Words + Music = Great Opera

Behind every great opera lurks a great libretto. Sometimes wonderful music can mask a weak story and weak libretto (script) but, in my opinion, for an opera to achieve greatness and universal, on-going acceptance, the libretto must also be of the first rank. The poet/playwright must not only supply inspiration to the composer but also deliver to the audience a moving and literate script.

For Lillian Alling we have such a libretto – and such a librettist. I am so honoured and thrilled to be working with the esteemed Canadian playwright John Murrell, who has supplied us with a stirring, mysterious, and moving libretto for our world premiere.

John is one of Canada’s most distinguished and most frequently produced playwrights (as well as a highly regarded arts advocate, mentor, and consultant). His plays have been translated into 15 languages and performed in more than 30 countries.

His best-known plays include Memoir, Waiting for the Parade, Democracy, The Faraway Nearby, Farther West, and New World. He is also a successful translator of classic theatre texts, including works by Chekhov, Sophocles, Ibsen, and Racine. He has adapted Homer’s Odyssey for young audiences, written scenarios for new works by Ballet British Columbia and The National Ballet of Canada, and the screenplay for a recent award-winning film, The Secret of the Nutcracker, produced by CBC in collaboration with Alberta Ballet.

But let’s talk about opera! “The two Johns” – Murrell and Estacio – have developed into a wonderful operatic team. Their first opera was the celebrated Filumena (2003) produced first by Calgary Opera then the Banff Centre; it was the centrepiece of The Alberta Scene at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa. Presented by the Edmonton Opera in November 2005, Filumena was filmed for CBC-TV’s Opening Night series and has twice been nationally telecast. Filumena was followed by Frobisher (2007), also produced by Calgary Opera and The Banff Centre.

I believe that allowing a creative team to develop over the creation of more than work is very important. Think of the great opera-writing teams: Mozart and da Ponte (The Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni, Cosi fan tutte), Verdi and Piave (Rigoletto, Macbeth, La Forza del Destino), Strauss and Hofmannsthal (Ariadne auf Naxos, Der Rosenkavalier, Elektra). They were able to work together over the course of years, learning from one another, bending to accommodate one another’s strengths, developing a cohesiveness that comes only from experience.

The team of John Murrell and John Estacio has done this, thanks to Calgary Opera, The Banff Centre and Vancouver Opera, who have given them the opportunity – the freedom – to explore this art form together. Of course, the ultimate beneficiary of this luxury is the audience. I know when we hear this opera in October we will realize that this is a team that is seasoned and in its prime. Here are two samples of John’s text for Lillian Alling, with accompanying piano/vocals from our most recent workshop.

Lillian strikes out across the country, all alone, searching for the man who went before her. She is awed by the land, its stark beauty, and its promise of freedom:

LILLIAN:
The land is large and smooth and green.
I hear many birds, I hear no war.
Such quiet I have not heard before…
A place of questions, not answers,
Of mistakes they do not call sins.
Here nothing,
Nothing is ending.
Everything,
Everything begins!

The land is large and smooth and green,
A quiet never heard before.
Its windows are open, so is its door…
A place of prairies, not gardens,
Not ghettos and cities, but farms.
Not sadness,
Not shadows, but sunlight.
Everything,
Everything warms!

I walk and the land comes out to meet me.
I rest and the land lies down for a while.
The land stretches out its hand to greet me,
Mile after mile after mile after mile…!

The land is large by day or night.
A music never heard before…
I hear its clear voice
In the telegraph lines:
“You are welcome,” it says,
“Go where you will.
Here everything,
Everything shines!”



Later in Act One, the young farmer Kristian falls quickly and rather hard for Lillian as she passes through looking for her betrothed. He cannot convince her to stay with him awhile, and shares his frustration and loneliness:

KRISTIAN:
I cannot leave my father,
Though I dream of it all the time.
You have traveled.
Please let me ask you:
Does it feel lonely,
Or does it feel free?
Does every new day fill you with strength,
Or does it fill you with fear?
I know everything about North Dakota,
I know everything about here…
The here and the now.
But I would love to learn about what’s out there…
What the future might look like…somehow.
Will you stay and teach me, just a few days?
When I saw you, I could see
That you are traveling
To find a brand-new life.
I cannot believe that is with Jozéf.
I cannot believe it is being his wife!
(He looks at her longingly.)
Lillian Alling...
Lillian Alling...
Lillian Alling...

LILLIAN:
What is your name?

KRISTIAN:
Kristian.

LILLIAN:
Kristian.



I think you can tell from these two brief selections that these are beautiful and descriptive words and music. The opera is filled with such moments – moments brought to us by Canada’s foremost operatic team.

~ James W. Wright, General Director

Credits:
Allison Angelo, soprano
Colin Ainsworth, tenor
Kinza Tyrrell, piano
Recorded January 3, 2010 at the Glenn Gould Studio, Toronto
Used with permission

John Estacio Gets It: Writing an Opera for the Audience

Music Dramaturge Les Dala and John Estacio (in foreground)looking over Lillian libretto

Full-length, “main stage” operas don’t grow on trees! There are many reasons, including the expense to produce and the risk of presenting new work to an audience accustomed to the “classics.” “R&D” money is practically non-existent for a not-for-profit arts organization, as is the ability – the luxury – to do extensive test-marketing!

But another – very important – reason is that there are not very many composers who “get” opera and who can also compose works that are musically and thematically appealing to traditional opera company audiences. We are very fortunate: we have John Estacio. When I heard John’s first opera, Filumena (with libretto by John Murrell), I knew I’d found the guy to write an opera for Vancouver Opera. I haven’t been disappointed. His music is emotional and expressive. What I’m hearing in our Lillian Alling workshops are tuneful arias, big chorus numbers, and lush orchestration.

After listening to a workshop performance of Lillian Alling in December, Vancouver Sun music writer David Gordon Duke wrote that “Estacio has made powerful, passionate music, and he’s not afraid of a good tune when one seems to be required.”
John has served as Composer in Residence for the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra, the Calgary Philharmonic, and the Calgary Opera. These residencies yielded several orchestral and choral works including his operas Filumena and Frobisher. CBC Records released Frenergy, the Music of John Estacio, featuring several of the orchestral works Estacio composed during his residencies in Edmonton and Calgary. The CD was nominated for two JUNO awards, including a nomination for Outstanding Classical Composition. It also received the Western Canadian Music’s “Outstanding Classical Recording Award.” His string quartet, Test Run, which he composed for the Banff International String Quartet competition, was also nominated for a JUNO. In 2008 he received an AMPIA Award for his first film score for The Secret of the Nutcracker.

Filumena premiered in 2003 at Calgary Opera and was also produced at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa April 2005, at the 2005 Banff Summer Arts Festival, and at the Edmonton Opera November 2005. Filumena was filmed for television and received its national television premiere in 2006.

According to the CBC, “Composer John Estacio and librettist John Murrell scored by taking their cue from Puccini and Verdi with this old-school tragedy about Italian immigrant bootleggers in Prohibition-era Alberta.” The Calgary Herald said, “John Estacio's score is eclectic and neo-romantic. Employing melodic styles that emulate Italian popular tunes, Scottish hymns and soaring Puccini-inflected idioms, the music effortlessly underlines the complex social mix of the various characters, the emotional high points achieved through melody and romantic climax.”

John is keenly attentive and active during the workshop process, often going back to his hotel room to do re-writes of sections of music that didn’t quite work. Singers are often presented with new music the next morning that solves a particular staging or orchestra or transitional problem. And the process is repeated again the next day and the next. After going through five workshops John is now orchestrating the piece. Full piano vocal scores have made available to the singers, a conductor’s score will be printed, and individual orchestra parts will be distributed this summer.

One of Canada’s most successful composers, Estacio's orchestra works are frequently performed by such illustrious ensembles as The St. Louis Symphony, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, The Winnipeg Symphony, and others, including The Los Angeles Philharmonic which, along with tenor Ben Heppner, recently toured Europe with John’s arrangements of Seven Songs of Jean Sibelius.

Estacio studied music and composition at Wilfrid Laurier University and the University of British Columbia. He attained national recognition after receiving an award in The Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra's Canadian Composers Competition in 1992. In addition to writing music during his residencies, he has written for the Vancouver Symphony, the Toronto Symphony, l'Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, and the CBC Radio Orchestra. The Vancouver Bach Choir John recently performed his cantata The Houses Stand Not Far Apart commissioned by The Bach Choir, the Grand Philharmonic, Chorus Niagara, and the Richard Eaton Singers.

In November The National Arts Centre announced that Estacio was a recipient of the NAC Award for composers, along with Peter Paul Koprowski, and Ana Sokolovic, all three talented Canadian contemporary composers with enviably successful careers.

It is a very special thing for an opera company to commission and premiere a new, full-size opera! We are so fortunate to have Canada’s foremost creative team preparing our world premiere for this October. Stay tuned for more about this extraordinary project in the months ahead.

~ James W. Wright, General Director