Tchaikovsky’s ‘Eugene Onegin’ at the Granada
With all due respect to Opera Santa Barbara, the opera event of the year may well take place this weekend when the Music Academy (MA) mounts an original and fully-staged production of Tchaikovsky’s popular and beloved opera Eugene Onegin at the Granada on Friday night and Sunday afternoon. Especially if Peter Kazaras’ direction comes close to the clever, approachable, and incredibly engaging 10-minute synopsis of the plot he shared with this writer that began with likening the misadventures of the title character with what might happen when a kid gets a Maserati for his 16th birthday from his well-to-do parents.
Based on Alexander Pushkin’s famous novel, Onegin is a tale of love, hope, loss, betrayal, jealousy, revenge, privilege, and more, including Onegin’s narcissism. “There is really no other way to put it,” said Kazaras, who portrayed the character’s best friend-turned-rival, Lensky, several times during his career as a tenor, boasting multiple appearances at the Met and Houston Grand.
Daniela Candillari, in her third year at the Academy, adds to the star quotient of the opera – her profile soaring after conducting Terence Blanchard’s Fire Shut Up in My Bones at Lyric Opera of Chicago and Matthew Aucoin’s Eurydice at the Met since last summer.
Kazaras, the Director of Opera UCLA (where he mentored Academy wunderkind James Darrah, among others) who previously ran Seattle Opera’s Young Artists program, marveled at the level of the vocal fellows in his debut at the institute. Here, he’s helping shape the young singers’ approach via Tchaikovsky’s classic that features parties and dance numbers as well as a series of arias and duets that move the story along even more than the grand scenes.
“I am fascinated by bodies in motion, where they go on stage, and how they interact,” Kazaras said. “And the beauty of the work is in its intimacy.”
To mark MA’s 75th anniversary, the director has also developed a framing device set in 1947 to pay tribute to the institute’s founder Lotte Lehmann, as well as Marilyn Horne.
‘When you go on stage, you are being your own performer, but you are also carrying with you all the history and experience of the singers who came before you,” he explained. “That’s true for everyone, the audience included.”
Upcoming@MA
Thursday, July 14: If you need any more evidence that this 75th anniversary season is anything but run-of-the-mill, consider that tonight’s second Picnic Concert of the summer actually has a title. Extremely Close could be describing the relationships between the instrumental fellows who have self-selected both their ensembles and their repertoire, but it actually refers to the title of a piece, to be performed by Charles Johnson on bass trombone and Yu-Ting Peng on piano, composed by Daniela Candillari, the one and the same musician who will be conducting two performances of the Academy annual opera, Eugene Onegin, at the Granada Friday and Sunday. Also on the bill of fare: Schubert’s perennially popular “‘Trout’ Piano Quintet” and Brahms’ “String Sextet in B-flat Major, Op. 18.” Not too shabby. (7:30 pm; Hahn Hall; free-$40)
Saturday, July 16: A few of the instrumental fellows who aren’t part of the Academy’s opera orchestra aren’t just sitting on their hands this weekend. Instead, they’ll be performing in the next installment of the Academy’s new Chamber Night series, part of the institute’s increased focus on chamber music curriculum, which matches fellows with faculty artists for intensive coachings culminating in evening concerts of a curated program. Guests are invited to enjoy complimentary wine during the intimate and casual event in Lehmann Hall, tonight putting the spotlight on the piano with Brahms’ “Piano Quartet No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 60, ‘Werther’” (Whitney Takata, violin; Vincenzo Keawe Calcagno, viola; Sophie van der Sloot, cello; and Victoria Wong, piano) and Faure’s “Piano Quartet No. 1 in C Minor, Op. 15” (Christina Nam, violin; Clara Bouch, viola; Jakub Wycislik, cello; Lucas Amory, piano). (7:30 pm; free-$40)
Tuesday, July 19: X2 with something new. The series that features fellows flanking faculty for finely curated chamber music concerts has but one even semi-familiar piece on the program. Bach’s “Passacaglia and Fugue in C Minor,” is a bold bit of brass bravado featuring four trumpets, three trombones, two horns, and a tuba conducted by Mark H. Lawrence. The brass faculty vet also wields the baton for Paul Terracini’s Gegensätze and John Mackey’s Hymn to a Blue Hour performed mostly by fellows, the three pieces together representing what might have otherwise been this year’s brass concert, as all of the 15 section fellows are involved. Also on the bill: Suite from La revue de cuisine, a 95-year-old ballet in one act by Czech composer Bohuslav Martinů, and No Uncertain Terms, which MA guest composer Nico Muhly wrote in 2017 and dedicated to Steve Reich as an archive of the ways the minimalist master’s music influenced Muhly. All told, it’s a generous and generations-spanning selection. (7:30 pm; Lobero Theatre, $10-$59)
Wednesday, July 20: In a rare day this season with more than two master classes, visitors can first attend a vocal session coached by Margo Garrett, an in-demand collaborative pianist who has enjoyed long partnerships with sopranos Kathleen Battle and Dawn Upshaw, to name just two (1:30 pm; Hahn Hall; free-$10)… Stick around Hahn for the piano master class led by composer Muhly, who writes orchestral music, works for the stage (Two Boys and Marnie for the Met Opera, e.g., plus several ballets), chamber music (see above), film scores (The Reader and Kill Your Darlings), and collaborations with pop artists (Sufjan Stevens, The National, James Blake, and Paul Simon). We imagine we might hear some of his more interesting works interpreted by the fellows (3:30 pm; Hahn Hall; free-$10)… Or buckle up for the Trombone & Tuba class with one of last night’s performers, Nitzan Haroz, who resumed his 25-year tenancy as principal trombone of the Philadelphia Orchestra in 2014 after a two-year hiatus holding down the same position with the Los Angeles Philharmonic (3:30 pm; Weinman Hall; free-$10)… Tonight, a special Showcase Concert stars yet another of the Academy’s acclaimed composers-in-residence for 2022, Molly Joyce, who The Washington Post recently deemed one of the “most versatile, prolific, and intriguing composers working under the vast new-music dome,” praising her work that is concerned with disability as a creative source. Joyce has an impaired left hand as a result of a car accident, and her primary vehicle in composition and performance is an electric vintage toy organ, an instrument she bought on eBay and which suits her body and engages her disability. The then-28-year-old’s 2020 debut full-length album, Breaking and Entering, has been lauded by New Sounds as “a powerful response to something that is still too often stigmatized, but that Joyce has used as a creative prompt.” After delivering eight of her songs as a solo performer – including the appropriately titled Occhiolism and Onism – Joyce will witness the world premiere of her newest piece, the Academy-commissioned Imperfection, played by fellows Kenneth Naito and Clara Schubilske on violin; Marcus Stevenson, viola; and Colin Hill, cello. (7:30 pm; Hahn Hall; free-$40)
