Adamantine goat
Mar. 18th, 2004 10:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
magidLast night I went to the 66th Lowell House Opera. On the program were two pieces, Igor Stravinsky's L'Histoire du Soldat and Maurice Ravel's L'Enfant et les Sortileges, which is apparently based on a poem by Colette.
I'd not been to a production in Lowell House before; the space is lovely, with tall arching windows along one side and an absolutely enormous crystal chandelier hanging above. It's a rather long space, which makes it harder to put a show in. And I found out why performances aren't until 8:30 pm: the actors and crew have to have time to set up the space for the performance after dinner, since it's also a dining hall. On the upside, this meant that there aren't fixed seats, and most of the seats were armchairs, too.
The set-up was impressive. Just in front of the audience on one side were a row of people with computers controlling lights and other effects. In front of them were the orchestra (a smaller group for the Stravinsky (11 people) than for the Ravel(75 people)), the conductor in very proper tails and white bow tie. Unfortunately, since there wasn't a pit, he blocked the middle of the stage for some of the audience. In front of the orchestra was the raised stage, which seemed to be a square with posts at the corners to support the sets of curtains. Hanging on the front plane of the cube thusly described was a white rectangle, which was where the subtitles were projected. Since they were above the action of the stage, subtitles doesn't seem quite the right term, though.
First up was L'Histoire du Soldat, the story of a soldier enticed by the devil to trade his violin for a magic book. Not surprisingly, nothing good comes out of this trade for the soldier. What was surprising was that this was not an opera at all (I had no idea beforehand what this would be like). It was a musical piece, with a three people speaking the French parts (which were sometimes hard to hear, but there were the subtitles I assume most of the audience was using), three other people dancing the roles on stage, and two large rectangles upon which colored slides were projected as well. Multi-media, indeed. The dancers were talented, the French accents good (from what I heard of them), the story sad.
L'Enfant et les Sortileges is an odd sort of opera, about a boy who is naughty, refusing to do his homework, and the things around him come alive, castigating him for his thoughtless and hurtful ways. The program had a longer precis, which helped figure out who the different characters were, since they weren't costumed as the objects, but as gentlemen and ladies from the late 1800s or so. It's a bizarre story, all around, and I suspect the plot would be less understandable without the notes. However, the production was interesting. There was a lot of use made of four screens moved around to break up the space in a variety of ways, and to project shadows of objects, to imply the characters about to appear (such as the armchair and the rocking chair, or the tea kettle and the china cup). That worked very well, except for the shepherds off the wallpaper, which was harder to do (they bemoaned the loss of their adamantine goat, and their pink and green? blue? sheep). I also liked when the boy was attacked by Arithmetic (how often does that happen?), though the costumes for most of them were really much more geometric, which different shapes held up to the faces. Oh, and the cats were wonderful, miaowing to each other, one in a lovely collapsible top hat, the other in a long white evening dress.
I was left with the impression that Ravel (or Colette?) might've been somehow slightly drug-induced while writing, but definitely interesting. And short (under an hour). I'm not a huge opera fan, but perhaps I'll see what they put on next year.
I'd not been to a production in Lowell House before; the space is lovely, with tall arching windows along one side and an absolutely enormous crystal chandelier hanging above. It's a rather long space, which makes it harder to put a show in. And I found out why performances aren't until 8:30 pm: the actors and crew have to have time to set up the space for the performance after dinner, since it's also a dining hall. On the upside, this meant that there aren't fixed seats, and most of the seats were armchairs, too.
The set-up was impressive. Just in front of the audience on one side were a row of people with computers controlling lights and other effects. In front of them were the orchestra (a smaller group for the Stravinsky (11 people) than for the Ravel(75 people)), the conductor in very proper tails and white bow tie. Unfortunately, since there wasn't a pit, he blocked the middle of the stage for some of the audience. In front of the orchestra was the raised stage, which seemed to be a square with posts at the corners to support the sets of curtains. Hanging on the front plane of the cube thusly described was a white rectangle, which was where the subtitles were projected. Since they were above the action of the stage, subtitles doesn't seem quite the right term, though.
First up was L'Histoire du Soldat, the story of a soldier enticed by the devil to trade his violin for a magic book. Not surprisingly, nothing good comes out of this trade for the soldier. What was surprising was that this was not an opera at all (I had no idea beforehand what this would be like). It was a musical piece, with a three people speaking the French parts (which were sometimes hard to hear, but there were the subtitles I assume most of the audience was using), three other people dancing the roles on stage, and two large rectangles upon which colored slides were projected as well. Multi-media, indeed. The dancers were talented, the French accents good (from what I heard of them), the story sad.
L'Enfant et les Sortileges is an odd sort of opera, about a boy who is naughty, refusing to do his homework, and the things around him come alive, castigating him for his thoughtless and hurtful ways. The program had a longer precis, which helped figure out who the different characters were, since they weren't costumed as the objects, but as gentlemen and ladies from the late 1800s or so. It's a bizarre story, all around, and I suspect the plot would be less understandable without the notes. However, the production was interesting. There was a lot of use made of four screens moved around to break up the space in a variety of ways, and to project shadows of objects, to imply the characters about to appear (such as the armchair and the rocking chair, or the tea kettle and the china cup). That worked very well, except for the shepherds off the wallpaper, which was harder to do (they bemoaned the loss of their adamantine goat, and their pink and green? blue? sheep). I also liked when the boy was attacked by Arithmetic (how often does that happen?), though the costumes for most of them were really much more geometric, which different shapes held up to the faces. Oh, and the cats were wonderful, miaowing to each other, one in a lovely collapsible top hat, the other in a long white evening dress.
I was left with the impression that Ravel (or Colette?) might've been somehow slightly drug-induced while writing, but definitely interesting. And short (under an hour). I'm not a huge opera fan, but perhaps I'll see what they put on next year.
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Date: 2004-03-18 02:06 pm (UTC)I'm surprised the Stravinsky orchestra had 11 instruments, as the piece was only scored for 7.
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Date: 2004-03-22 12:30 am (UTC)I didn't count the actual musicians for the Stravinsky, just counted those listed in the program. There may have been fewer for any given performance, I don't know.