4 ways that opera really is life

Editorial

The link between human behavior and art is so strong and so complicated that it's even an understatement to call it a "link" at all; art comes from humans, and humans are part and a product of our environments, natural and otherwise. There's a potential regression from La traviata to single-cell organisms, if you step back far enough.

Aria guides: Mi chiamano Mimì

How-To

Next up in our series of Aria Guides: Mimì's first aria from Puccini's infamous La bohème. The aria is Mimì's response to Rodolfo;s "Che gelida manina", and together, they form one of opera's most amazing moments of "getting to know you". Puccini's scores are rich in detail, and he doesn't leave much to the imagination. But along with your teachers and coaches, we can offer a few starting points as you get to work on this delicious bit of music.

The TFCO kicks off with Tolkien

News

David Day, author of A Tolkien Bestiary, will give a talk and discussion about the fantasy worlds of King Arthur and J. R. R. Tolkien's The Hobbit. Also on the docket are sneak peeks of two operas for young people, coming up later in the TFCO line-up, The Sword in the Schoolyard and The Hobbit, both by Canadian composer Dean Burry (The Brothers Grimm, The Bremen Town Musicians).

Singers: masters of illusions

How-to

There's no faking what opera singers do onstage. It's the result of legitimate hard work, and the staggering skills they show come precisely from not taking shortcuts or band-aid approaches to fixing problems. Real as it is, these artists have their bags of tricks. Singers, please forgive us for outing some of your little secrets...

Talking with singers: Bryan Register

Interview

"Physically, it feels like I'm doing my yoga practice in public, in front of an audience," Register laughs. Singers and yogis alike know how tricky it can be to find a comfortable balance of effort and ease. "I would equate a long, difficult phrase, to holding a difficult pose in yoga. You just have to breathe into it, accept it, you're not going to die."

Requiem on the South Bank

Review

From our place in history, with well over a century of hindsight, Verdi's Requiem can feel like a meta work; it's as though these beloved characters make a cameo, like a "operatic special", sharing the stage to perform a work that seems to evoke a first-person delivery by Verdi of these texts.

Talking with singers: Wallis Giunta

Interview

Canadian mezzo-soprano Wallis Giunta spoke to us from St. Louis, between performances of Angelina in La Cenerentola and Rossweise in Die Walküre, both at Oper Leipzig. She's also getting ready to sing Mercédès in Oper Frankfurt's Carmen in July, before returning to Toronto for the title role in Purcell's Dido and Aeneas at Opera Atelier in October.

John Fanning on The Pencil Salesman

Interview

June 25-July 3 the Westben Arts Festival Theatre presents the world premiere of Brian Finley's new opera, The Pencil Salesman. Canadian baritone John Fanning will sing the role of Boris, the inventor of the Personal Touch Typewriter, who develops a cynical relationship with the world's technological advancements. We chat with Fanning about playing a "Luddite", about working on a brand new opera, and about how technology dictates our own human interactions.

Violetta, haute couture, & sharing the opera stage with fashion

News

Combining fashion design and opera is like any use of cross-disciplinary art - it's about finding balance. Valentino wouldn't be a great choice for the costumes of Hänsel und Gretel, say, and perhaps Coppola wouldn't have been wise to choose a brand new work as her first foray into directing opera. Likewise, there's little room for homage to hip-hop in Dialoges des Carmélites, or to try adding the Can-Can in Wozzeck.

Royal Academy Opera's L'incoronazione di Poppea

Review

Most importantly, not a note can go by without meaning. Monteverdi is generous with hints; he's a master of word-painting, illuminating words like "sorrow" and "fly" with musical gestures that are almost too obvious to miss. Something like Poppea almost echoes that bit by George Carlin on the blues: paraphrased, he says, "it's not enough to know what notes to play, you have to know why they need to be played."