Libiamo!: Opera’s Love Affair with Booze

"This opera has quite a structured palate, with a long finish, but do you find the nose lacks complexity?" A second-half season preview from our chorister couple Scott & Lianne in their own, inimitable style.

Patrick Carfizzi as Frank, Michael Fabiano as Alfred and Susanna Phillips as Rosalinde in Strauss' Die Fledermaus. Photo by Ken Howard/ Metropolitan Opera.

By Lianne Coble-Dispensa & Scott Dispensa

If, amidst the tsunami of the weekend's various political activities, you missed the live HD broadcast of Bartlett Sher's inspired production of Gounod's Romeo et Juliette, fear not! There will be an encore broadcast in movie theaters around the country on Wednesday, January 25th at 6:30pm. And, of course, you'll have 7 more opportunities to witness the “white hot sensuality and impassioned lyricism” (New York Times) of Vittorio Grigolo and Diana Damrau live at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City (the show closes on March 18th).  

One might say this could be a cause for celebration! At least, Scott & I seem to think so. And when we celebrate, the first thing that comes to mind is wine. And, of course, why shouldn’t it? Opera and alcohol have maintained a friendly relationship throughout the centuries. Think of the operas with delightfully raucous party scenes: La Traviata, Die Fledermaus, Otello, The Merry Widow, Cavalleria Rusticana, and even Roméo et Juliette! 

So, to pair with this sumptuous piece, we recommend a wine from the region closest to Verona, where Romeo & Juliette is set: namely, an intensely-flavored, dark-hued Amarone della Valpolicella. If you’re interested in a little nosh to go with your tipple, some asiago cheese (or pecorino romano) drizzled with a little bit of honey will do the trick!

Emily Pulley as Valencienne and Paul Groves as Camille in Lehar's "The Merry Widow." Photo: Ken Howard/ Metropolitan Opera

If you couldn’t tell already, Scott & I love wine (particularly Scott). When we’re not at the Metropolitan Opera rehearsing, staging, or performing one of the 24 operas that feature the chorus, we’re often home drinking wine, talking about wine, going to wine tastings, planning wine-centric summer vacations to Napa or France, or maintaining our (very humble) wine cellar. Scott also has a soft spot for in-the-weeds, educational wine tomes. The books on his bedside table include (and I’m not kidding) “The Complete Bordeaux”, “The Oxford Companion to Wine”, and “A Wine & Food Guide to the Loire”.

I swear, we do have other hobbies.

At any rate, at this point in the year, we have 11 more chorus shows to open, 2 shows that are making their return to the schedule after a small hiatus (Don Giovanni & Aida), and one show (Werther) that doesn’t include chorus, but deserves mention anyway since it’s absolutely gorgeous and worth the trip. So, we’ve taken the liberty to offer you a wine (or alcohol) pairing for each of the 14 shows that are left this season. Enjoy a pre-theater glass, or hit the pub after the show. Either way, enjoy yourselves responsibly. Cheers!

Carmen

Opens: January 19th

What to Drink:

While the story itself is fairly dark, the joyous effervescence of the music would pair well with pair with a nice glass of Cava, Spain’s famous sparkling wine.

Rigoletto

George Gagnidze in the title role of Verdi's Rigoletto. Photo by Richard Termine/ Metropolitan Opera.

Opens: January 20th

What to Drink:

Verdi originally intended the character of Rigoletto to be the court jester of Mantua, in Italy. If we were going for a traditional pairing, we’d offer a nice Nebbiolo from one of Barbaresco’s traditional producers in the Lombardy region of Italy.

However, since the Met’s production has set the story in decadent, overtly masculine 1960s Las Vegas, we were thinking you might enjoy this performance with a nice Canadian Club & soda. Or, heck, a martini.

Rusalka

Opens: February 2nd

What to Drink:

It’s not too often that one gets to see an opera written by a Czech composer, in the Czech language, AND based on a Czech fairytale! So, we recommend jumping headlong into a glass of pilsner, which originated in the town of Pilsen (a city that was originally located in the Austrian Republic, but is now part of the Czech Republic)!

Better yet, try a traditional Czech drink called the Beton: a mixture of the Czech Republic’s famous liquor, Becherovka (a potent bitter said to help digestion), and tonic water.

I Puritani

Opens: February 10th

What to Drink:

The Puritans of Plymouth weren’t big fans of “the sauce”, so we’ll encourage you to abstain from the sampling of spirits to get yourself in the right mindset for this opera.

Lianne suggests a non-alcoholic Cape Cod cocktail! While vodka is often an ingredient, you can leave that out and simply mix cranberry juice and lime juice with club soda. Ah, a beverage even a Puritan could appreciate.

Werther

Opens: February 16th, 2017

What to Drink:

This achingly beautiful story of unattainable love is set in the town of Wetzlar, Germany, which isn’t too far from the border of France. So, Scott was thinking that a Pinot Gris from Zind-Humbrecht would do nicely. The sweetness or dryness of Zind-Humbrecht wines varies greatly between vintages, which is why they created a Sweetness Index ranging between 1-5. So, if you’re looking for a wine to pair with the first act, go with a 5. If you’re looking for something drier and more austere to pair with the final few acts, then go with a 1.

Sonya Yoncheva as Violetta in Verdi's La Traviata. Photos by Ken Howard/ Metropolitan Opera.

La Traviata

Opens: February 24th

What to Drink:

Could the ideal pairing be champagne? Si, certo! Violetta, the star of the show, loves a proper party, so libiamo!

Idomeneo

Opens: March 6th

What to Drink:

Scott & Lianne are, admittedly, not well-versed in the wines of Greece (or, more specifically, Crete, where Idomeneo’s story is set.). We are even less knowledgeable about what the royalty were drinking in 1200 B.C. Just putting that out there. Nevertheless, we can get creative and offer you a taste of Retsina, a Greek white (or rosé) resinated wine. Resinated, by the way, means that the wine was fermented with small pieces of pine resin, creating a truly unique palate. Retsina has been part of Greece’s drinking history for at least 2000 years, so that’s as close as we’re going to get to the days of Idomeneo. If you don’t feel like being that adventurous, enjoy a chilled glass of ouzo with a hefty mezedakia platter.

Fidelio

Opens: March 16th

What to Drink:

Scott & Lianne diverted WILDLY on their ideas for alcohol pairings with Fidelio, Beethoven’s operatic masterpiece (and, incidentally, the only opera he wrote). Scott, with his extensive knowledge of wine, thought Beethoven’s Austrian background meant a pairing with a nice, full-bodied, mineral-y glass of Riesling. Lianne, considering that the setting of the opera is in a prison, felt that the more appropriate beverage would be a mug of Prison Wine, preferably fermented in a garbage bag under one’s cot, and chugged quickly before the guards catch you. Though she also maintains that, since the prison is located in Spain, a nice Rioja could work. So, you know… you have choices. Who are we to judge?

Eugene Onegin

Bill Irwin as Frosch in J. Strauss' "Die Fledermaus." Photo: Ken Howard/Metropolitan Opera.

Opens: March 30th

What to Drink:

Lianne & Scott were torn on what was more appropriate for this opulent Russian classic. Do we pour out a couple shots of Russian Standard vodka, or go with a nice glass of champagne? Lest we forget, the Russian aristocracy of the 18th and 19th centuries were heavily influenced by French culture. So we’d say go with your gut: if you’re feeling rustic, then enjoy your vodka. If you’re feeling fancy, pour yourself a glass of bubbly. Either way, За здоровье!

Aida

Returns: March 23rd

What to Drink:

Ah, Aida. Let’s cheerfully ignore the fact that this opera is set in Egypt, and focus on the juicy parts: Aida is a grand, opulent show, written by an Italian composer, sung in Italian, full of Italian bravado, big voices, and a cast of thousands! (Well, maybe just hundreds.) Keeping these things in mind, Scott & I think a beefy, knock-you-off-your-feet Barolo would be the way to go to celebrate the glories of Egitto!

Der Rosenkavalier

Opens: April 13th

What to Drink:

Just because our production of Der Rosenkavalier features some luxury casting (Renee Fleming, Elīna Garanča, and Erin Morley in the 3rd act trio?! Come ON. Bliss.) doesn’t mean you must splurge on a luxury wine! We’ll be looking at Viennese offerings, since our director, Robert Carsen, has set the scene in Vienna in the early 1900s. There are several delicious Viennese wines that won’t break the bank. Why not try a light, perfume-y Grüner Veltliner? Or, take a chance on a glass of Blaufränkisch, an Austrian red varietal which can be rich and full-bodied, with notes of spice.

Simon Keenlyside in the title role of Thomas' "Hamlet." Photo: Marty Sohl/Metropolitan Opera.

Don Giovanni

Returns: April 26th

What to Drink:

The Spanish legend of Don Juan (or, in Italian, Don Giovanni), the fictional womanizing hedonist, deserves to be paired with a full-bodied, muscular Priorat (made from Garnacha, Cariñena, and a blend of other red varietals), or an opulent, oaky Ribera del Duero (usually 100% Tempranillo grapes). I imagine the Don, who sings a famous aria (“Finch’han da vino”) about the, um, benefits of wine, would approve of either of these choices.

The Flying Dutchman

Opens: April 25th

What to Drink:

When you’re sailing the seas in search of true love, it’s good to have liquor around that can weather the long journey. Why not a cold shot of Jenever, the juniper-flavored national liquor of the Netherlands, and also, the first gin! After you’ve arrived on land, pour a glass of German “Hock”, which is what the English termed wine from Germany until almost the 20th century!

Cyrano de Bergerac

Opens: May 2nd

What to Drink:

We’ve arrived at one of Scott’s favorite topics: the wines of France! Our last opera of the season begins at the Hotel de Bourgogne, which is the perfect opportunity to sample the exquisite (and, erm, often pricey) wines of the Burgundy region. Scott would like to offer two options: the Millionaire’s Delight, and the Bourgogne for the Bourgeois. (Or, in other words, the wine that the rest of us can afford.) If you’ve just won the lottery and money is no object, go for a bottle of Domaine de la Romanée-Conti-Romanée-Conti, a Pinot Noir from a monopole vineyard, which means it is one of the rare vineyards in Burgundy owned by one domaine only. This is one of the finest, and most expensive, bottles you can buy. So, good luck. For the rest of us, find a nice village-level Meursault, which, as a Chardonnay, is one of our personal favorites.

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Scott and Lianne enjoying their favorite... hobby...

Lianne Coble-Dispensa & Scott Dispensa are a pair of lucky newlyweds (if three years counts as new!) that get to work together every day at the Metropolitan Opera. Lianne is currently in the middle of her second year as a full-time chorus member, and Scott is on his seventh year! They swear that they don’t just drink wine all the time. In fact, in their spare time, they enjoy running (Lianne is a 3-time marathoner, and Scott is an ultramarathoner, which is insanely impressive), cycling, general gym-rat activities, cooking constantly, eating (which they might like just as much as drinking), singing at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, and spending far too much time with their two cats, Maximillien de Robespierre and Charles Hubert Hastings Parry. They live in New Jersey, and they actually like it.

From Physics Lab to Opera House to Bookstore Near You

A profile of the Metropolitan Opera’s own C. A. Higgins, production assistant and author of the Lightless trilogy.

By Edward Hanlon

       The first three rules of singing in chorus are (a) Keep your eyes on the conductor, (b) Keep your eyes on the conductor and (c) Review rules 1 and 2! ¹ No matter what happens on stage ² , a chorister must maintain a symbiotic understanding of the conductor’s intentions. But sometimes even the mighty Metropolitan Opera Chorus can be distracted; so who is disrupting the laser-like focus of the chorus this month?

       Meet C. A. Higgins, costume production assistant ³ at the Metropolitan Opera. She spends her days making sure that all costumes (and there are many, many costumes at the Met), get to the all the people that need to wear them when they need them. But that’s just her day job; she is also the author of Lightless, released in May of 2015 by Penguin Random House and named one of the best books of the year by Buzzfeed and Kirkus Reviews. Supernova, book two of the trilogy, was released this summer and the third and final entry, Radiate, is scheduled for May 23rd, 2017.

Lightless & Supernova, books one and two of the Lightless Trilogy by C.A. Higgins

       C. A. Higgins grew up a storyteller. Her earliest efforts were illustrated flip-books of happy unicorns jumping over waterfalls ⁴ . Those evolved into fantasy fiction she is happily reports are “mercifully not published”. But while she always wanted to be a writer, a love of science led her to a distinctly non-writerly degree in physics at Cornell University. Science and physics have become her muses. One of the core concepts of Lightless was born in a theoretical physics class: “we were talking about the inevitable thermodynamic end of the universe” and she has infused her writing style with a scientific approach. She deals with her characters “in an isolated system the same way she treats particles”. This might sound a bit dry, but the story-teller in Higgins never succumbs to the researcher. There is a tension and claustrophobia to the book that lends it much more the feeling of thriller than science textbook.

       The story is set in a future when a ruthless earth-based shadow-government dominates the solar system. This government, called the System, has launched an experimental military spacecraft (Ananke). Althea, a computer scientist on board, developed a deeply personal understanding and relationship with her ship’s computer throughout its development, launch and voyage. But when a pair of fugitives gain access to Ananke, they throw the mission, the crew, and the computer into ever-escalating chaos. Althea is cut adrift from friends she knew, the world-order she accepted, and even the rules of reality she understood ⁵ .

       So where does a person find time to write three books while working a full-time job making sure everyone on stage looks beautiful? Higgins is at the Met all day during the week so “I write on weekends” she said. “I can sit and get it done and not be up until midnight” like when she tries to write after a full day at the opera house. She is also aided by the Met’s seasonal schedule; during the offseason the costume shop is closed for five weeks (after storing all the costumes from the previous season and before starting the monumental task of preparing for the next season). This is the time when Higgins can really dig in and devote some real time to writing. When opera season ends, writing season begins!

       But this is, after all, an opera website so I would be remiss if I didn’t insert something gratuitously operatic ⁶ into the conversation. Therefore, I will ask the question on no one’s lips; the question that literally not one person has wondered after reading the book: if Lightless was an opera, who would be the composer? The author has a clear answer: Puccini. She’s biased though, “I always have to choose Puccini because he’s my favorite!”. Chorister Rebecca Carvin respectfully disagrees. She wants Nico Muhly (composer of Two Boys, performed at the Met in 2013, and currently working on Marnie, to be premiered in the 2019-20 season) to write the opera. Higgins’ colleague in the costume shop, Vicki Jo DeRocker can’t quite decide but comes in somewhere between the two: either Richard Wagner for his grandeur and drama or Philip Glass for his “futuristic, mesmerizing effect”. I’m not going to give an opinion (journalistic integrity and all that) but that doesn't mean I don't have one ⁷ . What I think we can all agree on is that it would make a fantastic opera! So, if you like opera, give the Lightless Trilogy a try… and if you like the Lightless Trilogy, then why don’t you stop by the Metropolitan Opera and give it a try? It’s a match made in heaven ⁸ .

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Photo: © © Lisa Verge-Higgins

C. A. Higgins is the author of the novels Lightless and Supernova and numerous short stories. She was a runner-up in the 2013 Dell Magazines Award for Undergraduate Excellence in Science Fiction and Fantasy Writing and has a B.A. in physics from Cornell University. She lives in Brooklyn, New York. Her third novel, Radiate, is scheduled for release by Penguin Random House on the 23rd of May, 2017. For more information on the Lightless Trilogy check out her website or follower her on Facebook or Twitter.

1. Maestro Palumbo, chorus master of the Metropolitan Opera Chorus, would definitely agree with this statement. ↩

1. … and pretty some crazy things have happened on stage at the Metropolitan Opera! ↩

1. … she prefers the title “Costume Production Empress”. ↩

1. Higgins is in good company on the literary unicorn front:
   "This is a child!" Haigha replied eagerly, coming in front of Alice to introduce her, and spreading out both his hands toward her in an Anglo-Saxon attitude. "We only found it to-day. It's as large as life, and twice as natural!"
   "I always thought they were fabulous monsters!" said the Unicorn. "Is it alive?"
   "It can talk," said Haigha, solemnly,
   The Unicorn looked dreamily at Alice, and said "Talk, child."
   Alice could not help her lips curling up into a smile as she began: "Do you know, I always thought Unicorns were fabulous monsters, too! I never saw one alive before!"
   "Well, now that we have seen each other," said the Unicorn, "if you'll believe in me, I'll believe in you. Is that a bargain?"
   - Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass ↩

1. I assure you that Higgins is much better at writing novels than I am at writing synopses. So, if you don’t find yourself thrilled by the paragraph you just read, blame me, not the author! ↩

1. Gratuitously Operatic: my next opera aria CD title! ↩

1. cough (Mozart) cough. ↩

1. ... or at least the outer reaches of the solar system! ↩

So You Want to Be in the Chorus? Part 1

An oral history of the auditions, decisions and opening nights of the the Metropolitan Opera Chorus’ three newest members.

New Choristers at the Metropolitan Opera: Brian Anderson, Sara Heaton & Patrick Miller

by Edward Hanlon

This year, three new singers have joined the ranks of the Metropolitan Opera Chorus as full time singers: Sara Heaton, Patrick Miller and Brian Anderson. It has been a career and life changing transition for all of them. To get a sense for what it means, I sat down with them to listen to their experiences and the path that lead them here. Here are their stories:

Before the Audition

All three singers have had solo careers throughout the country and worked in the extra chorus at the Metropolitan Opera.

Sara Heaton: Since I graduated in 2007, I’ve been doing young artist programs and building up my career as a soloist. In the beginning I did mostly opera and quite a bit of new music. For the past few years, I’ve been focusing more on concert work with symphonies and chamber music ensembles and doing recitals.

Brian Anderson: I traveled a lot from the time I finished my Adler [Fellowship at San Francisco Opera]. Then I ended up making my [New York] City Opera debut and latched on with them. I was covering and singing second cast kind of stuff but it was great because I could be home. But then when they went belly up that source of income dried up for me.

Patrick Miller: After I finished the Ryan Opera Center at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, I worked professionally for 10 years, singing leading roles mostly with small to medium-large houses along with my wife, who is also a singer. Five years ago I started working in the extra chorus; it was a great "side job" and provided stable, dependable pillars of income and family time throughout the season. It also conveniently coincided with the birth of our daughter.

Sara: I’ve been doing extra chorus for three years now.

Brian: For the past 5 years, I would say I’ve been more or less transitioning to staying in New York more and traveling less. Especially since my daughter was born in 2011. So I went and auditioned and got into the extra chorus and I just kept doing that.

Brian is married to Christina Thomson Anderson (also in the Met Opera Chorus) and has four children, ages 20, 17, 8 and 5.

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Sara Heaton as Celia in Lucio Silla with Odyssey Opera. Photo by Kathy Wittman.

Sara: It wasn’t until a few years ago that I even knew you could be a full time singer in the Met chorus. I did the audition to be in the extra chorus and when I did my first extra chorus show here, it was just eye-opening to learn about the full time position. I can't believe I didn't hear about it earlier on in my career and education. I realized that this is another way to have a singing career.

Patrick: As a soloist, unless you are in a situation where you’re working with a particular house, (like the Met), that’s hiring you frequently enough, you’re traveling a lot, you’re staying in hotels, you’re out of town for weeks and sometimes months on end. I wanted to be closer to my family, so doing extra chorus work meant spending time with them. I was going to be home for extended stretches.

Patrick is also married to a singer and has a five year old daughter. All three singers hoped for an full time position with the chorus.

Sara: It has been in the back of my mind since the beginning. I was a little bit torn, because there are a lot of things I really loved about the freedom to create my own performing schedule. Just in the past couple years I’ve formed some special relationships with musicians I collaborate with regularly and, given the schedule at the Met, it will be a little more difficult to do gigs with them during the year.

Patrick: It was much more fun than I expected… not that I was expecting that it wouldn’t be fun! The experience of working with 80, or sometimes over 100, singers - that many great voices in one room was a rush. I’ve sung in choirs all my life, and you’re usually hired to pull other people along. To be in a group where we were all leading the charge musically and vocally… it was a real pleasure because you immediately felt that you would achieve something great artistically. Many of my colleagues were accomplished soloists before joining the Met Chorus, and joining such a fraternity of artists is exciting. I never felt that anywhere else but here.

Sara: I tried not to think about it too much because it wasn’t a given. I assumed I would do the extra chorus for many years and then, maybe, I would get a full time thing. But I certainly wasn’t counting on it and I didn’t set my hopes on it too much.

The Audition

Patrick: I remember postponing my audition a couple of times: first I was out of town, then I was sick. I finally did my audition some time in October.

Sara: I sang “Je veux vivre” [Juliette’s first act aria from Romeo et Juliette] in my August audition.

Both Brian and Patrick heard in December that they would be called back for a full time position on the 14th of December.

Brian: I had heard about two weeks ahead of time that I was going to be doing it which was great because it gave me a lot of time to prepare.

Patrick: We both got dressed in the extra chorus locker room and warmed up in there at the same time. I was in the bathroom and he was in the dressing room - finding a space to vocalize in this city requires creativity, and sometimes you have to share!

Brian: Singing for a chorus audition is different from a solo audition. Maestro Palumbo is looking for the voice to do certain things that should blend into the rest of the section. Being in the extra chorus I learned so much about what it means to be in the chorus (also, of course, being married to one!) I learned the demands of the job and the level of musicianship he expects and what it really means to sing in an ensemble as opposed to singing solo. It really is, to me, a big difference.

Donald Palumbo (chorus-master of the Metropolitan Opera Chorus): ¹ First and foremost, there has to be a basic amount of sound produced for work in a large opera house. If the voice is so small that it won’t add to the sound, that’s a strike that’s going to be pretty hard to overcome, even if it’s a pretty voice. I also evaluate the purity of the tone and whether the vibrato is controlled. I want to determine whether the voice maintains its shape and focus throughout the the range, and, in particular, whether it gets pushed past the beautiful point in forte singing. Intonation is also critical. Problem signs are a constant sagging in pitch or a tone with no spin. If a person has a beautiful voice that sits below pitch, that would create problems in the chorus.

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Brian Anderson as Tamino in Die Zauberflöte at the Miami Dade Auditorium. Photo by John Pineda.

Brian: I sang “De’ miei bollenti spiriti” [Alfredo’s Act 2 aria from La Traviata]. You send the chorus office a list of arias. They pick two and then you choose from that. But Maestro Palumbo just wanted to hear the one aria.

Patrick: For the callback I sang The Flower Song [Don José’s Act 3 aria from Carmen]. There is some strategy involved in selecting what you sing in an audition, but essentially you should offer the arias that best show off your technique, vocal color, and artistry under pressure. For me that was Don José.

The Decision

Patrick & Brian learned they were accepted over the Christmas holiday.

Patrick: My wife, daughter and I were in Minneapolis over Christmas break to spend a few days with my parents. It was New Year’s Eve, and we had just finished some shopping. My wife says, “Is there anything else you want?” and I say “I just want a job. A job I can be proud of - that I can support my family -that I can feel like I’m making a contribution.” That was about 3:30 pm.

Brian: I think I heard about a week after the audition. But I just kind of knew. When I did the audition I felt really good about it. Sometimes in auditions, somehow you just know that you’re doing something right. And this was one of those times. I was ready, I really prepared, and I said, if it doesn’t happen now whatever… but I couldn’t have done any better.

Patrick: I pull into the grocery store parking lot and look down at my phone… I remember it was snowing… and I see a missed call from the Metropolitan Opera and I was like “that’s weird… why am I getting a call on New Year's Eve?" So I check the voicemail: “Patrick, this is Donald Palumbo calling. Please give me a call at your earliest convenience”. My heart started racing… I was like “Oh this is it, this is it!" I called back and he wasn’t there. When I got back to the car I said “umm… Donald Palumbo just left me a voicemail…” and my wife was like “THAT’S IT, THAT’S IT! YOU GOT IT!” I said “OK, let’s calm down here” (we Minnesotans try to avoid assuming "best case scenarios"!); I’m trying to wrack my brain to think of some other reason he might be calling me. I got home and told my parents and they were really excited. My parents had been hoping and praying for this, as we all had, for quite a while.

Maestro Palumbo did call back an hour and a half later and offered Patrick the job

Patrick: And the best part about it: I told you I had that moment in the car where I said this is all I want. I checked the timestamp on the voicemail and it was right at that time. It was between 3:30 and 3:45., within a couple minutes of when I said that, that Palumbo called me. And if my ringer had been on it would have been an even better story! Why couldn't I have had my ringer on???

But what about poor Sara!?!? She had auditioned in late August, but March rolled around and she still hadn’t heard from the Met.

Sara: I didn’t hear anything until some time in the early spring when they asked me to sing in Fidelio and Nabucco.

Sara had been hired to sing extra chorus. That was all she expected to sing with the Met in the 2016-17 season.

Sara: I had those chunks of time already blocked out in my schedule for the Met productions, and I had other solo engagements throughout the year in addition to some freelance work as a grant writer. Then on July 29th (it was a Friday) I got a call from Kurt Phinney saying: “I wanted to see if you were interested and available to start the season with us on Monday as a full time soprano in the chorus." I pretty much started freaking out!

Kurt Phinney (Chorus Manager): The hire was last minute because a chorister decided that they wanted to retire but hadn’t come to that conclusion until very late. Maestro Palumbo always has a keen sense of the talent pool at his disposal and ultimately it’s his call. Sara was the number-one candidate for him. And I think everyone that was listening at the audition concurred whole-heartedly because not only is she a great singer but also a great colleague. It was a convenient thing that we had someone so good already working here. So actually, it was one of the most easily resolved casting crises we’ve ever dealt with. With Sara, the choice was very easy.

Sara: After the conversation with Kurt, I had the weekend to mull it over, talk to my husband, etc.. On Sunday I called Kurt to tell him I accepted, and I was here for rehearsals on Monday!

The decision to join the Met Chorus was not one they took lightly

Brian: It’s somewhat of a challenge for our family; both of us doing this job and having two small kids but at least now they are both in school during the day. It’s just the evenings that are tough — I won’t get to put them to bed a lot.

Sara: I was excited, but it was also a little bittersweet. I had to cancel several engagements I had coming up this year. An added complication is that my husband and I recently bought a house in Beacon, which is beautiful, but it’s not like living in the city and being around the corner!

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Patrick Miller and his wife, soprano Veronica Mitina, as Cavaradossi and Tosca, respectively, in Tosca with Syracuse Opera. Photo by Doug Wonders.

Brian: I don’t think I would have even tried for the job if we didn’t think we could make it. And once I was given the job, we went to find quality child care and look at the schedule for what the year would look like for us. Where’s going to be the easy time, where’s the challenging time?

Sara: My husband was really proud of me and just really excited. He’s a musician too, so he appreciates both the enormity of being offered a job like this, as well as what it means to not be pursuing a solo career anymore. We did discuss not seeing each other as much anymore given that it’s a long commute but we’re open and flexible to seeing how it goes.

Patrick: You feel validated as an artist. I really feel that an investment has been made in me. That there’s one spot and I’ve been chosen to take it.

Sara: I remember feeling this wave of relief. I had been working as a soloist for so long but to have that recognition from this company was this emotional wave like… wow! It was really gratifying and humbling at the same time to feel like somebody at that company thinks I’m good enough to be there. Even though I had done extra chorus before it was different. There’s a lot of weight to that.

Patrick: It’s an honor, but also a responsibility. You feel immediately that you want to "step up to the plate” and deliver every time you open your mouth.

End of Part 1.  Click Here for Part 2

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Edward Hanlon, graduate of McGill University and University of Michigan, is a happy Long Island boy making good with the Metropolitan Opera. Favorite roles include Figaro, Sparafucile, Dick Deadeye, Sarastro and Nick Bottom with companies such as the Lyric Opera of Chicago, the Lincoln Center Theatre, Opera Theatre of St. Louis, Des Moines Metro Opera and the Glimmerglass Festival. He dreams of singing another Figaro with his beautiful wife, soprano Tanya Roberts. His first novel is is due to be released this summer ... at the end of the 2017-18 season ... umm... someday? Check out his website and follow him on Facebook or Instagram.

1. From an March, 2009 issue of Classical Singer Magazine. Interviewed by Rachel A. Antman. ↩

A Chorister's Bohemian Rhapsody

A deep dive into the many casting choices of La bohème

by Edward Hanlon

La bohème Act 1

(The scene: a shabby radio-studio garret, overlooking the rooftops of Washington D.C.)

Rodolfo: Robert Siegel (Who but the host of All Things Considered could play this part?!)
Mimi: Lakshmi Singh (Hands down best name in NPR, "ma il suo nome è Lucia”.)
Marcello: Steve Inskeep
Musetta: Terry Gross (That flirt!)
Colline: the Car Talk guys (Controversial pick, I know, particularly since one of them has sadly passed away, but their combination of wisdom and humor is perfect for the philosopher-bass.)
Schunard: Ira Glass (Understudy: Ira Flatow)
Alcindoro: Peter Sagal
Benoit: Bill Kurtis (the host & voice of Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me should have the comedic chops for these two roles)
Parpingol: an NPR pledge drive
Chorus: the many and variously accented correspondents of the BBC News Service

       It’s possible that I’ve been listening to a bit too much NPR lately ¹ . Combine that with Bohème rehearsal and I’m having some… odd day dreams. There’s just something about Bohème that gets into your head, And yet, I’m in my third year in the Metropolitan Opera Chorus. I have 30 performances of Bohème under my belt and that number will be far higher by the end of my career ² . Shouldn’t that familiarity breed boredom (if not contempt)? After all, if it isn’t routine yet, it will be.

       So how can I possibly still have Bohème on the brain?

       Well, to start with, it’s the luscious music, brilliant orchestration and devastating tragedy ³ . And the Met adds a whole new dimension to the drama. The Franco Zefferelli production is iconic ⁴ (not to mention beautiful and heartbreaking) ⁵ and has become a vital part of New York City’s cultural landscape. For me though, it’s all about the singers throughout the years. The production premiered on December 14th, 1981 with a dream cast Teresa Stratas as Mimì, José Carreras as Rodolfo, Renato Scotto as Musetta, Richard Stilwell, Allan Monk as Schunard, James Morris as Colline and Italo Tajo as Alcindoro/Benoit. (I’m going to admit that it’s a bit better than my NPR cast.) Over time nothing has changed: names like Domingo, Freni, Frittoli, Netrebko and Alagna have graced that Parisian garret ⁶ . It’s no different this year: Ailyn Pérez, Kristine Opolais, Dmyto Popov, Piotr Beczała, and Michael Fabiano will carry on that grad legacy. ⁷

I’m going to admit something: I’ve just listed some amazing singers but not one of them is in my favorite cast. That’s because it’s not my favorite cast because they are the greatest singers ever (although they are some pretty incredible singers!) It’s my favorite cast because of the deep and personal connection this opera creates. On February 22nd, 2003, a bright-eyed and bushy-tailed freshman in college, who had never seen an opera, spent a night at The Met; he saw Bohème. The cast starred Elena Kelessidi, Ramón Vargas, Ainhoa Arteta, Vassily Gerello, Earle Patriarco ⁸ and Richard Bernstein. That was the evening he decided to devote himself to becoming an opera singer. Now, as I look back fourteen years later, I could not be happier with the choice I made. I saw (what will always be for me) the greatest cast perform the greatest production of the greatest opera in the world.

       So, you ask me, why do I have Bohème on the brain? Why am I still excited for every performance? ⁹ Because it’s my opportunity to give someone in the audience what my greatest cast gave me: a love of opera.

1. I need my news in the morning! ↩

1. … at this pace, just under 900! ↩

1. umm.. yeah… Boheme makes me use lots of adjectives… ↩

1. Trivia Time: there are three typos on the Act 2 Paris street shop signs. Can you tell me where they are? ↩

1. My wife, Tanya, cannot see the third act snowfall without crying (which is perfect because it means that she doesn’t see me crying too!) ↩

1. For the sake of brevity there is no way I can list even a fraction in the body of the article. That’s what footnotes are for: John Alexander, Renato Capecchi, Angela Gheorghiu, Hei-Kyung Hong, Frank Lapardo, Catherine Malfitano, Mark Oswald, Louis Quilico,Teresa Żylis-Gara to name just a few more! You could get happily lost in the Met Archives forever. ↩

1. Not to mention choristers Daniel Smith, Yohan Yi, Joseph Turi and Raymond Aparentado playing Parpigol, the sergeant, the officer and a dude selling prunes from Tours, respectively. ↩

1. … who I now sit across from in the chorus dressing room! ↩

1. … or wake up from day-dreams wondering whether Steve Inskeep or Kai Ryssdal would make a better Marcello or how Robert Siegel and Lakshmi Singh’s vocal colors would compliment each other in Rodolfo and Mimi’s act one duet? ↩

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Edward Hanlon, graduate of McGill University and University of Michigan, is a happy Long Island boy making good with the Metropolitan Opera. Favorite roles include Figaro, Sparafucile, Dick Deadeye, Sarastro and Nick Bottom with companies such as the Lyric Opera of Chicago, the Lincoln Center Theatre, Opera Theatre of St. Louis, Des Moines Metro Opera and the Glimmerglass Festival. He dreams of singing another Figaro with his beautiful wife, soprano Tanya Roberts. His first novel is is due to be released this summer ... at the end of the 2017-18 season ... umm... someday? Check out his website and follow him on Facebook or Instagram.

Chorus Costumes from Fitting to Finale

Spotlight on Roberto Devereux’s costumes designed by Moritz Junge

by Daniel Clark Smith

As we rehearse on stage for the premiere of Sir David McVicar’s Metropolitan Opera production of Donizetti’s Roberto Devereux on Mar 24th, 2016, let’s take a moment to acknowledge the importance of costumes and costume designers in opera. Moritz Junge, the designer of the beautiful costumes you see here made his Met Opera debut in McVicar’s recent production of Cavalleria Rusticana/Pagliacci. He has shared with us some photos of the trim and baubles used to decorate these Jacobean-era costumes for Roberto Devereux, as well as photos from our costume fittings for the opera, most of which occurred last fall.

Costumes play an important role in the life of a chorister at the Met. From our initial fittings to the final performances of an opera, costumes inform us as to who our characters are, and how we might act and move on stage. Some costumes are designed to individualize us, and some help to identify us as members of a particular community. In Cavalleria Rusticana, for example, we wear variations on a theme of black and white, the color scheme uniting us as the religious community in small-town Sicily. In Pagliacci, we play (perhaps) descendants of those same Sicilians, but more colorful and unique characters: from the local mayor, a policeman, a matron, a man-about-town, to the parish priest.

Opera costumes also give the chorus ideas about how our characters might move onstage. From the moment we put on a period costume, for example, the development of the physicality of an operatic character begins. Sir David McVicar, in one of our early rehearsals for Roberto Devereux, directed the chorus men to make our entrance, striding on with a “confident, masculine swagger”, and demonstrated a hand-on-hip courtier walk which to our 21st-Century eyes was anything but masculine! However, when we take into account the aristocratic court at the turn of the 17th-Century, and remember our costume fittings, that swagger becomes appropriate and begins to take on a life of its own.

There is nothing like wearing a costume that has been made to your exact measurements, and each one in its own way gives you ideas how to “play” onstage. Whether it’s a prisoner’s raincoat and handcuffs in Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, an Old-West cowboy look in La Fanciulla del West, Cyrano de Bergerac’s swashbuckling hip boots, or Madama Butterfly’s multi-colored kimonos, we put on the costume, and our body mechanics immediately change. Pair that with a masterpiece from the operatic repertoire played by the world-class Met Orchestra, and with the superb stagecraft (lights, sets and stage direction) of the Met, then a specific scene starts to come to life.

There are challenges to wearing costumes in opera, though, such as the men’s multiple costume changes in Il Trovatore (back and forth from Manrico’s Gypsy followers to Di Luna’s soldiers and back again!). But our dressers work hard with us to make sure our quick changes go smoothly. We can sometimes feel the effects of a costume hours later, however, such as a heavy cape draped to one side. Thankfully, we have help from members of the wardrobe staff, who work to make sure we are as comfortable on stage as possible. It is, of course, the nature of opera that sometimes we stand on stage for an entire Act or two a night. But working in opera is what we’ve all dreamed of doing, and we are thankful to work with the greatest artists and artisans in the field. Nevertheless, when we join the chorus, we learn very quickly why one of the first bits of advice from colleagues is: “make sure your shoes fit well!”

Most costumes are rigged with 21st-Century conveniences such as velcro, zippers or button snaps, in order to make a quick change easier. Some, however, are designed with historical accuracy in mind, such as the costumes for Anna Bolena which have multiple laces, most of which are never seen by the audience. These are much more like historical clothing, rather than costumes.

Whether costumes serve as character study, guides to movement, or simply as a way to identify the chorus onstage, we are thankful that the Metropolitan Opera has such talented wardrobe and costume personnel. From designers like Moritz Junge and the costume staff who build the costumes, to the dressers and wardrobe staff who oversee them, we are in their debt. They make us look good onstage and we are eternally grateful!