The Hungry Monster that is Opera

“Opera is an omnivore and can eat everyone alive.” Anne Bogart at VOX 2009

At VOX 2009, I had the pleasure of hearing George Steel, the new general director of New York City Opera, moderate a panel of prestigious artists involved with the making of new operas on May 2, 2009. Steele, who seems to be embracing new American opera with culinary gusto (he said he had just consumed Elise Kirke’s wonderful reference book American Opera), started the discussion with the preternatural question, What is opera?








Who were the panelists? Let’s start there.

Mark Adamo is composer librettist of Little Women and Lysistrata.

Eve Beglarian, characterized as post minimalist composer. Her work has been performed by Bang on a Can All-Stars, The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and others. She approaches music from all timeframes and styles and is considered in your face, outrageous, and intellectual.

Anne Bogart is an award-winning dramatic director who made her debut directing opera through the work of composer Deborah Drattell.

Carlisle Floyd is composer librettist of many operas including Susannah, Of Mice and Men, and Cold Sassy Tree.

Nico Muhly, known as a wunderkind composer (he was born in 1981), he is working under commission from the Metropolitan Opera on his first operatic project with Craig Lucas.

Quotable lines from this panel discussion:

“Performing arts is about changing time.” Anne Bogart

(I agree and think that is why any artist pursues his work – to get some control over the speed at which our lives go by and to help our audience experience what is happening right at this moment.)

“We listen faster (in opera).” Mark Adamo

(The operatic experience brings life into warp speed so that we can experience the full compliment of activities from birth to death. Yet the performance of opera can make time slow down so we can take in a whole life time.)

“The operatic story is ruled by the emotional content of the music.” Carlisle Floyd

(The music helps clarify and deepen a story.)

“In opera, the story has to be the right size.” Nico Muhly

(Everything in the arts is a question of balance.)

“Don’t worry about whether it is an opera. Anyone asking doesn’t matter.” Nico Muhly

(There is a lot of debate about what constitute an opera. Muhly’s advice to a question from the VOX audience was if the creators say the work is an opera, it is an opera.)

According to Floyd, the libretto contributes 60% to the success of an opera. He also said you would think that the playwright is the artist best suited for writing opera libretti but he thinks that poets can better adapt themselves to the job.

Because I am weighing the idea of creating a new libretto based on the same source text for existing music, the panel seemed a timely bit of counsel. I will add that Carlisle Floyd was skeptical that one could effectively rework the music to good effect because he feels the libretto provides the inspiration. Another Steiny Road challenge for me.

High Noon at the Library of Congress

National Poetry Month has begun with a lot of fanfare for the Steiny Road Poet. First was the WOM-PO reading at the National Museum of Women in the Arts.

Next, April 7 was the 15th Anniversary Reunion Reading of Poetry at Noon series at the Library of Congress. I was one of 27 poets to read. It should have been 28 – Greg McBride I saw you last night at Café Muse and Judy McCombs did a shout out to you to come to the mic if you were hiding behind the celebration cake. I hope all is well with you.

Beginning with Nan Fry who was the first Poetry at Noon reader, the quick succession of readers to the mic was quite a survey of styles and subject matter. Nearly everyone knew each other and so there was an energetic exchange of greetings and news. A hearty thank you to poet Patricia Gray who started and continues to run this important program in our Nation’s Capital. And by the way, George Bilgere was right to expect the President—Barack and Michelle Obama should be invited to EVERY reading on the LOC schedule.

Here is the list of readers:
Karren Alenier
Nancy Arbuthnot
Cliff Bernier
George Bilgere
Jody Bolz
Kenny Carroll
Grace Cavalieri
John Clarke
Nan Fry
David Gewanter
Barbara Goldberg
Patricia Gray
Erich Hintze
Reuben Jackson
Hiram Larew
Lyn Lyfshin
David McAleavy
Greg McBride
Judith McCombs
Miles Moore
Yvette Moreno
Jean Nordhaus
Linda Pastan
Heddy Reid
Kim Roberts
Marty Sanchez Lowery
Rosemary Winslow
Kathi Wolfe
Edwin Zimmerman

Letters to the World: Meet the WOMPOnies

On April 5, 2009, the National Museum of Women in the Arts hosted a celebration reading of Letters to the World: Poems from the Wom-Po Listserv edited by Moira Richards, Rosemary Starace, and Lesley Wheeler. The 452-page anthology nicknamed the WOMPOlogy contains poems from 258 women and one man. Yes, the WOMen's POetry Listserv allows men as long as they talk about women in poetry or women's poetry.

The creation of the book, with a preface by Annie Finch—the founder of the WOM-PO and an introduction by D'Arcy Randall, is a study in an unusual collaboration. The egalitarian process took much longer than anyone predicted but everyone agreed the results were worth the wait. In my experience with creating anthologies (I have edited two: Whose Woods These are, I was the sole editor, and Winners: A Retrospective of the Washington Prize, I was co-editor with Hilary Tham and Miles David Moore), they always take longer than you originally plan.

While there are poets from five countries represented in the anthology, the gathering in DC brought WOMPOnies from such American states as California, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, DC, and the greater DC area of Maryland and Virginia. On a beautiful spring day during the peak of blossoming cherry trees and its annual festival, the NMWA auditorium was respectably occupied and the audience attentive. After all, the the National Museum of Women in the Arts is a prestigious space and place for women's voices to be heard.

The featured readers included Rosemary Starace, Lesley Wheeler, Kim Roberts, Julie Enzer, and Rosemary Winslow. Eleven other WOMPOnies read from the anthology including some like me who joined the WOMPO listserv after the call for Letters to the World had ended. The event was a grand opportunity to meet women poets, put faces to names known on the WOM-PO listserv, and display our books along side the new anthology.

The bottom line is buy the book and join the WOM-PO listserv now. You will not find a warmer and more welcoming community anywhere in our world. I love the blend of cyber and real world contact. Wherever I go, I make a point to meet WOMPOnies.

The Epiphanies of Celebrating Four Saints in Three Acts

Having given herself nearly one month to reflect on the outcomes of celebrating the 75th anniversary of Gertrude Stein’s and Virgil Thomson’s Four Saints in Three Acts, the Steiny Road Poet is still basking in the energy of the over-capacity crowd that showed up at the CUNY Graduate Center’s Elebash Recital Hall to experience Encompass New Opera Theatre’s concert version of the experimental opera that still puzzles and delights. Who would have thought that in only a year’s time, a celebration of such magnitude could successfully come together? The celebration included:
• A film screening—Steven Watson’s Prepare for Saints based on his book Prepare for Saints: Gertrude Stein, Virgil Thomson, and the Mainstreaming of American Modernism.
• Five talks done by a cubistic set of esteemed speakers—a cultural historian (Watson), a poet-librettist (Karren Alenier), a composer-orchestral arranger (Charles Fussell), an American art historian (Wanda Corn), and a theater director who was mentored by Virgil Thomson (Nancy Rhodes).
• A culminating panel that included all of the speakers and composer Scott Wheeler who was a student of Virgil Thomson.
• An exhibition of Stein memorabilia from the collection of Hans Gallas.
• A video film interview by Steven Watson of Virgil Thomson.
• Book selling of selected titles by Bluestockings Bookstore.
• Production of Four Saints that included a cast of 24 performers and an orchestra of 16 musicians.
• A post-production talk back that included the stage and music directors, two singers from the cast, the cultural historian who documented Four Saints, and two composer who had worked closely with Virgil Thomson.
• Special guest David Vaughan, the biographer of Frederick Ashton, the choreographer of the original Four Saints production.
• A modest wine reception.
• Financial support from two major organizations—City University New York (thanks to the sponsorship of Dr. Frank Hentschker, Director of Programs at the Martin E. Segal Center of The CUNY Graduate Center) and the Virgil Thomson Foundation (thanks to the sponshorship by the Foundation’s Board member Charles Fussell)—and many private individuals.
• Advance publicity from The New York Times by a senior music critic.

THE WORK OF THE ACCIDENTAL CATALYST

What was the role of the Steiny Road Poet? Besides serving as the accidental catalyst that started the celebration ball rolling, she was responsible for suggesting and enlisting the cooperation of most of the principal participants, including Nancy Rhodes who became a significant partner in developing the daylong festival. The Poet also coordinated:
the details of the afternoon program, such as
• The order of the speakers.
• How long they would speak.
• Who would introduce them.
• How the Q&A period would proceed.
• When the speakers needed to show up.
• What information they needed to be successful.

Additionally, she
• Kept in contact with the speakers.
• Collected their bios.
• Prepared their introductions.
• Made sure Hans Gallas stayed connected to the CUNY staff who would provide the locked display cabinets.
• Interfaced with the CUNY staff such as Jan Stenzel and Siobhan Glennon who prepared the publicity and the program brochure.
• Lobbied for a small reception after the event.
• Reassured the director when her job load seemed unappreciated and too heavy to bear.

Thank you, Frank Hentschker! The Poet considered the libations and the NY Times publicity divine intervention.

OF SLIPPERY SLIDES AND BOOKMARKS

If there could have been one element that could have turned out better, it was getting a little more support for the audio-visual presentation of two slide shows (the bottom lines of the Poet’s slides were not seen because of last minute change of software needed for the art slide show by Wanda Corn and Professor Corn’s slides were somewhat distorted.) Nonetheless, the auditorium was 60 to 70 percent filled for most of the speaking sessions and only one person (who was unable to get back into the auditorium for the opera performance) complained about some of the talks not meeting his expectations.

Someone—was that you, Roger Cunningham of Encompass New Opera Theatre?—decided on the fly to give departing audience members The Steiny Road to Operadom bookmark as an entrance ticket to the evening performance. While not many books were sold, surely among those audience members carrying the Poet’s bookmark were potential future buyers. This was another little glitch in the management of the event. Not everyone who attended the afternoon session was able to identify him- or herself and therefore didn’t get into the auditorium for the evening program. The Poet rescued a woman with a cane whom she encountered in the restroom. The woman lacked a bookmark, but had been in the afternoon sessions and so the Poet walked her around the crowd into the auditorium and felt darn good for doing that.

MISSING THE EYES

One regret was that the Poet was unable to get to New York for the dress rehearsal, which would have been the right time for photo ops. Oh, to capture the eyes of Eve Gigliotti as as the Commère, Laura Choi Stuart as Saint Teresa, and Roland Burks as Saint Ignatius. However, there were videographers enlisted by Steven Watson to shoot archival footage. The Poet hasn’t heard anything yet about this, but expects to see it at some point in the near future. The Poet said all along this celebration would go down in the history of American opera as a significant event and the archival footage should ensure that. And yes, the Poet asked for a closed circuit monitor for the exhibition hall in case there was an overwhelming crowd with a battering ram. As it was, dear beleaguered Dr. Hentshker had to schlep an old monitor from his home so that the singers could see the conducting directions from maestro Mara Waldman.

WHAT ARMIES AND PERFORMERS DO TO STAY ALIVE

What kept the Poet calm during this exciting day? She was lucky enough to have shelter from a friend in the neighborhood of the CUNY Graduate Center, a seven-minute walk so she could check on the last minute details in the morning. Ellen Rappaport, a new friend had organized a lunch at Ali Babba’s, the Poet’s favorite Turkish Restaurant, which kept her nourished until the short break between the afternoon and evening events. Then some more of her friends—composer Janet Peachey, poet-librettist Nathalie Anderson, dramaturg Maxine Kern—joined her at the CUNY Graduate Center’s café while she ate a little vegetarian fare (okra stew and rice, yum!). And after, this time for sure thanks to Roger Cunningham, the triumphant Nancy Rhodes, Mara Waldman (Encompass music director), singer Roland Burks (St. Ignatius), Frank Hentschker, Hans Gallas, Steven Watson, his videographers, several people associated with the new music orchestra Ionisation, Norman Carey (director of the CUNY Graduate Center Doctor of Musical Arts performance program and Nadine Carey (she was in the Four Saints chorus and both she and her husband Norman have worked with Nancy Rhodes in the past on Encompass productions) and the Poet all leaned in to toast the production and the events that led up to it at Brendan’s Bar and Grill. More good food eaten there. Armies and performers definitely travel by what goes into the stomach. Good food helps produce good results.

Then with the spirits of Gertrude Stein and Virgil Thomson lighting the way, the Poet, thinking about how a February 2008 production of In Circles, a musical by the late Reverend Al Carmines based on Stein’s A Circular Play: A Play in Circles was the genesis of the Four Saints celebration, walked the few blocks home to her friend’s condo and fell deliriously into bed like a heavy log.

Raising Four Saints in the 21st Century

Before the moment flees, the Steiny Road Poet wants to clarify—she only raised one saint and his name is Ivan. The Saints under discussion here are the ones Gertrude Stein created for Virgil Thomson so they could have an opera together: Four Saints in Three Acts. That opera premiered on Broadway February 20, 1934, and that is what the Poet will be celebrating with her dear friends and colleagues Nancy Rhodes, artistic director of Encompass New Opera Theatre, and Frank Hentschker, director of the Martin E. Segal Theatre of the Graduate School of City University New York, on February 20, 2009, at CUNY’s Graduate Center.


THE COST OF FREE

The 2009 celebration of the 75th anniversary of Four Saints will be gloriously free to the public. The public, that means you, Dear Reader, must come early to claim a seat because after the 180 seats in Elebash Recital are filled, there will be no seeing the historic 50-minute oratorio version Nancy is producing with Roland Burks as St. Ignatius, Laura Choi Stuart as Theresa, Eve Gigliotti as Commère, and Nils Neubert as St. Chavez and St. Stephen.



At the 2009 Encompass New Opera Theatre party, I heard Roland Burks sing the joyful “Pigeons on the Grass, Alas” segment of the opera (there are no arias in Four Saints—it’s an equal opportunity opera) and my heart nearly broke open with excitement and spiritual lift. If you cannot come early, I recommend you contact Encompass and donate $100 so a seat can be reserved for you. The money is needed to pay the small orchestra that will enhance Virgil Thomson’s settings of Gertrude Stein’s poetry.

MORE STEIN IN 2011

All the photos from that fundraising party can be seen in the slideshow currently installed in the upper left-hand column of this blog. Seen at the opera party was American art historianWanda Corn who will be speaking at the 75th anniversary celebration in the afternoon on what Stein’s operas did for this early Modernist who now folks say is a Post-Modernist as well. Go, Gertrude! Professor Corn, who is currently teaching for one semester at CUNY’s Graduate Center, will be curating an art show that is a cultural study of Stein’s friendships and partnerships with other artists during the period between the two great wars (WWI & WWII). That show entitled “Seeing Gertrude Stein” will open in San Francisco at the Contemporary Jewish Museum and run from May to September 2011. The show will move to the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC (Fall 2011). Wouldn’t it be swell if Gertrude Stein Invents a Jump Early On could be featured along with this art exhibition?

PHILISTINE, SAINT OR STEINIAN—BUY BOOKS

OK, so come hear the Steiny Road Poet talk about why Four Saints in Three Acts remains the most important American opera at CUNY’s Graduate Center 3 pm on February 20. Be a saint and bring your checkbook so you can buy The Steiny Road to Operadom: The Making of American Operas and Steven Watson’s book Prepare for Saints: Gertrude Stein, Virgil Thomson, and the Mainstreaming of American Modernism. Steven will be airing his film based on his book and original film footage from the 1934 production of Four Saints (2 pm). If you don’t get into the Elebash Hall at 6:30 pm, you will be able to see the Hans Gallas Gertrude Stein collection.