Multicultural Season

Opera Festival of New Jersey takes on Italian, Russian and German works for its 20th anniversary season.

By: Ilene Dube

"image"
Figaro


(Daniel Belcher) plots with Rosina (Margaret Lattimore) in Opera Festival
of New Jersey’s 2002 production of The Barber of Seville. Yali-Marie
Williams as Violetta in OFNJ’s 2002 productions of La Traviata.


   Operagoers will have a chance to travel the world this summer,
when Opera Festival of New Jersey performs L’Italiana in Algeri (sung in
Italian), Eugene Onegin (sung in Russian) and Wozzeck (sung in German).
All three are tales of love, loss and jealousy.
   Gioacchino Rossini’s L’Italiana (performed June 29-July
17) is commedia dell’arte set to music, written when the composer was 21. The
Italian woman of the title is Isabella, who loves Lindoro, a fellow Italian, and
is in turn loved by Mustafa, the bey of Algiers. Elvira, the bey’s wife, is feeling
unloved by her husband, so he sends her away for complaining so much. Mustafa
plans to give Elvira away to Lindoro, who longs for Isabella. In the end, Isabella
tricks Mustafa and she and Lindoro set sail for their homeland.
   Eugene Onegin (July 1-18), based on a novel in verse
by Alexander Pushkin, is one of 10 operas Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky wrote. With
soaring emotional music, it is full of longing. Tatiana, a young woman who is
wrapped up in the fantasies of her novels, becomes enamored of Onegin, the worldly
friend of the poet Lenski. Lenski, in turn, is the suitor of Tatiana’s sister,
Olga. After Lenski pours forth his love to Olga, Tatiana decides to reveal her
passion to Onegin in the form of a letter. Onegin admits he is touched by the
letter but advises her to control her emotions; he is not ready for marriage.
Jealousy erupts when Onegin dances with Olga, and Lenski challenges Onegin to
a duel. Lenski loses his life to Onegin, who returns years later, in love with
Tatiana, who has by now married another.
   Wozzeck (July 8-19), by Alban Berg after Georg Buchner’s
play, Woyzeck, is considered one of the outstanding, if controversial,
20th-century operas. The composer himself wrote, "However thorough one’s knowledge
of the musical forms which are to be found within the opera… everyone should
be filled only by the idea of the opera, an idea which far transcends the individual
fate of Wozzeck." It is a drama of un-heroism, of senseless accident, the tragedy
of a poor, harassed common soldier — Wozzeck says virtue is a luxury in which
the poor do not indulge — who kills the mother of his illegitimate child
and then drowns himself.
   Supplementing the performances this year will be lectures, a
symposium and art exhibition, and a concert. "There will be something going on
almost every night," says OFNJ Artistic Director David Agler, a Canadian who spends
16 weeks of the year in Princeton for the festival, held at McCarter Theatre.
   "Singers come to sing, not sit around for days between performances,"
he says, explaining his decision to condense the festival season from five to
three weeks. "When performances are spread out, it’s hard to keep the energy and
quality together." The shorter season also will give a more festival atmosphere
to OFNJ’s 20th anniversary season.
   Set designers have taken the turnaround into consideration.
In fact, Erhard Rom is designing the sets for both L’Italiana and Eugene
Onegin. "The condensed season will require extra hours for teching and dressing
performers," Mr. Agler says.
   Planning the season begins more than a year in advance. Mr.
Agler, who is in his second season with OFNJ, was already thinking about summer
2003 in November 2001, and is presently planning the 2005 season. "There are a
lot of elements that go into selecting the (operas)," he says. "It’s not just
picking your three favorites. I look to see what the New York City Opera is offering,
and what can be seen in Philadelphia. Since ours is a festival, I want to offer
something different, special, unique, intense."
   The season must include variety. L’Italiana, Eugene
Onegin and Wozzeck are all premieres for OFNJ, and it is the first
time the company has performed a Russian opera.
   Throughout the year, as Mr. Agler conducts — four to five
symphony concerts and as many operas, with at least one production in Europe —
he thinks about roles for which singers might be well suited. When he gets a critical
mass of performers interested in one piece, that becomes the choice.
   "Once we decide on the repertory and know what singers are available,
we balance a Rossini comedy, for example, with a romantic opera and a modern one,"
says Mr. Agler, a Westminster Choir College alumnus.
   Some productions are done in collaboration with other opera
companies. L’Italiana will travel to Boston in 2004, and Wozzeck is
a co-production with the Pacific Opera. Sometimes the sets will be built in Montreal,
for example, because of the weak Canadian dollar, but this year two of the sets
will be built in Virginia. Wozzeck’s set will be built on Vancouver Island, then
shipped in two trucks.
   "Some people ask, ‘Why do a difficult 20th-century opera?’"
posits Mr. Agler. "Many believe ‘Wozzeck’ is the greatest opera of the 20th century.
It’s an important work that was never done in Princeton, it has critical interest,
and I was able to secure a marvelous cast and a partner to co-produce it.
   "It can be a searing and dramatic experience," he continues.
"But it requires the public to engage itself and concentrate and participate as
much as the performers — you cannot sit back and let the music wash over
you. People will be well served to read the libretto."
   Interestingly, OFNJ has an anonymous benefactor who underwrites
the performance of a modern opera every year. Wozzeck was originally composed
for an orchestra of 90, but 90 musicians would never fit into the pit at McCarter
Theatre, so Mr. Agler was able to secure the American rights to perform it with
44 musicans.
   Mr. Agler, who once taught at Westminster Choir College and
served as organist and choirmaster at All Saints Church in Princeton, has recently
been directing the score for a major motion picture. Working with the Toronto
Symphony and tenor Richard Margison, Mr. Agler had to have the music laid down
first, before the film was edited, so the lip-syncing could be added.
   "It’s a fascinating project, a totally different world," he
says. He looks forward to returning to it when the festival comes to its end.
Opera Festival of New Jersey will perform L’Italiana in Algeri June
29, 2 p.m.; July 5, 11, 8 p.m.; July 15, 17, 7:30 p.m.; Eugene Onegin July
1, 10, 7:30 p.m.; July 6 2 p.m.; July 12, 18, 8 p.m.; Wozzeck July 8, 7:30
p.m.; July 13, 2 p.m.; July 19, 8 p.m. Single tickets cost $25-$90; subscriptions
$80-$243. Performances take place at McCarter Theatre, 91 University Place, Princeton.
Wozzeck: The Play — the Opera — Past and Present, a symposium in
collaboration with the Princeton University Art Museum, will be held July 8, 4-7
p.m. The Art Museum will exhibit artwork from turn-of-the-20th-century Austrian
and German artists. Tickets, including the performance, cost $50. In the Shadow
of Mahler, a concert of arias and songs to complement the Wozzeck period,
will be performed July 16, 7:30 p.m. Tickets cost $20. Pre-performance lectures
in Scheide Hall, Princeton Theological Seminary, June 29, July 6, 13, 12:45 p.m.;
July 1, 10, 15, 17, 6:15 p.m.; July 5, 11-12, 18-19, 6:45 p.m. Tickets cost $5
For information, call (609) 919-1003. OFNJ on the Web: www.operafest.org