Madame Butterfly, Vancouver Opera, Queen Elizabeth Theatre

What a wonderful night for Puccini’s masterpiece Madame Butterfly.  Pink cherry blossoms on the streets as we walked to the car. Pink cherry blossoms on the magnificent set depicting Nagasaki Japan during the allied occupation 1940’s to 50’s. .  We driove in from the Burnaby suburbs to the busttling Vancouver city.. Saturday night. Cultural events and sports events and just the city itself.  So much life.  Parking wasn’t a problem just finding our way to Queen E once we came out on Hamilton turned around and looking for Homer street. 

 Laura had the tickets. We arrived on time.  She was dressed in a new tan and white spring frock with her Mexican cowboy boots engraved with flowers. . I had the grey shirt, wheat coloured Harris tweed jacket, tan slacks and sandals. I would have worn shoes but I couldn’t find the shoe horn.  

We were ‘dressed’ for an event and I was thankful to see almost all others were. Vancouver was once an uncultured town where too many vied for attention by dressing like refugees at theatre, ballet and opera events the expense of production itself exclusive.  No more. Every year that college student attention seeking has declined.   Audiences are participating in the aura of the evening. Vancouverites are a quick study. 

I remember going to Rocky Horror Picture Show\ a couple of decades back to be one of very few in costume on Halloween.  A few years later almost all had arrived with rice ready to participate in the act. 

Here at the opera I loved the long gowns, brocades and satins, little black numbers, capri pants, suits and sparkling jewelry.    A lot of beautiful and handsome young people too. A lot of Asians.   I wondered if this was reflection of the show itself or the love of music, especially classical, in these talented educated folk.  My first opera, again decades ago,  seemed to be dominated by  elderly church folk, a white haired affair. The ballet has.always had a hip slick and cool following but that  fashion and vibe seemed to have moved to the opera. There was a complete age spread and culture spread and just a whole lot of interesting people watching.   The ‘in crowd’ was certainly here tonight.   Lots of elite along with those who just loved the music. I loved it.  Standing in line for a cappuccino while others collected stemmed glasses of wine I loved the people watching. It feels so good to be part of something so much more than television, a time, a place, a magical memorable event.

Laura looked lovely. The first bell to announce seats sounded.

I don’t like announcements, political or otherwise. Fortunately they were brief. Frankly, I always want to skip right to the beginning. That was the orchestra which was unbelievably superb. Music director Jacques Lacombe out did him self with the collective of fabulous musicians.  What a start to a magnificent night. Next the perfect set that took me instantly back to my time in Japan.  The singing began with acting thatt  all just flowed and fit..

I loved the English titles thrown up on the screen above the performers. I realized I was  trying to match the words to song till I realized how silly that was,  Puccini’s Italian. Pinkerton, the male scoundrel lead whose character transformation was profound wore modern naval attire which juxtaposed with the traditional costume of the Japanese family.  The costuming was incredible and the juxtapositions of American and Japanese were fascinating. 

I really loved the two men Pinkerton ( Robert Watson)  and the Consul Sharpless (Brett (Polegato)  singing. What rich tapestry of male sound!  The chorus was wonderful at the wedding.  But really. Yasko Sato who played  Cio-cio-san the bride . Madame Butterfly, was the most captivating.  Her maid, Suzuki ( Nozomi Kato) was delightful. These women’s voices together were such a marvellous dance.  The uncle, the Bonze played by Insung Sim was the perfect gangster wicked witch in the dramatic scene of wedding conflict, pagan gods offended by the American cross. What a perfect moment made vivid by Puccini’s music and timing thanks to conductor Lacombe and director Mo Zhou. After the earlier happy wedding music this shift was so dramatic.  The dischord was magically followed by the  the most tender and intimate love song duo of Watson (Pinkerton) and Sato (Butterfly).  The rising moon in the set and romantic poetic duet literally brought down the curtain to the first act followed by applause and more applause. 

The second act and third act were even more perfect as the story unfolded with surprising twists of plot. I won’t be a spoiler. The pathos was profound. The breadth and depth of music just so moving.  The final curtain fell. The cast appeared  bowing and smiling.  The standing ovations followed with  crescendoing applause for Yasko Sato so well deserved  What a truly magnificent  moving performance by all. Laura and I spoke with admiration and joy about the performance as we left the threatre.  It was  clear Vancouver cherry blosoom night

 

Sarah Brightman

Laura loves Sarah Brightman.  I liked that she was a classical singer and had been married to the Cats creator, Frank Lloyd Webber.  I’d heard her Pie Jesu somewhere along the journey. I got us tickets late surprised that the best tickets were sold out and we were in the balcony, centre but still, balcony.  The advantage was that we had a really great view of the show. I was glad I’d brought the Nikon binoculars (opera glasses) because they allowed us to zone in on her face. The venue was sold out.

She was marvellous. What an incredible voice! What a great performer! Standing ovations! Such elegance.

No photos or recording was allowed. The female guitarist was entertaining in leathers as a contrast to Sarah in great gowns and tiera. The light show was spectacular. Nearly thirty people in the choir, a symphonic orchestra and a rock jazz group. That’s a wall of sound. Sarah Brightman’s voice was a symphony of it’s own.  

The Queen Elizabeth is a great venue.  We loved the evening.  

In contrast to the normal swag of t shirts and cd’s, Sarah Brightman had jewelry and a really glamorous bag which looked good on Laura.  We just needed it to carry home the CD’s. I’m looking forward to listening to her Hymn cd. So many beautiful songs.

Nutcracker, Royal Winnipeg Ballet. Queen Elizabeth Theatre

Royal Winnipeg Ballet did an awesome performance of  Tchaikovsky “Nutcracker”.   Artistic Director Andre Lewis is to be commended royally. Choreographers Galina Yordanova and Nina Menon were amazing. Paul Daigle’s costume design was out of this world.  I loved the mice. The polar bear were terrific too but all the ballet dancers were colourfully costumed in what seemed perfect for each of their roles.  Brian Perchaluk, Scenic designer with Michael Whitfield lighting designer made the best of  sets that showcased so well all the performances.  The sleigh was terrific.

I loved all the dancers and all the performers.  They were simply outstanding.  The children were delightful.  All in all it was a fabulous evening. I was enchanted from beginning to end.  The intermission was a bit jarring given how captivated we were by the wonder of the production. The skill of the dancers was such that they made the most gruelling dance appear effortless.  

Tonight’s performance made me proud to be from Winnipeg.  I had had seasons tickets  to the Royal Winnipeg Ballet 40 years ago. I loved seeing the Nutcracker over and over again but this surpasses all I’ve seen before.  Tchaikovsky is timeless.  The music is so uplifting.  I love classic ballet. 

I love Ballet BC and so enjoy season’s tickets. I love that they hosted the Royal Winnipeg Ballet. It was such a jolt of nostalgia.  I remembered fondly Arnold Sporr . All the men in the audience wore dark suits and the ladies wore great gowns back then. Winnipeg was such a sophisticated city and so supportive of the arts. .  I’ve enjoyed Ballet BC gaining the recognition and appreciation they deserve through the leadership of Emily and John. 

Thank you all for an unforgettable evening.  

Ballet BC, Program 3

Ballet BC, Program 3 was by far the best ballet of the season. All three pieces were spectacular.
 "Beginning After” , Choreographed by Cayetano Soto, with music of Handel  was physically inconceivable.  The dancers seemed otherworldly in their movements. The parts and the whole in harmony with the music. Soto’s dance is Daliesque in motion. I love Cayetano Soto’s choreography. It’s the most original and inspirational I’ve seen in recent times.  It’s authenticity and unique interpretation of the human spirit through dance is so uplifting.
“when you left’ choreographed by Emily Molnar was so utterly different from all that has gone before.  The music of Peteris Vasks: Plainscape was performed by the Phoenix Chamber Choir under the direction of Grame Langager. When we stood to cheer and applaud at the end of this remarkable piece we saw all the smiling happy faces of this gifted choir in the orchestra pit .  This piece amazed me for it’s modernity and abstract birdlike flocking flow so reminiscent of classical with it’s  elegance of form.  But where Soto brings to mind Salvador Dali, this Molnar piece was reminiscent of Klimt.
I loved Bill.  Bill was the choreography of Sharon Eyal and Gai Bhear, first performed in 2010 by the Batsheva Dance Company .Music by Ori Lichtik. I’d seen Bill once before and loved it.  Reminiscent of Paul Gauguin I thought it the most amazing tribal post apocalypse interpretation. The drums and white bodies  and that Monty Python funny walk  was all so chorus like in the song of creation.  I found myself outside trying but failing to repeat that inconceivably simple looking impossible walk  such a  complex rhythmic repetition around which the whole community of dance and song revolved. Outside others were doing the same. I don’t recall seeing this before, though of course,  some of it had to do with this being Spring.  There were just so many of the audience dancing and imitating different bits they’d loved from the show in front of the old Queen E. It was wonderful.
The Ballet BC dancers are all the best.I’ve loved Alexis Fletcher for ever, even bidding  this night on a silent auction black and white photograph of her captured  in leaping flight  Livona Ellis and Rachel Meyer and Rachel Prince, , Christoph Von Riedemann and Peter Smida all stood out for me tonight.  But I love them all and a different one just shines a little brighter in different performances, all so professional.  Professional remains a designation of meritocracy. In contrast to the values of mediocrity, the professional is not uniform but unique in that the skills consistently rise above an impossible level which an amateur might only attain on rare occasion.   Even the apprentices tonight were memorable with Justin Calvadores and  Parker Finley’s dance being noteworthy to me.  I find myself watching an individual then looking to see who they were.  I noticed these delightful new folk whereas Nicole Ward , Kirsten Wicklund, Gilbert Small, and Patrick Kilbane are names I’ve come to know and faces I’ve come to recognise.  But they’re all superb.  If this were hockey we'd speak of Brandon Alley and Andrew Bartee as the Sabines or Emily Chess and Kiera Hill as ‘all stars’.  Zander Constant and Shanna Wolfe have joined the big leagues
But its dance and the audience didn’t dress like Walmart. Intermission was a feast for the eyes in terms of haute coiffure.  The shoes, the shoes, the shoes! the ladies exclaimed.  I loved the men in gold lame jackets and the lithe and sensuous ladies in long  spring gowns. So many of the young had perfect dancer bodies whereas some of us who danced compared out girth and reminisced nostalgically about times when we moved liked cats and leaped liked lions.  it was a great night.  Laura and I shared it with our friends Lorne and Justine.  After all the standing ovations we ourselves couldn’t stop singing the praises of the dancers and choreographers..  Ballet BC is just so vital.

Ballet BC Program 2 Queen Elizabeth Theatre

Both Laura and I are getting over spring colds.  Vancouver is experiencing  dreariness with ugly rain holding back the coming of the sun.  If it weren’t for season’s tickets to the ballet neither of us would have got off the couch and escaped from the tv to culture.  It never seems like a good idea getting dressed but history has proven over and over again that an evening of Ballet BC is an uplifting intriguing consciousness raising event. It even puts a smile on my face. Curmudgeon that age is making me.

And true to form this ballet did.  The  Queen Elizabeth Theatre is  a bright oasis.  Tonight  the young women were truly gala in the latest fashions.  Marvellous dresses and splendid shoes. I like best the gaggles of the  early teens with their aunt or dance instructor mentor  all fluttering and vibrant. But tonight it was the 20 year olds looking truly mysterious and captivating.  The young men in jackets and fancy shirts and well scrubbed faces were there as well.  

There is always the older crowd. Fewer tonight  compared to the surge of youthful enthusiasm with it’s obvious appreciation of excellence. Us older folk are main stay.  The City set.  Very uptown.  Banyan Books meets Nordstrom crowd.  Uniquely Vancouver.  But this night seemed mostly for the young and beautiful people. My favourite place in the whole world for people watching is the Ballet.

 Queen Elizabeth really is a fine little theatre.  Not the Lincoln Centre by any means.  Neither is it shabby.   I like the seats and the view.  I like too when Emily Molnar comes on stage and briefly describes the coming show. I was miffed though she didn’t mention St. Patrick.  There was however a swath of green dresses and jackets in the audience.  I was wearing my patch vest from Dublin.  Laura looked divine in her Ivanka. 

When the lights went down, the Anthem choreographed by Lisa Gelly and Josh Martin exploded on the stage, a minimalist background, with functional costumes,  a plethora of new moves and impossible bodies reached out to meet the industrial music of Colin Stetson, Sarah Neufeld, Ginzburg and Purgus. It was something never considered possible and yet it worked all together as one, a most incredible explanation of space and sound emotionally explored by human.  I truly loved the piece.  A World Premiere and somehow especially 2017.

I love watching individual dancers. I’ve known Alexis Fletcher, Peter Smida, Rachel Prince, Rachel Meyers and Gilbert Small now for several seasons so truly appreciate their interpretations and sophistication.  Each night a dancer might capture my attention as tonight Nicole Ward and Brandon Alley stood out for me.  It’s the troop though that astonishes,, like a flock of birds moving together in ultimate unison.  

I loved Swan, choreography by Wen Wei Wang,  music from Swan Lake, Alexis Fletcher and Kirsten Wicklund sublime and Christoph von Reideman, Andrew Bartee, Gilbert Small and Peter Smida so strong and robust.  Combinations and permutations so very modern and refined. Such a tableau of exquisite form.  Robson Street and Davie.  Kate Burrows costume design rippled.

The audience loved the Lesly Telford composition, “If I were 2” , an exploration of narcissism, especially the young people. A dance duet by Emily Chessa and Brandon Alley set to the words of Barbara Adler sounding like a poem played by nightclub turntable.  It wasn’t my cup of tea, like  the other time they brought a painter on stage.  I just wish for Nutcracker at such times despite my overall joy of the contemporary.  

But then as always Ballet BC redeemed itself  with the especially intimate Solo Echo choreographed by Crystal Pite to the beautiful music of Brahms.   It actually had me crying and laughing at the same time as the dancers together reminded me of the otters holding onto each through the night at Vancouver Aquarium or at other times they became like a mob of inquisitive meerkats.  I’ve never seen the like of it in all my years of ballet attendance such an original work of humans holding to each other, letting go and finding one another, then holding together as a group or family or community. Such delicacy and love.  The tablleaus of human forms were mesmerizing.  

The audience really loved it and we all leapt to our feet to give the performers a well deserved standing ovation. Then we funnelled back out to cars and taxis and the less dreary still raining city of Vancouver.  I even had a little bounce in my step.  

 

Ballet BC Program 3, May 2016

"I and I and you” was choreographed by Jorma Elo to the music of Bach.  At first there was disorganization with dancers taking on grotesque inhuman shapes that at times reminded me of the frogs I pithed in the science lab. It was jarring and unaesthetic to my taste yet the music was divine.  Then slowly the most amazing transformation occurred as the dance became more elegant and orderly. The pas de dieux were traditional. The harsh softened into the lyrical and the piece ended with resolution of conflict and celebration of movement and dance.  A truly wonderful performance
At intermission the doors to the outdoor patio were opened so we could wander outside in the centre of Vancouver looking out at the CBC building and up at the half moon in the sky. As always the audience out did itself with studied fashion, a whole range of avant garde designer ward robes.  I can’t say it enough but "people watching" at Ballet BC is the very best fun in Vancouver. What a collection of characters and definitely some of the usual suspects.
"16 + a Room” choreographed by Emily Molnar in collaboration with artists of Ballet BC to the music composed and arranged by Dirk P. Haubrich was in stark contrast to the first piece.  “We are all being shot backwards and forwards on this plain to make a pattern” quotation of Virginia Woolf accompanied the piece.  Harsh, bleak and Kaffkaesque the dancers seemed trapped in a prison like space with an individual holding a sign, “This is the beginning”.  This seemed like a bit of hope juxtaposed with what seemed at times to be Dante’s Hell.  As the sense of a New York street, the urban anomie came through the performance, “This is the beginning” seemed more a curse. Then the lighting and sound effects took on a flavour of helicopters and war.  I thought of the UN’s Agenda 21 with the aim to round up people in camps like the Pol Pot had,  in an attempt to protect holy mother earth from human infestation.  Dancers fleed from side to side but there seemed only the tangled space of encroaching borders and a new sign as equally enigmatic, “This is not the end”. The curtain closed.
Applause and more applause.  “That’s what I like,” said a young man beside me at the coffee bar where I was buying chocolate to sweeten the experience, “Intense,” he said "I liked the intensity of that piece”.  It was definitely intense I thought contemplating suicide.
My companion laughed when I said I could use with a little Swan Lake about now.  
Emily Molnar ensured we got something more and together all of the program made an organic whole
“Bill" was a Canadian premiere but first performed by the Batsheva Dance Company. Choreography was by Sharon Eval, born in Jerusalem, and Gai Behar of Tel Aviv. The music was by Ori Lichtik.
A single male dancer in white strutted almost smaltzilly across the stage. The music was East European Middle Eastern and each move of the dancer’s body was unique display of peacock finery.  As more dancer’s came on stage there was a shifting of music to increasing drums. At one point the dancers seemed like a collection of prehistoric birds calling cries to one another as they congregated. Again they transformed to a tribal grouping.  I found myself thinking of Africa.   Amazing choreography.  So much for the eye.  A group moving in ritual here while another combination of dancers erupted off to the side as three or more interpreted the music centre stage, layers upon layers with individuals flying off to the sides only to coalesce in the amazing drum beat.  A primitive chief arose, then it was as if Basheba had graced the stage.  Ancient movements of utter sensuality contrasting with the rhythmic abrupt frenzied patterns danced in the background. It was a kaleidoscope of dance that crescendoed to the falling of the curtain.
The whole audience erupted  in applause bursting to their feet with bravos and more. .  Bows and bows and more bows were made by the appreciative dancers. Everyone loved the piece.
What a wonderful night.
Outside I found my friend waxing poetic about the incredible emotional ride the collected works had provided. He especially loved the last one and was explaining the symbolism he saw to the beautiful young dancer who accompanied him.    We joined in, excited.  Voices entwining like dance.   It was all so novel, so visual and moving. Then we were laughing, parting, waving good byes and off to our cars.
What an incredible night at the Ballet.  Ballet BC, thank you.  Emily Molnar, Thank you.  Thank you to all of the dancers.

Ballet BC 30th Anniversary Season

What a joyful evening! Ballet BC has again outdone itself.  No individual performance, not a single outstanding piece de resistance tonight. Just simple grace of the whole with amazing choreography, lighting, set, music and voice. The ensemble was the thing. A fluid alive pulsating spectacular wonder of dance, bodies and minds melded with the beauty of theme, sound and silence.
Twenty eight thousand waves was whimsical yet deep, Choreographer Cayetano Soto  A touching piece of mastery.  The celebration of harmony in movement. Timing was everything. Everyone was there for each other.  On the mark.  Totally meditatively now.  An instant expanding in space with music touching soul.  A lovely moment by moment expression of form. Sufi-esque!
Awe was just that. Awe inspiring.   A world premiere.  The music and presence of world reknowned male vocal ensemble, Chor Leoni.  What a feast for eye and ear! A stupendous wedding of music, words, and dance.  Music of Janczak, Orff and Esenvalds with text of Leonard Cohen. Sheer brilliance.  A wonderful collaboration, Ballet BC and Chor Leoni.  Heavenly and Angelic.  I loved the interpretation.  Stijn Celis, Choreographer.  Erick Lichte, music director.  I feel truly blessed to have been there tonight. I could have gone home after seeing Awe and been simply fulfilled. A true dance and music extravaganza.
But then there was also Solo Echo. Choreographer, Crystal Pite.  The set design of Jay Gower Taylor and lighting by Tom Visser was the blessed backdrop to a dance of wisdom and spirituality.   The quote from Cayetano Soto in the program read, “I always find myself captivated by the thin line between life and death.”  The set and dance together spoke to this timeless space filling it with art and beauty. I was transfixed.  I simply loved this piece. The dancers were magnificent.
I love all the Ballet BC dancers individually but the corp is organic.  Tonight it was all about the troop, pas de dieu, pas de trois, men and women exploring.  The whole a thing alive.    I believe its ever increasing creativity,  cohesiveness and oneness reflects the visionary genius of artistic director,  Emily Molnar.
Of the dancers, Alexis Fletcher  is in her 11th season. I simply can’t get enough of her.  Every year I’ve watch her art grow. She is amazing.  Rachel Prince, 9 years with the company. stood out as well for me this night.  I loved too the maturity of Livonia Ellis dance interpretation. Now here 6 years,  I remember fondly her first season as if it were yesterday. Gilbert Small now in his 7th season is even more powerful today if such could be conceived.  Then Christoph von Riedman, in his second year,  shone  for me tonight. I love Rachel Meyers and Peter Smida is terrific.
The audience: intermission people watching has never been better.  Thank you young lady in the gold lame stilettos. Young man, your stylish and unique hair cut will definitely set a trend.  The model in that form fitting yellow dress  mesmerized her handsome partner.
But the best of all, this Vancouver audience collectively got it!   The volume of applause could challenge the theatres of New York and London.  There was that enthusiasm, appreciation and sophistication. The  packed  Queen Elizabeth Theatre, stood, clapping and cheering  fully appreciative of experiencing  culture in at it’s finest.  Thank you Ballet BC.  Thank you Chor Lioni.

Sweeny Todd, by Stephen Sondheim, Vancouver Opera at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre

I’ve seen several Sweeny Todd’s but this Sweeny Todd by the Vancouver Opera is by far the best.  Stephen Sondheim’s music is rockstar sensational and Jonathan Darlington’s musical direction is genius.  I loved Darlington’s opening performance the best.  Greer Grimsley, bass baritone, from New Orleans, plays Sweeny Todd and his performance alone was worth coming for. I’ve never heard such an incredible voice so perfect for this role.  That said, Luretta Bybee playing the pie lady Levitt  was so enjoyable to listen to and delightfully comedic.
Tenor Rocco Rupolo was equally a delight as the love struck sailor singing his heart out for Johanna Barker, played by soprano Caitlin Wood. I thought her first number ’shrill’ only to fall completely in love with her voice as it grew richer and warmer throughout the production.  The whole musical ensemble grew together this way crescendoing to a great finale.
Pascal Charbonneau’s tenor, as he played  Tobias was alive with character. I loved Karen Ydenberg’s soprano beggar woman performance.  David Curry, tenor, played Adolfo Pirelli hilariously and had an amazing voice that filled the hall with laughter.    Baritone Doug McNaughton played the evil judge so well that he really irritated me despite his masterful voice. Michael Barrett, tenor, played the horrid Beadle to vocal perfection.  Zacchary Reed Baritone sang immensely well in the part of Jonas Fogg.  I loved all the voices and all the costumes and all the acting and the ingenious set.
To a non opera going friend I said, Greer Grimsley’s voice is to opera what Wayne Goretsky’s stick handling is to hockey.  That good, my friend replied.  Yes, I said.  And Darlington is like the coach the Canucks needed to bring the Cup home.
As for the story, written by Hugh Wheeler, it’s rather tasteless, more like a fart joke than Steven King at his lowest. Hugh Wheeler clearly could have used editing by Monty Python. A vengeful barber slices the throats of his enemies and others rather indiscriminately while Mrs Lovett turns the corpses into pies for profit, selling human remains to the unaware cannibalistic masses. It’s as macabre as a Robert Picton Farm opera with Sarah McLaughlan  and Bryan Adams in happy pig costumes singing a Bare Naked Lady score.  Is someone in the VSO smoking BC Budd or are times so bad in Gotham Vancouver that the well heeled need this level of humour to continue their decadent businesses?

Carmen, the Opera, Vancouver 2014

I love music.  I love song.  I love the amazing capacity of the human voice. Opera is the penultimate expression of human vocal music. It’s the ballet of voice,  Amazing.  A learned experience.
I didn’t begin liking opera. I preferred Gordon Lightfoot, Joni Mitchell, Country Joe and the Fish, the Guess Who, Eagles,Dave Matthews Band to anything operatic for the longest time.  My friend Anna Borowska, a physician who also sings beautiful operatic soprano heavily influenced me. I liked Handel but hearing Messiah sung by her and friends at St. John’s Anglican Church one year really made me think there may be more to music than Banjo and Bluegrass.  I’ll always love Amy Grant and Third Day but really, maybe I could listen to more opera, and see if there’s something there for me.
So over the last decade, I took in a few of the Vancouver Opera Series and wasn’t disappointed.  It was different. Not reggae. And certainly not rapp.  Opera is a whole other world.  Out there, like Mars and the space probes.  Something to reach for.
I cried for the first time listening to a soprano sing this last spring at an opera I heard in the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow.  I came home and bought seasons tickets to the Vancouver Opera for the first time.  I've always liked seasons tickets to the BC Ballet and Pacific Theatre but this was the first time for me with opera.
Carmen was the VO's first production of the year. My friend, Laura, loves the opera.  It gives her a chance to wear her long gloves.  I’d taken her to Barber of Seville, another Vancouver Opera piece a couple of years before and she's been hooked ever since.
Opera stories are a bit odd. A barber who chops up people. Now Carmen , a bad girl who works in a tobacco factory, cuts up a girls face and then lures a good son and soldier from his duty and the good girlfriend to the life of a gypsy smuggler. Then she dumps him for another and he kills her. Domestic violence. Telling the ending in Opera isn’t a spoiler. The whole story is written in the program.  Nobody is there for the prose. It’s all about the music,
Bizet the french composer who died in 1875 wrote this amazing music that everyone knows. I recognized it right off.  Two of the pieces from Carmen are the most heard and most easily recognized opera musical lines in the world today.  Meanwhile Bizet wasn’t sure of himself.  Died shortly after Carmen first appeared and before it achieved almost universal fame.
It’s like “Don’t put on the red dress’ of modern day music.  Indeed a lot of this hysterical borderline personality disorder shallow lust theme is a kind of morality play. The music transcends all this.
I loved mezzo-soprano Ginger Costa-Jackson’s voice and performance as Carmen.  She was terrific. Her voice caught every nuance of emotion and filled the theatre. Her every movement oozed bad girl. Tenor Christopher Magiera played soldier Don Jose and was truly believable as the young duped lover who chose Carmen over Micaela, the woman who truly loved him performed by  Marianne Fiset.  Soprano Caitlin Wood, played  Fraguita and Mezzo Soprano Laurelle Jade Froese who played Mercedes were delightful, their songs and performances thoroughly entertaining.  I especially loved Baritone Morgan Smith who played Escamillo, the bull fighter who Carmen left soldier Don Jose for.  The chorus was stupendous.
Laura and I both loved the Orchestra conducted by Jacques Lacombe.  Director Joel Ivany outdid himself with all the activity and large cast.  Kinza Tyrrel as Children’s Chorus Director had reason to be proud of the performance of all the children.  Camellia Koos set design was unforgettable. The bull ring was truly inspired.   We loved it all.
All around, a great afternoon of entertainment.  The music so moved me, the voices sublime.  Laura loved it.  Packed Queen Elizabeth Theatre and roaring applause.

Ballet BC - Walking Mad

Another night at the Ballet BC! Three works: Walking Mad, a Canadian Premiere, by Johan Inger; Vitulaire, a World Premiere by Aszure Barton and 'between disappearing and becoming' a world premiere by Emily Molnar.  Emily Molnar, the Artistic Director of Ballet BC opened the night at Queen Elizabeth Theatre with enthusiasm and welcome.
"between disappearing and becoming'  was stark in blacks, whites and greys. The music was Hildur Gudnadottir. . The female dancers in black body suits and  ballet slippers on point moved like Swan Lake classics  in contrast to bare chested  men in suits powerfully striding.   The dance was an astonishing repetoire of unique moves, flowing and cascading across the stage.  The dance of the women captivated me most as they wove their bodies  in intricate tales of relational beauty.  The applause at curtain fall filled the theatre.
Vitulaire  show cased the music of Socalled, Stephen Hatfield, Brooklyn Rider, Dachev, Topferova and Tsvetkova. This was primal dance with folk roots and colourful gypsy costume.  What a joy to see Makailla Wallace and Alexis Fletcher dancing on stage together, two extraordinarily accomplished dancers whose every movement evokes music and rythmn! I loved the uplifting beat of this dance as the whole troop became tribal with irony. Guest artist Darren Devaney's gymnastic dance set a breakneck pace.   At intermission the audience seemed ready themselves to break out.  The applause was resounding.
Walking Mad with music from Ravel's  Bolero and Fur Alina was a thorough delight. Using a four doored folding wall as prop the dancers passed in and out of doors in party hats and bowlers careening  and carousing,  Gilbert Small,  Rachel Meyer,  Alyson Fretz and Maggie Forgerson individually danced with charm and grace amidst the departures and admissions.  So moved was the audience that the curtains fall brought the house to a standing ovation with calls of celebration as dancers bowed again and again and again.
The house was all but sold out.   Revitalized we left the theatre glad we'd braved the dark and cold rain.  Bliss,by Jose Navas,  the last Ballet BC performance of the season is May 10 to 12, when Vancouver's weather is made for a night on the town.