The opera Postcard from Morocco began with all of the characters walking busily across the stage. The story line is set of ordinary people, on an ordinary day, waiting for an ordinary train. In part a good opinion to sum performance of this opera up is, ordinary. It did have its high and low points that sent me to this conclusion. For starters I found the performance of the Duquesne contemporary ensemble to be magnificent. David Stock was the music director and guided the various musicians throughout the opera amazingly. Improvisation was used on many occasions, and the combination of call and response with the singers and musicians was great.
To gain my attention in the beginning of the opera was a vocal fight over a dream of having a boat between Matt Morgan's character and Matthew Shaw's character. This was a most pleasant display of range and delivery. Shaw obviously used techniques studied while he was at the Manhattan school of music and opera theatre, where he acquired his master of music degree. I felt Matt Morgan was a bit over acted on some of the vocal parts and had trouble following the music played at points, but an overall performance was adequate. Also, The knock off of the titanic when the two are pushing around on a janitors cart was a bit out of place. With Shaw being a Bass-Baritone, he really brought out the low range of voice integers, which made the difference in the first half of the opera.
During the middle of the opera, Coral Owdom performed a solo. Ms. Owdom received her bachelor of music degree from the university of Dayton followed by a master's degree in music at the Manhattan school of music in the spring of 2000. The performance was great vocally. The use of deep bass from the musicians emphasized changes in her performance and also in the whole opera. But, in a performance, I think it is important to know your audience and adapt to the stylistic comfort that they would most likely be at. When Owdom's character performed a great musical piece, and great example of how a soprano should sound, she turned the opera into a strip tease for the 15 minutes she was singing her solo. There were comments in the crowd from Grandmothers to Grandson's to close their eyes.
Their acting chops were very impressive whether it was comedic, emotional, or just stunning overall. Yet, on the other hand, some minor characters weren’t as well heard as others. I feel as the play could be better if some of the minor characters had projected their voice more, allowing their character to be known. However, although some voices were much stronger than others, all actors were full of talent, capable of dealing with script’s requirements, and did a good job
I could see how Harold Hill’s tactic changed from something along the lines of ‘to deceive’ to ‘to woo’ around the song “The sadder but wiser girl”. Marian Paroo’s tactic also changes from ‘to avoid’ to ‘to love’ around “My white Knight”. These actors also projected extremely well, as I could hear everything being said. They articulated well too, which I believe must be hard for them as every character had a southern accent. The actors easily incorporated their character’s goals into their acting and onstage
The production had many elements which for the most part formed a coalition to further the plot. The characters, the three part scenery and costumes represented well the period of time these people were going through. As far as the performers entering and exiting the stage, it could have been more organized. There were a few times when the performers exited at the wrong times or it seemed so due to the echo of the music. At certain moments the music was slightly loud and drowned the performers. Many of the songs dragged on, so the pacing could have been more effectively executed. Though the music was off at times, the director's decision to have most of the songs performed center sage was a wise one. Also the implementation of actual white characters that were competent in their roles came as a great surprise to the audience and heightened the realism.
Overall I truly enjoyed myself at the opera. It gave me a new perception on plays and operas, before I went I thought it would be cut and dry and I would be ready to leave as soon as I got there, but it was the complete opposite of that. I laughed, I wanted to cry (but I didn’t), and I felt the energy from the stage. I did recommend this opera to some of my friends and I will recommend it to more people because it was really, really good. All of the music was well executed and performed beautifully. I can see myself checking out more operas and plays here at USC, they are really good way to spend an evening enjoying classical music and a good show.
... as the music. James Levine, the conductor, as well as the entire orchestra really captured the essence of what each of the scenes in both acts were trying to convey as well the emotion. The orchestra played fantastically and the performers sang and acted beautifully. I thought the set, the scenery, and the costumes were very elaborate and decorative. I really enjoyed the story the opera told and the dramatics it involved. What really captivated me was that Cosi fan Tutte was also somewhat of a comedy. There were parts of the performance that made me laugh. I enjoyed the fact that it was not such a serious opera. The opera was light, enjoyable, somewhat comical, dramatic, and romance filled. The concert environment was intriguing. I really admired the Metropolitan Opera House. The design, architecture, overall appearance of the opera house. It was very exquisite.
Eastern Washington University Department of Music presented a program of Opera works by Giacomo Puccini, Aron Copland, W.A. Mozart, John Dowland, Franz Shubert, Maurice Ravel, and Robert Schumann on Friday, March 7, 6:30 p.m., in the Music Building, Recital Hall. These Opera works were sung by Senior Recitalist, Alexandra Rannow.
Besides the fact that I didn't like this play, the actors did do a pretty good job with their acting and memorization of their lines. Couple times Marisol hesitated with her lines but it wasn't too bad. I like the accents they were using. It wasn't to hard to understand what they were saying, but once again there were those times when their accents did effect a little on their pronunciations and my understanding on what they were saying. Overall, I don't think they were too believable with their characters. They didn't reach me.
Overall this production was very interesting and well performed. It was somewhat enjoyable to the audience, there were times of boringness but the comedy kept the play interesting. The director did a great job of putting everything together and as a result everything was on point. The only thing to say that would better the play is to make the play more interesting to the audience so that the audience does not get tired of watching.
... made it last a long time. The work that they did paved the road for the people that are going to come down the road that they have done. The principles that they have put down make opera a genre of classical music. Nineteenth century was a century that marks its time in the history books for the rest of time. From the composers to the events that happen that this century was the best one that happened for opera.
The dynamics were played out excellently by the use of unity of time, place, and action. The climate was heated and so too were the members of the jury as the story progressed. The characters grew to understand each other and the audience learns more and more about the individuals. Perhaps, the motive for that said characters verdict or backstory on the matter. A few characters were highly stereotypical and the actors did a worthy job in portrayed them as accurately as possible. For such a short production, it was an extremely elaborate one. The absence of an intermission also played an important role in keeping the audience submerged in the action. The use of the thrust stage made the acting and situation feel more real. The message was powerful and received well by the audience.
Noble, Yvonne, ed. Twentieth Century Interpretations of The Beggar=s Opera. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1975.
Though, Maria Callas gained her reputation by performing outstanding musical concerts and displaying enriching vocal sounds, contrary in contrast to Madonna. Callas became known as one of the most renowned operatic divas of the mid-twentieth century shortly after ‘culminating in a ‘stunning’ performance in 1949 in Bellini’s I Puritani at La Fenice Theatre, Venice’ (Moohan, E,. 2008, p.192). Having had ‘an extraordinarily and sensitive way of acting the words as she sang them’ (Phillip, R,.
All in all I thoroughly enjoyed Puccini's La Boheme. After watching this opera I became much more familiar with The New City Opera and the Lincoln Center Opera House. I not only learned much more about opera itself; I also was able to discover a new personal musical liking. I have a found a new love interest in the opera. It is true to say that music has a large emotional effect on one's self. After exiting the opera I was in a completely different mind set than I was upon entering. Even though I had just sat through a tragic love story, I was smiling. I was smiling because as a result of my reaction to the opera, I realized that music does indeed have a huge effect on our personal life no matter what way you look at it, and this makes me happy.
The musical performance aspect of my paper was not an issue to complete. If you go to Little Italy, New York on any given weekend, especially around the holiday season or the San Gennaro Festival, musical performers are usually playing on the streets. There are many restaurants in Little Italy, Manhattan that have live entertainment; most of these musical performers will come to your table. When it came to comparing the musical traditions of Italy to the Italian-American performance that I observed, I had a little more trouble. Italian music is such a large topic to delve into–there are so many composers and different types of music that it made it difficult to narrow down my research for this paper. In future research among this community, I would suggest that the student is aware of what type of performance they are going to observe—I was unaware of whether the musician would be a Classical Italian performer or an Italian American performer. In my opinion, most of the performers in Little Italy, Manhattan seems to be Italian-American.
Even though many find opera unintelligible, overwhelming, and boring, opera continues to be a popular form of storytelling. People love the drama and the musical masterpieces written by well-known French, Italian, and German composers. The addition of beautiful costumes and eye-catching scenery make opera an attractive form of entertainment. However, even with all these positive elements, many avoid opera like the plague. The goal of this paper is to help eliminate these negative opinions by educating the opera challenged, to love, or at least tolerate the fine art of opera.