New Opera: "Three Decembers"

By -

"Three Decembers", a new chamber opera by composer Jake Heggie and librettist Gene Scheer, opened a three-performance run on Thursday in UC Berkeley's Zellerbach Hall. This is the second opera by this pair, the first "Dead Man Walking" (2000) received rave reviews. Their most recent venture isn't doing as well.

Jeff Dunn, from San Francisco's Classical Voice says, "I longed for some decent melody. Almost all the melodic elements are merely accompaniment figures to pleasing though unmemorable arioso vocal lines. The only melody of significance, a cross between Faure’s Pavane and Pachelbel’s Canon, leaves little for the audience to whistle home about. This is a shame, because the libretto offers several opportunities for music to push rather than coddle its performers."

Josh Kosman, of the San Francisco Chronical, enjoyed the music but not the libretto, "Most striking is his (Heggie's) command of the rhythms of spoken English, and his ability to maneuver them deftly into the textures of the music. The vocal lines shift repeatedly from two beats to three and back again, always responding with winning ease to the demands of the text. And when he has the freedom to indulge his gift - as in a fizzy, funny waltz number about Maddy's obsession with shoes - the results are delightful. But Heggie's music can only go so far before it comes smack up against the bathos and dullness of the overall theatrical conception."

Sue Gilmore of the Contra Costa Times had this to say, "there is nothing of the grand sweep and scope of opera about it — no overtures, no arias, no spectacle. This is musical theater plain and simple, with librettist Gene Scheer's sung dialogue, almost always one note per syllable, dominating. In fact the orchestra, an 11-member ensemble that includes both Heggie and conductor Patrick Summers on separate pianos, plays right up there on stage with the three singers, Broadway style." While she later mentions liking the music, "Heggie's music, tuneful and pleasant, was quite clearly deployed in great service to the three voices," it didn't hit the mark the way she felt it should to really hold interest.

The concept of the opera is a glimpse at a mother-son relationship at 10 year intervals. Bernard Slade wrote "Same Time Next Year" which deals with a couple meeting every 10 years to have a one night stand. While it saw success both as a play and a movie, it's never been a story I thought did well. The characters are too distant in time segments for us to really get to know them and what we end up with is glimpses or shadows of a moment in time. Interesting concept, but not something that works theatrically.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Role of Music in Opera

By -
There are numerous books on the topic, and every composer, librettist, director, singer and audience member has their opinion as to what role the music should play in an opera. In a play without music, the words ought to support the meaning behind a character's actions. However, in the case of action movies, often times the action is what tells the story and there aren't words, just images to forward the plot. We might hear music to accompany action, build tension, but the action tells the story. Musicals tend to speak until the emotion of the moment just "has" to break out in song - unless it's something like "Mama Mia" where the dialog is the rails we travel on between songs; the songs themselves, written before the concept of the musical, are the focus of the production, while the story is secondary. Operas are a different beast. The music provides emotion to the words spoken, but it also plays the role of ambience when there is only action. In ...
Read more

Episode 210b: Joyeuse le départ

By -
Image
Podcast:  Play in new window  |  Download Subscribe:  Apple Podcasts  |  Android  |  Google Play  |  Stitcher  |  TuneIn  |  RSS Provost Cunningham has Transmigrated, but to where! What is Dr Sage going to do with his body? And how can she bring home her friends, Abigail and Erasmus, without also bring home Cunningham? What are they going to say when they find the “skeleton” she’s hiding in her closet? Cast: Eddie Louise Clark  as Dr Sage Chip Clark  as Professor Savant Justin Bremer  as the Narrator Emily Riley Piatt  as Abigail Entwhistle, Calypso & Dean Stewart Written by  Eddie Louise Theme music by  Unwoman Sound Design by  Chip Michael
Read more

Teaching Composition – What are we trying to achieve

By -
In the process of learning composition I have spent time with a number of instructors who have encouraged me to write twelve-tone, pitch-class, electro-acoustic and other forms of experimental techniques. No matter how much I might understand and appreciate the work of other composers in the genres, these are not forms of music I resonate with. They are simply not forms of music I listen to and I struggle with the idea of writing them. However, in a Master Class by Libby Larsen she made the comment, “Learn them all, because all forms of music have something to offer.” This I very much agree. There are elements of each of the above mentioned forms (and others) that I do resonate with. Berg’s Violin Concerto is a beautiful twelve-tone work, although it is possible to look at numerous sections of the music with a “tonal” analysis. Another composer friend, Gary Bachlund commented that using these techniques can narrow the choices for how to compose a piece of work. If you look at ...
Read more