The Met seems to be attracting its share of controversy these days, first for opening with a non-traditional Tosca and more recently for the version in which it presented The Tales of Hoffmann. I didn’t see either production, so I’m not about to take sides here. But regardless of how effective the productions may or may not have been, I was dismayed when naysayers invoked something along the lines of “the composer’s intent.” I was glad to see this recent piece for the New York Times, in which Anthony Tommassini reminds us that strict suppositions about “the composer’s intent,” particularly those informed more by the manuscript page than the present-day stage, would have baffled most of the composers we seek to “protect” from interpretation.
Organizational adjustments
Glimmerglass Opera, like many arts organizations, has had to make some strategic, and very hard, decisions regarding the future of the company. We have had to make major adjustments to the company’s operating budget to meet our income projections – which, due to this economy as you may guess, are significantly lower than in the past.
The fact is, our audience members would never know about these adjustments – you certainly won’t be able to tell from our product this summer – our recent design presentations assured that. We will have four wonderful operas and maybe our best group of Young American Artists ever. The budget reductions touch all areas of operation. Sadly, our balanced budget comes at an extremely tangible cost for the Glimmerglass family. Some of these decisions have met with heartbreak and tears. This week, seven of our 29 full-time, year-round staff positions were eliminated. We have lost our extremely talented colleagues, and it is with great sadness that we make this announcement.
Michael MacLeod
General & Artistic Director
Copland on my mind
Set model for The Tender Land. Photo: Gabriel Oshen
Our 2010 Festival will include performances of Aaron Copland’s The Tender Land, and I’ve spent much of the fall happily immersed in all things Copland. The Brooklyn-born composer was born in 1900 and lived until 1990. His life spanned nearly the entire century, during which he met and worked with many remarkable individuals—a study of his life very quickly become an survey of American musical/cultural life in the twentieth century. Two books he completed with the help of Vivian Perlis, Copland: 1900-1942 and Copland: Since 1943, weave in first-person recollections from people like Nadia Boulanger, Leonard Bernstein, Virgil Thomson, Martha Graham… to name a few.
In September, I spent some time with the Aaron Copland Collection at the Library of Congress, a truly marvelous institution. It takes about as much time to obtain a reader’s card as it does to renew your driver’s license at a small-town DMV. With that card, I was able to request boxes of correspondence between Aaron Copland and Leonard Bernstein. Not photocopies, but the actual letters, telegrams, etc. If you’re not planning to be in Washington, DC anytime soon, many of the letters have been scanned and are available here.
Last Friday, the designers and directors of the 2010 season presented their preliminary ideas to a small group of staff and board members. The production for The Tender Land, designed by Donald Eastman and directed by Tazewell Thompson, reminds me of the music—spacious and simple, yet richly textured.
The State of Stage Photography
La Cenerentola, 2009
Kelley Rourke, Glimmerglass Opera’s dramaturg, recently directed me to the theater blog of The Guardian, where Andrew Haydon discusses the state of stage photography. His post is a fascinating read, and the contributed comments are insightful.
Glimmerglass has worked with several great photographers and photography interns, who have taken extremely beautiful and creative production shots. It is interesting to see which photographs are primarily used in the end. Many opinions and factors are considered when production photographs are chosen for publicity or other purposes, as many of the comments on Haydon’s blog suggest. Check out some recent Glimmerglass Opera production photographs on the company’s press site. What do you think?
