassive—no swooning, swaying, or smiling.

Before his 1971 television broadcast, Heifetz responded to a question about his stage presence by saying: “Actually, I don’t feel I’m impenetrable, cool or aloof when I’m on the stage. I’m not even aware that I appear serious. If I don’t smile …it’s only because I become so absorbed in my playing that I forget everything else. If a smile doesn’t come spontaneously, why resort to an artificial grimace?”

Listen for yourself, and see if you don’t agree with Howard Taubman, long­time music critic at the New York Times, who once offered a retort to the charge that Heifetz was “a splendid, heart­less violin playing machine” by saying that “anyone with ears to hear knows this charge is rubbish.” “For me and many others,” Taubman wrote, “he was a non­pareil of violinists. He had everything—technique in super­abundance, purity of tone, taste, loftiness of feeling.”

Back on 15 April 2007, City Opera proposed the creation of a new recording series, Canadian Classics. Klaus Heymann (the owner of Naxos, the world’s largest classical recording company) said “yes”. Work began.

On 24 September, we launched Canadian Classics right here in Vancouver. This is a Vancouver Symphony Orchestra release of an all-Jeff Ryan album, Fugitive Colours, conducted by Bramwell Tovey. It is quite brilliant. We thank the Canadian Federation of Musicians for making it possible.

Canadian Classics will continue with music from 1800 to the present. This repertoire will be in vocal, piano, small ensemble, wind band, symphonic and — ultimately — operatic literature. We thank the many scholars and musicians who have recommended repertoire for this new series — and especially thank manager Raymond Bisha, the Director of Media Relations for Naxos in North America.

This new series will take Canadian music to the world. The distribution reach of Naxos is enormous. City Opera Vancouver is proud to have proposed Canadian Classics, and grateful for Naxos’ willingness to take it on.

Second Annenberg / Explore Chamber Opera Workshop

The $250,000 grant we received from the Annenberg Foundation is being put to good use. On 18 and 19 September we spent another two days in workshop. Composer Tobin Stokes and librettist Heather Raffo were joined by our cast, director John Wright, story consultant Christian Ellis, staff pianist Dr Greg Caisley, and the Board and friends of the company. Charles Annenberg Weingarten and Tom Pollak flew in from LA to see how we were doing with their opera. Dr Hilde Binford flew in from Pennsylvania to help. We focused on Act 1 only. Many thanks to Canadian Actors Equity.

It was magical. Wonderful. Deeply moving. Here’s our workshop cast…

Ken Lavigne, Phillip; Christopher Mayell, Taylor and Lucas van Lierop, cover; Marc St Pierre, Wissam; Daniel Foltz-Morrison, corpsman; Willy Miles-Grenzberg, Lalo; Nickolas Meyer, Rocks; Megan Morrison, Colleen; Arianna Sovernigo, Shatha; and Stephen Aberle, Kassim. They are superb. Next workshop in November.

More pictures on our Facebook page.

How To Make An Opera

On Monday 14 November, from 7:30 – 9pm, we present ‘how we make an opera’ to the good people of the Carnegie Centre in the DTES. We’ll be joined by members of the Annenberg-Explore cast.

CACV Tea Party

The Community Arts Council of Vancouver began life 65 years ago. Five years ago, we became an affiliate. They helped us get off to a speedy start.

On Sunday 2 October, at the Museum of Vancouver in Vanier Park, they’re having a tea party in celebration of their refusal to retire. City Opera artists Kathleen Morrison (soprano), Andrew Greenwood (baritone) and David Boothroyd (piano) will be performing. Max Wyman hosts. Please join us, and meet good friends.

Pauline & Brokeback Mountain

Steady work continues on our two other chamber commissions. We plan to make a major announcement about casting, funding, and dates in the near future. These are both great projects. You will be proud.

Opera At Minoru Chapel

We’ve been asked back. Twice in one day.

At Richmond’s heritage Minoru Chapel, 6540 Gilbert Road, we’ll be appearing at 2 and 7pm on Wednesday 2 November. This is another of our many outreach concerts, and will feature Gina McLellan Morel, soprano; Willy Miles-Grenzberg, baritone; Richard Epp, pianist, and narrator Tom Durrie. All proceeds to our Production Fund.

Tickets $20. INFO: 604.276.4300, local 2.

David Y.H. Lui, CM

A great friend of our company, impresario David YH Lui has passed away at age 67. This was 200 years too soon for a man of his gifts, vitality and imagination. David was also Advisor to our original Pantages Theatre Project, and to a dozen other groups in Vancouver. He was helping us raise money for Brokeback. This was a life of amazing accomplishment in the arts. Bravo and well done, David.

Corresponding With Carlos

In 1989, our artistic director wrote a letter to the legendary, and famously reclusive, conductor Carlos Kleiber. He asked to study with him. The great maestro replied, and so began a 15-year correspondence, friendship and apprenticeship. On 16 November, a new book will be published in NYC about their unique connection, and the stunning musical genius that was Kleiber. Corresponding With Carlos: A Biography of Carlos Kleiber. ISBN-10: 0810881438. It has many good jokes.

CK was, perhaps, the most eloquent conductor who ever lived. If you’ve never seen him, here, one of his many small miracles – with the Vienna Philharmonic.

City Opera Vancouver Online

Website: www.cityoperavancouver.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/pages/City-Opera-Vancouver/297764267658
Blog: http://cityoperavancouver.com/blog/

This project, City Opera’s second commission, is rolling ahead. Based on the real-life experiences of Christian Ellis (USMC, ret’d), who fought at the Battle of Fallujah in 2004, this is one of our most unusual and powerful creations. It is funded by a landmark $250,000 grant from the Los Angeles-based Annenberg Foundation, and its Explore organization.

Our first of four workshops was held on 15 and 16 May, and saw nine professional actors road-testing the libretto. This workshop was led by director John Wright, together with librettist Heather Raffo, composer Tobin Stokes, story consultant Christian Ellis and City Opera Artistic Committee members Harvey De Roo, Nora Kelly, and Janet Lea.

Table read with actors, Canadian Music Centre, 15 May 2011

Director John Wright, story consultant Christian Ellis, Russian Hall, 16 May 2011

On 29 and 30 May, we held auditions for the professional singers who will take the nine roles over the next year. These auditions attracted three dozen fine artists. It is always difficult to cast for an opera that doesn’t yet exist, but we will be announcing our choices very shortly. All thanks to Auditions Manager Sonia Stastny, pianist Greg Caisley, our Board members and volunteers, and our friends at Dunbar Heights United Church. More information on our website.

Board director Janet Lea, staff pianist Greg Caisley, workshop director John Wright

Workshop Two (focusing on Act 1) is set for 18 and 19 September, and Workshop Three (focusing on Act 2) for 13 and 14 November. The final workshop, with a 12-piece orchestra in the theatre, concludes on Sunday 13 May 2012.

Brokeback Mountain

The famed short story by Annie Proulx, and the Academy Award-winning film by Ang Lee, is becoming an opera. Its composer is Charles Wuorinen, and its librettist Annie Proulx herself. On 5 April 2011 we signed an agreement that gives City Opera its world premiere as a chamber opera.

This is a deeply moving story, and will be a wonderful event: intimate, powerful, engaging, memorable. We expect to present it in early 2015. More information here.

Pauline

Our first commission is now scheduled for world premiere in 2013. This coincides with the passing of Pauline Johnson, in Vancouver, a century before. It is another wonderful story in music.

City Opera At Italian Day

Every year, City Opera Vancouver offers concerts and recitals across Metro. Regularly in the DTES, and recently in Richmond, we present wonderful young singers in great repertoire. Again this year we were honoured to headline at Italian Day on Commercial Drive.

Richard Epp, Andrey Andreychik, Rachel Fenlon, and hundreds in the crowd

On 5 June soprano Rachel Fenlon, baritone Andrey Andreychik, pianist Richard Epp, led by narrator and producer Tom Durrie, charmed the crowd. No wonder. Immediately after, we got an e-mail from someone attending asking to take voice lessons. She’s fallen in love with opera. Rightly so!

City Opera Vancouver Online

Our Website

Facebook Page

City Opera Blog

There is a CD, just released, which conveys Verrett at her peak in recital. It is a survey of her work in Schubert, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, Mozart, Copland and traditional Negro spirituals arranged by the great Hall Johnson and John Jacob Niles. Recorded live on 30 January 1965, with Charles Wadsworth at the piano, she was in her mezzo glory that night. The audience clearly adored her. No wonder.

Her voice had a great richness, refined by a pointed musicianship, one in which nothing was taken for granted. She could cut through any orchestra, and sail above any oasis of quiet. And she had range, such range. It was a famous, although mixed, compliment that she was often referred to as ‘The Black Callas’.

It remains legend that on one occasion, and quoting Anthony Tommasini in the NYT, “In 1973, when the [Met] opened its historic production of Berlioz’s ‘Troyens,’ starring Jon Vickers as Aeneas, Ms. Verrett sang not only the role of Cassandra in Part I of this epic opera, but also Dido in Part II, taking the place of the mezzo-soprano Christa Ludwig, who had withdrawn because of an illness, a tour de force that entered Met annals.” This was Shirley Verrett.

There was another side, and it wore a comic costume. I saw her live at The Met once only, she starring opposite a singer who shall be unnamed. My friend Jean Godden and I dressed up as musicians. I carried an empty viola case, and we sneaked in through the stage door, and watched the show from the third light loft, stage left. What a view.

Unfortunately, this was the notorious event in the two stars were not even on speaking terms. After each ‘duet’, each retired to a separate part of the wing, there to be fanned and reassured by their respective claques. The hapless stage director buzzed back and forth between each, trying to keep their separate camps from exercising some dread option or other. It was possible to see Verrett’s occasional giggle as this silly spectacle proceeded.

This new CD is worth our attention. The rich caress and excellent German of Verrett’s voice makes the Schubert sound as if still wet on the page. So too the American spirituals, sung with belief and faith and respect. It is a pleasure to hear such work treated as inherently worthy, and not merely an occasion to demonstrate progressive credentials. In this, Ms Verrett stood in the great path of Marian Anderson and Mahalia Jackson.

Her Mozart, the evergreen Alleluia K165, is given with a youthful fervour and bright spirit. She is less concerned with making a beautiful noise – that she certainly does – than in conveying the good news of its text.

Only in the Rachmaninoff and Tchaikovsky does she disappoint. Spring Waters, a well-known and much-traversed work, suffers the problem of by-rote diction, and was perhaps a poor choice. Verrett gets away with it because of the drama and allure of the voice, and for that we may be grateful.

As to the rest? Most grateful that there was once such a great and gracious voice.

SHIRLEY VERRETT / CARNEGIE HALL RECITAL 1965
Schubert, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, traditional, Copland, Mozart

Charles Wadsworth, piano

Joseph Habig, original producer

Remastering Engineer, Charles Harbutt

Sony 82319

Original liner notes by Mary Campbell, RCA 1965

$17.99 US

Available at Sikora’s Classical Records

When first conducting the German Requiem as a grad student at Stanford, I was perplexed by the issue confronting all who confront Brahms: is this the hand of the classicist, or the romantic? The startling ambidexterity of his signature allows wide reign.

In this new Sony CD, led by Nikolaus Harnoncourt with soprano Genia Kühmeier and baritone Thomas Hampson, but propelled throughout by the Arnold Schoenberg Chor, we are drawn to Brahms the Romantic.

Across the seven movements of the Requiem, the conductor finds and italicizes those dramatic apparitions that speak to the stage-worthiness of the work. This is not a dry oratorio dully reciting the words of the Requiem. In fact, Brahms chose a Protestant text that bears little connection to the Latin mass that informed most of his predecessors. More than by any other arena, this Requiem is informed by the passing and memory of Brahms’ own mother – a warm ghost that Harnoncourt never overlooks. It sweeps above and through every moment.

The glory of this recording is its diction. The chorus, which carries 90% of the weight, is a wonder of articulate purpose. In accent and point and comprehension, this text is refreshed and reanimated. One cannot praise too highly diction in all voices, and – unsurprisingly – its constancy and accuracy of pitch. One reinforces the other.

The orchestra is the Vienna Philharmonic, whose night job is that of pit band in the Vienna Staatsoper. No surprise, then, that those sequences of ‘operatic’ voice and dynamic do not elude this orchestra. Typical of this ensemble, every timbre has an intimate relationship with every other. Blend and balance are unforced, and wondrous.

The work opens almost masked, with an abiding homogeneity and a string sound more closely matched to the human voice than perhaps any other orchestra in Europe. Rhythmic pairs are robust, and a contrapuntal energy pushes forward.

The second movement is a kind of dead march, curiously in three, almost (like the slow funeral step of great British army units) holding in suspension on the third beat. It is an eerie and dramatic device.

Thomas Hampson is in good voice in the third movement, and easy in his upper register. This is not the stentorian Hampson. He moves to pulse, and never lingers falsely. In this he is aided by Harnoncourt, surely one of the least libertine of conductors. The fourth movement is a small garden of easy energy, timbral openness, all grace and simplicity. Here the Vienna Philharmonic shines.

In the fifth, soprano Genia Kühmeier provides a sweet and joyful colour, not pushing nor self-important. Her text, As one whom his mother comforts, so I will comfort you, is a model of compassion and repose. One occasionally hears a soprano attempt to make of this text a kind of star turn, serving self and not language. No such blunder of vanity occurs here.

In the sixth movement, Brahms the dramatist assumes a new energy. Anglophones will recognize Brahms’ language, from First Corinthians and much earlier employed by Jennens and Händel: Behold, I show you a mystery… the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible… Death is swallowed up in victory. Now, Hampson and the chorus are allowed full throttle, and take us to the words of Revelation in the seventh and final movement. Blessed are the dead… their works do follow them.

And now this ensemble comes home to blessing, and deeper repose, and the certain confidence promised. One need not be a Believer to believe this: in the Brahms Requiem, and in this most thoughtful and joyful performance, we understand where Brahms the famous cynic concealed his secret self.
Most highly recommended.

BRAHMS:  Eine deutsches Requiem, Op 45

Vienna Philharmonic

Genia Kühmeier, soprano

Thomas Hampson, baritone

Arnold Schoenberg Chor

Nikolaus Harnoncourt, conductor

Martin Sauer, producer

Michael Brammann, recording engineer

Sony / RCA Red Seal B003VKW108
The superb and comprehensive liner notes, with excellent sourced translations in German, French and English, are by Dr Benjamin-Gunnar Chors.
$35.57 CDN

Available at Sikora’s Classical Records, and in several formats online. Samples may be heard at amazon.com or sonymusic.ch.

There are no other City Opera Vancouver auditions scheduled at this time.

READ MORE ABOUT THE PROJECT

www.cityoperavancouver.com

City Opera on Facebook

City Opera Blog

Largest Commissioning Grant In Canadian History

City Opera Vancouver’s Board of Directors is delighted to announce the company has been awarded a commissioning grant of $250,000 US from the Annenberg Foundation, in connection with the philanthropic multimedia organization Explore.

This extraordinary sum is believed to be the largest single commissioning grant in Canadian history.

“We would like to express our gratitude to the Annenberg Foundation and Explore for entrusting City Opera Vancouver with this honour and opportunity,” said Dr. Nora Kelly, President of the Board. “City Opera’s role here is one of development. The company will oversee the creation of an operatic libretto and score based on Christian Ellis’ story. Ellis was an American Marine in Iraq, but the story is universal. Our goal is to share a deeper truth about humanity, told through music, and to put a human face to both sides of military conflict.”

The Annenberg Foundation, a private US-based family foundation, provides funding and support to non-profit organizations around the world. Explore, a signature project of the Annenberg Foundation, developed the concept of the project and presented the commissioning grant to City Opera. It is awarded for the creation of a new chamber opera, to be developed over a two-year period. It is based on the real life experiences of US Marine Corps Sergeant Christian Ellis at the Battle of Fallujah in 2004.

Explore documents the stories of leaders who have devoted their lives to extraordinary causes. Upon their first encounter with Christian Ellis, Explore’s Director and filmmaker Charles Annenberg Weingarten and Executive Producer Tom Pollak were immediately inspired by Christian’s remarkable story.

“Christian Ellis’ story is representative of thousands of Marines from around the world returning from the horrors of war,” explained Weingarten. “Christian paints a vivid picture of the harrowing realities he and his comrades faced in Iraq. He tells of his experiences with emotional honesty, and with deep compassion and understanding for the opposing side.”

The libretto will be written by noted American-Iraqi playwright Heather Raffo, in consultation with Christian Ellis, and its score by acclaimed Canadian composer Tobin Stokes. Raffo is based in New York City, and Stokes in Vancouver.

“City Opera is thrilled that Heather Raffo and Tobin Stokes – impassioned and skillful artists – are central to the creative team for this new chamber work,” said Dr. Charles Barber, the company’s artistic director. “Their expertise makes them deft handlers of this sensitive and extremely relevant subject. Heather wrote 9 Parts of Desire, an award-winning play based on her interviews with women in Iraq who survived the war. Tobin is a versatile composer of opera, theatre music and dance who has always shown a gift for the human voice. They are a perfect team for this project.”

Workshops

City Opera will mount a series of four workshops in Vancouver, starting in May 2011. Through these sessions, a process of testing and development, the new opera will be taken to a viable and performance-ready level. This new work is slated for completion in June 2012. Production funding for the opera will be separate from the commissioning grant announced today.

Auditions

If you are a professional singer and interested in auditioning for these workshops, please check the AUDITIONS page on the City Opera Vancouver website.

About City Opera Vancouver (www.cityoperavancouver.com)

City Opera Vancouver is a professional chamber opera company. Our goal is to bring chamber opera to a wide audience. The company’s repertoire spans four centuries, from chamber opera’s beginnings to contemporary and commissioned works, with a special interest in Canadian music and artists. Opera is music drama: City Opera presents outstanding singers whose talent for tragedy and comedy will bring opera’s human stories to life. The company gives singers new repertoire to explore, and creates new opportunities to hear voices that are at their best in an intimate setting. Accessible and innovative, City Opera offers a unique musical experience to Metro Vancouver audiences.

City Opera Vancouver was organized in 2006 in tandem with efforts to restore the century old, 650-seat Pantages Theatre in the Downtown Eastside.

About the Annenberg Foundation (www.annenbergfoundation.org)

The Annenberg Foundation is a private family foundation that provides funding and support to nonprofit organizations in the United States and globally. Since 1989, it has generously funded programs in education and youth development; arts, culture and humanities; civic and community life; health and human services; and animal services and the environment. In addition, the Foundation and its Board of Directors are directly involved in the community with several projects that expand and complement its grant support to nonprofits. Among them are innovative nonprofit capacity building initiatives, the Annenberg Space for Photography, Explore, and the Metabolic Studio. The Annenberg Foundation exists to advance the public well being through improved communication. As the principal means of achieving this goal, the Foundation encourages the development of more effective ways to share ideas and knowledge.

About Explore (www.explore.org)

Led by founder Charles Annenberg Weingarten, the Explore Team embarks on fact-finding missions to meet the courageous leaders of the non-profit world and document their work through images and films. By sharing their knowledge, Explore seeks to connect people to extraordinary cultures and ideas. These expeditions also serve as a way to identify potential recipients for Annenberg Foundation grants.

*********************

City Opera goes online today with a new blog:  http://cityoperavancouver.com/blog/

This blog, managed by Sonia Stastny, will track the ongoing creative process behind our Annenberg/Explore commission. Using interviews and comments from librettist Heather Raffo and composer Tobin Stokes, we’ll keep you up to date on the work and how we do it.

We will post updates from director John Wright, from our outside advisors, and from the actors, singers and musicians who will be participating in the workshop process over the next 18 months.

We will also add audio and visual materials. Please tell us if there’s anything else you’d like to see, or to know about.

*********************

CITY OPERA VANCOUVER ONLINE

WEBSITE:  www.cityoperavancouver.com

FACEBOOK: www.facebook.com/pages/City-Opera-Vancouver/297764267658

BLOG: http://cityoperavancouver.com/blog/

City Opera Vancouver’s Board of Directors is delighted to announce the company has been awarded a commissioning grant of $250,000 US from the Annenberg Foundation, in connection with the philanthropic multimedia organization Explore.

This extraordinary sum is believed to be the largest single commissioning grant in Canadian history.

The Annenberg Foundation, a private US-based family foundation, provides funding and support to non-profit organizations around the world. Explore, a signature project of the Annenberg Foundation, developed the concept of the project and presented the commissioning grant to City Opera. It is awarded for the creation of a new chamber opera, to be developed over a two-year period. It is based on the real life experiences of US Marine Corps Sergeant Christian Ellis at the Battle of Fallujah in 2004.

“We would like to express our gratitude to the Annenberg Foundation and Explore for entrusting City Opera Vancouver with this honour and opportunity,” said Dr. Nora Kelly, President of the Board. “City Opera’s role here is one of development. The company will oversee the creation of an operatic libretto and score based on Christian Ellis’ story. Ellis was an American Marine in Iraq, but the story is universal. Our goal is to share a deeper truth about humanity, told through music, and to put a human face to both sides of military conflict.”

Explore documents the stories of leaders who have devoted their lives to extraordinary causes. Upon their first encounter with Christian Ellis, Explore’s Director and filmmaker Charles Annenberg Weingarten and Executive Producer Tom Pollak were immediately inspired by Christian’s remarkable story.

“Christian Ellis’ story is representative of thousands of Marines from around the world returning from the horrors of war,” explained Weingarten. “Christian paints a vivid picture of the harrowing realities he and his comrades faced in Iraq. He tells of his experiences with emotional honesty, and with deep compassion and understanding for the opposing side.”

The libretto will be written by noted American-Iraqi playwright Heather Raffo, in consultation with Christian Ellis, and its score by acclaimed Canadian composer Tobin Stokes. Raffo is based in New York City, and Stokes in Vancouver.

“City Opera is thrilled that Heather Raffo and Tobin Stokes – impassioned and skillful artists – are central to the creative team for this new chamber work,” said Dr. Charles Barber, the company’s artistic director. “Their expertise makes them deft handlers of this sensitive and extremely relevant subject. Heather wrote 9 Parts of Desire, an award-winning play based on her interviews with women in Iraq who survived the war. Tobin is a versatile composer of opera, theatre music and dance who has always shown a gift for the human voice. They are a perfect team for this project.”

As a key step in the development process, City Opera will mount a series of four workshops in Vancouver, starting in May 2011. Through these sessions, a process of testing and development, the new opera will be taken to a viable and performance-ready level. This new work is slated for completion in June 2012. Production funding for the opera will be separate from the commissioning grant announced today.

About the Annenberg Foundation (www.annenbergfoundation.org)

The Annenberg Foundation is a private family foundation that provides funding and support to nonprofit organizations in the United States and globally. Since 1989, it has generously funded programs in education and youth development; arts, culture and humanities; civic and community life; health and human services; and animal services and the environment. In addition, the Foundation and its Board of Directors are directly involved in the community with several projects that expand and complement its grant support to nonprofits. Among them are innovative nonprofit capacity building initiatives, the Annenberg Space for Photography, Explore, and the Metabolic Studio. The Annenberg Foundation exists to advance the public well being through improved communication. As the principal means of achieving this goal, the Foundation encourages the development of more effective ways to share ideas and knowledge.

About Explore (www.explore.org)

Led by founder Charles Annenberg Weingarten, the Explore Team embarks on fact-finding missions to meet the courageous leaders of the non-profit world and document their work through images and films. By sharing their knowledge, Explore seeks to connect people to extraordinary cultures and ideas. These expeditions also serve as a way to identify potential recipients for Annenberg Foundation grants.

NB:  We are pleased to advise that, for the purposes of these workshops,
“City Opera Vancouver engages, under terms of the Independent Theatre Agreement, professional Artists who are members of Canadian Actors’ Equity Association” — and to thank Equity for its help and cooperation in this endeavour.