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Ghost Patrol is a one-act chamber opera in ???? scenes composed by Stuart MacRae to an English-language libretto by Louise Welsh. The opera is based on ???? and was co-commissioned by Scottish Opera and Music Theatre Wales. It's first performance was given on 30 August 2012 at the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh, conducted by Michael Rafferty and directed by Matthew Richardson. It has a running time of about 58 minutes and is scored for three singers accompanied by a small orchestra of 4 woodwind, 2 brass, percussion, harp and stings.[1]

Background

Kafka's harrowing story "In the Penal Colony" ("In der Strafkolonie") had previously been adapted as a play by Steven Berkoff in 1969. The choice to use it as the basis for an opera was Glass's, as was the creative team. He and his long-time collaborator and former wife JoAnne Akalaitis had worked on the idea on and off for three years before receiving a formal commission from ACT Theatre in Seattle. Akalaitis worked closely with the librettist, Rudy Wurlitzer, in adapting the story for the musical stage and directed the premiere production. Glass referred to the work as a "pocket opera" and had deliberately chosen the small-scale format of a chamber opera to increase the likelihood that it would be frequently performed.[2][3]

In Kafka's story, only two of the four characters speak, The Officer and The Visitor, whose roles in the opera are assigned to a bass-baritone and tenor respectively. As in the story, The Prisoner (who is about to be executed) and The Guard remain silent.[4] However, Akalaitis added a fifth character for the premiere production, Kafka himself, who serves as a narrator and onlooker.[5] The texts for the narration were chosen by Akalaitis from Kafka's diaries. The opera's music is played by a string quintet. In the original production, they appear as musicians from the penal colony where the story takes place and are costumed as a mixture of soldiers and civilians.[2]

Performance history

Rehearsal for the Swiss premiere of The Penal Colony at the Theater der Künste in Zürich, May 2011

The world premiere performance of the opera on 31 August 2000 at ACT Theatre was a co-production with the Court Theatre in Chicago who would stage it later that year. John Duykers, who had created the role of Mao Tse-tung in Adams's Nixon in China, was The Visitor, and Herbert Perry, who had created the role of Vasco da Gama in Glass's The White Raven was The Officer. Perry's identical twin brother, Eugene, alternated with him in the role. Andrew O. Johnson conducted the Metropolitan String Ensemble. The sets were designed by John Conklin, with costumes by Susan Hilferty and lighting by Jennifer Tipton.[5]

The Penal Colony ran at the ACT Theatre until 1 October. The production, directed by JoAnne Akalaitis with the same singers, opened in Chicago at the Court Theatre in December 2000. Its New York City premiere followed in June 2001 when it was performed by the Classic Stage Company.[3] The work premiered in France at the Opéra National de Lyon on 23 January 2009.[6] The UK premiere took place at the Linbury Studio Theatre in London's Royal Opera House on 15 September 2010. On that occasion, it was performed in a production by Music Theatre Wales who then took it on tour to several British cites.[7] It was given three performances in May 2011 at the Theater der Künste in Zürich as part of the Philip Glass Festival and had its Australian premiere at the National Institute of Dramatic Art's Parade Playhouse in Sydney on 7 April 2012.[8][9]

After the original Akalaitis production performed in Seattle, Chicago and New York City, subsequent ones have varied in terms of the number of non-speaking roles and the placement of the string ensemble. The Opéra National de Lyon production directed by Richard Brunel, added a second guard to the non-speaking roles.[6] The Music Theatre Wales production directed by Michael McCarthy eliminated the guard's role completely.[10] The Australian production directed by Imara Savage placed the ensemble off-stage and set the action in a hospital-like corridor.[9] None of these later productions used the Kafka narrator.

Roles

Role Voice type Premiere cast, 30 August 2012[11]
(Conductor: xxx yyy)
Sam, an ex-army sergeant tenor xxxx yyyy
Alasdair, an ex-army captain and pub landlord baritone xxxx yyyy
Vicki, an aspiring singer soprano xxx yyy

Synopsis

Setting: The remote island penal colony of a powerful but unnamed country in 1907 [12]

A high-ranking visitor arrives in the penal colony. He was invited there to witness the public execution of a prisoner using a strange machine which had been invented by the former commandant of the colony. The machine slowly carves a description of the condemned man's crimes into his flesh and after hours of excruciating torture eventually kills him. The device is operated by the current officer in charge of the prison who is utterly devoted to the machine and to the memory of the deceased commandant who had invented it. He is disturbed by the machine's state of disrepair and the growing criticism of its use, including criticism from the island's current commandant. He hopes that the visitor will be impressed by the machine and will speak in favour of its "redemptive powers" to the commandant. The visitor is appalled by the machine but sings "It's always risky interfering in other peoples' business [...] I oppose this procedure, but I will not intervene."[3] When the officer realizes that the visitor will not actively support him, he frees the condemned prisoner from the machine and climbs onto it himself, seeking the redemption of a slow and painful death. However, the machine goes haywire, and instead of killing him slowly, kills him almost instantly by piercing his skull. It then self-destructs. In the final scene, the visitor gets onto a boat and leaves the island.

Recording

  • Glass: In the Penal Colony – Michael Bennett (The Visitor), Omar Ebrahim (The Officer); Music Theatre Wales; Michael Rafferty (conductor). Recorded 27-28 October 2010. Label: Orange Mountain OMM0078[13]

References

  1. ^ Chester Novello. "Stuart MacRae: Ghost Patrol". Retrieved 13 March 2013.
  2. ^ a b Akalaitis, Joanne (10 June 2001). "Adapting the Horrors Of a Kafka Story To Suit Glass's Music". The New York Times. Retrieved 27 February 2013.
  3. ^ a b c Kinzer, Stephen (6 December 2000). "A Pocket-Size Opera From a Harrowing Kafka Story". The New York Times. Retrieved 27 February 2013.
  4. ^ In English translations of Kafka's original story, The Visitor is called "The Explorer", The Prisoner is called "The Condemned", and The Guard is called "The Soldier",
  5. ^ a b Ehren, Christine (31 August 2000). "Seattle's ACT Goes In the Penal Colony w/ Glass-Akalaitis World Premiere Aug. 31 – Oct. 1". Playbill. Retrieved 27 February 2013.
  6. ^ a b Opéra National de Lyon (2009). Dans la colonie pénitentiaire (Libretto and notes). Retrieved 27 February 2013 Template:Fr.
  7. ^ Church, Michael (16 September 2010). "In the Penal Colony, Music Theatre Wales, Linbury Theatre". The Independent. Retrieved 27 February 2013.
  8. ^ Zürcher Kammerorchester (16-22 May 2011). Philip Glass Festival, p. 2. Retrieved 27 February 2013 Template:De icon.
  9. ^ a b McCallum, Peter (9 April 2012). "Redemption, through Glass, darkly". The Age. Retrieved 27 February 2013.
  10. ^ Maddocks, Fiona (19 September 2010). "In the Penal Colony; Don Pasquale; La bohème/Euridice; Chilingirian Quartet". The Observer. Retrieved 27 February 2013.
  11. ^ Cite error: The named reference castref was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  12. ^ Unless otherwise indicated, synopsis based on Opéra National de Lyon (2009) and McCallum (9 April 2012).
  13. ^ Godfrey, Paul Corfield (12 March 2012). "Recording Review: In the Penal Colony Orange Mountain OMM0078". MusicWeb International. Retrieved 27 February 2012

Stanford Olsen

Stanford Olsen is an American operatic tenor.

Between 1986 and 1997 he performed over 160 times at the Metropolitan Opera, specialising in light lyrics role such as Count Almaviva in The Barber of Seville.[1].

He was educated at the University of Utah and the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. In 1986 he won the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions After retiring from full-time performance in the late 1990s he became a faculty member at the Florida State University's College of Music, where he is Professor of Voice and Lucille P. and Elbert B. Shelfer Eminent Scholar.[2] He continues to perform on the concert platform in addition to his teaching and coaching.

Career

A BFA graduate of Juilliard, she joined MOMIX in 1983 where she collaborated and performed with Moses Pendleton throughout the world for eight years. She choreographed and performed with Pilobolus, creating a number of pieces including "Television", "Return to Maria La Baja" and "Lands Edge" which remain in the repertoire, as well as with Marta Clarke including the "Garden of Earthly Delights", "Vienna: Lusthaus", "Wienna: Lusthaus Revisited", "Endangered Species" and "A Midsummer Night’s Dream."

Giobbi founded the Lisa Giobbi Movement Theatre when she was working on circus arts and dance with Circus Flora and working as a staff choreographer for the Big Apple Circus. Lisa Giobbi performed aerial work most notably at The Joyce Theatre in NY, La Scala in Milan, La Fenici in Venice as well as the Boston Dance Umbrella Aerial festivals, the Frequent Flyers Festival and the Santa Rosalia Festival in Palermo. She was a three-time guest artist in the Deutche Opera in Berlin.

Giobbi has created choreography for films including What Dreams May Come and Temptesta and for independent films, music videos, commercials, fashion shows (Victoria’s Secret 2000, 2001, and 2003 runway shoes), benefits, television specials, cabaret theatre, gala presentations and rock cocerts (2005 Amsterjam). Her Off-Broadway theatrical productions include David Rabe’s "Those the River Keep" and David Lynch’s "Industrial Symphony #1". Giobbi has been nominated for M.T.V. choreographer awards for videos such as Gloria Estefan and Tommy Lee’s "Hold Me Down", among others. Her work has been presented in Variety Teatre at the Wintergarten Variety in Berlin, the Apollo in Dusseldorf and the Friedrichbau in Stuttgart. She has toured excerpts from the “Falling Angels” show throughout Europe in collaboration with the British band the Tiger Lilies in "The Tiger Lilies Circus".

Roles performed at the Metropolitan Opera

Opera Role Performances First performance Last performance
I Puritani Arturo 6 1986 1997
Rigoletto Borsa 15 1986 1989
La Traviata Gastone 9 1987 1988
L'elisir d'amore Nemorino 14 1988 1996
Lucia di Lammermoor Arturo 17 1988 1989
Il tabarro Song Seller 4 1989 1989
Barber of Seville Count Almaviva 20 1989 1995
Die Entführung aus dem Serail Belmonte 5 1990 1991
Der Rosenkavalier Italian Tenor 20 1990 1995
Don Giovanni Don Ottavio 28 1990 1997
Semiramide Idreno 7 1990 1993
Falstaff Fenton 6 1992 1996
La Fille du Régiment Tonio 3 1994 1994
Die Fledermaus Alfred 5 1995 1995

References

  1. ^ Metropolitan Opera archives
  2. ^ Florida State University website

Grant Doyle

Grant Doyle (born in Adelaide) is an Australian operatic baritone.

Biography

Doyle studied at the Royal College of Music and was then a member of the Young Artists Programme at the Royal Opera House,[1] where he played Tarquinius in The Rape of Lucretia in the Linbury Studio Theatre.[2]

With Opera North he has played Sasha in Paradise Moscow,[3] Albert in Werther[4] and Robin Oakapple/Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd in Ruddigore.[5]

With the State Opera of South Australia he has played Starbuck in Moby Dick,[6] Count Almaviva in The Marriage of Figaro[7] and Zurga in The Pearl Fishers.[8]

In 2012 he will play Figaro in English Touring Opera's Barber of Seville.[9]

References

Table

Nadal 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012
Australian Open 4R A QF SF W QF QF F
French Open W W W W 4R W W W
Wimbledon 2R F F W A W F 2R
US Open 3R QF 4R SF SF W F
Federer 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010
Australian Open 4R W SF W W SF F W
French Open 1R 3R SF F F F W QF
Wimbledon W W W W W F W QF
US Open 4R W W W W W F SF
Sampras 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000
Australian Open SF W F 3R W QF SF
French Open QF QF 1R SF 3R 2R 2R 1R
Wimbledon W W W QF W W W W
US Open W 4R W W 4R SF F
Borg 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981
Australian Open 3R A A A A A A A
French Open W W QF A W W W W
Wimbledon 3R QF W W W W W F
US Open 2R SF F 4R F QF F F

table

Rank Player Win F SF QF
1 Federer 17 7 8 5
3 Nadal 11 5 3 4
2 Djokovic 5 3 8 5
9 Del Potro 1 0 1 4
4 Murray 0 4 6 3
6 Tsonga 0 1 3 4
7 Berdych 0 1 1 3
5 Ferrer 0 0 4 5
10 Almagro 0 0 0 3
8 Tipsarevic 0 0 0 1
11 Isner 0 0 0 1
12 Simon 0 0 0 1

references

  1. ^ Agent's website
  2. ^ Guardian review
  3. ^ The Stage review
  4. ^ Independent review
  5. ^ http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2011/oct/03/ruddigore-opera-north-review Guardian review]
  6. ^ ABC photo
  7. ^ Australian Stage review
  8. ^ Adelaide Now review
  9. ^ The Stage listings

Category:Living people Category:Australian baritones Category:Australian opera singers Category:Operatic baritones

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