Monthly Archives: July 2016

HOT’s Orvis Opera Studio Live in Concert with Maestro Tim Shaindlin

The HOT Orvis Opera Studio: Live in Concert with Maestro Timothy Shaindlin

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Honolulu, Hawaii – Hawaii Opera Theatre (HOT) presents the HOT Orvis Opera Studio: Live in Concert with Maestro Timothy Shaindlin, on August 6, 2016, at the Sacred Hearts Academy Chapel. This free event is offered by of HOT’s Education Department.

Singers from the Mae Z. Orvis Opera Studio will perform in this free concert featuring opera arias and other classical music favorites led by Maestro Timothy Shaindlin.  The event is the culmination of the singers’ work, after two weeks spent with Maestro Shaindlin.

Maestro Timothy Shaindlin has been on the faculty of the Yale School of Music since 2008 and has served on the music staffs of the Metropolitan Opera, New York City Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Washington National Opera, San Diego Opera, and multiple world-renowned companies. Mr. Shaindlin has played in classes and coachings for some of world’s most beloved voices including such artists as Joan Sutherland, Birgit Nilsson, Luciano Pavarotti, and Frederica von Stade, who Stade returns to HOT next Spring in Jake Heggie’s modern opera, Three Decembers.

In addition to his work as a Coach and Teacher, Mr. Shaindlin has had engagements on the podium with the Wolf Trap Opera Festival and Chicago Opera Theatre. He most recently conducted HOT’s production of The Mikado (2014), which performed for audiences in Honolulu and on Maui.

Founded in 1998 by HOT’s Artistic Director, Henry Akina, the Mae Z. Orvis Opera Studio provides training and performance experiences, with classes and seminars in movement, musical style, language, repertoire coaching and vocal master classes. The Studio is home to some of Hawaii’s finest vocal talent. Members of the studio have gone on to be cast in HOT performances and productions around the world, most notably international star Baritone Quinn Kelsey, who thrilled audiences this past June with his performance in Verdi’s Rigoletto in Concert.

The HOT Orvis Opera Studio: Live in Concert with Timothy Shaindlin will be held on August 6, 2016, starting at 7:00pm. Doors to the public will open at 6:30pm.

Both on street and limited parking are available at Sacred Hearts Academy. Please call 808-596-7372 to RSVP.

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The HOT Take Abroad Pt. 3 – Boris Godunov

The BBC Proms is one of the world’s biggest music festivals, with over 70 concerts in 2 months, most of which take place at London’s Royal Albert Hall.

Royal Albert Hall

On Saturday, Prom number 2 was a concert performance of Mussorgsky’s epic opera, Boris Godunov, by the Royal Opera House.  As with HOT’s recent concert performance, the chorus and orchestra were onstage throughout, with the soloists entering and exiting according to the score.  Since this production had already been performed fully staged at the Royal Opera House, the soloists were in costume.

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Boris Godunov

The vast scale of the Royal Albert Hall was very much suited to Mussorgsky’s great dramatic work, with a full-voiced chorus of 80, and peals of bells in the upper gallery.  The title role was superbly sung by the renowned Welsh baritone, Bryn Terfel, who managed to bring both majesty and pathos to the role. The rest of the cast was equally divided between Russian and British singers, with excellent singing all round, particularly from John Graham Hall (Prince Shuisky) and Andrii Goniukov (Varlaam).  The conductor was Sir Antonio Pappano, Music Director of the Royal Opera since 2002, and one of the world’s finest opera conductors. I had the privilege of working with him several times in Scotland in the 1990’s. His mastery of the score kept the music flowing evenly, with huge climaxes as well as beautifully intimate moments, over the 2 hours and fifteen minutes of the piece, which was performed without intermission.

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The previous evening we had seen a delightful and lavish production of Jerome Kern’s Showboat at the New London Theatre, with an immensely talented cast, and bursting with great tunes!  Variety is the spice of life!

The HOT Take Abroad Pt. 2

Jonathan Dove’s In Damascus

Snape Maltings

Snape Maltings

It is wonderful to be in Aldeburgh, the home of Benjamin Britten, and the venue for his Aldeburgh Festival. We visited the Red House, where Britten and his partner Peter Pears lived, and the Snape Maltings, the concert hall where the Festival is based.  I sang there with King’s College Choir many years ago.

Jonathan Dove

Jonathan Dove

Last night there was a concert featuring a new piece by Jonathan Dove, who was in Hawaii last year for HOT’s production of his opera Siren Song. Jonathan’s new work is a wonderfully evocative song cycle for string quartet and tenor, performed by Mark Padmore, who was my roommate at King’s.  He is now one of the leading English tenors in oratorio and recital repertoire, and his lyrical and authoritative performance was both impressive and deeply moving.  The poetry is by the Syrian writer, Ali Safar, in a translation by Anne-Marie McManus, and Jonathan displays his extraordinary ability to set words to music, unleashing the bleak despair and real human grief of the Syrian civil war, while holding out the promise of future hope.

Mark Padmore

Mark Padmore

“I don’t think any nations in existence will match Syrians in their expressions of sadness, their airing of grief.”

In the first half of the concert there was a world premiere performance of another new song cycle by the young English composer, Jordan Hunt, for Soprano and Piano Trio.  And the same forces also performed Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems of Alexander Blok.  Soprano, Katherine Broderick, was ravishing in both works, especially Jordan Hunt’s emotional account of the death of his partner and subsequent isolation.

“Your shoulder to cry
Your anchor at sea
Your pinion to fly
Your atlas to be free.”

The HOT Take Abroad

HOT General Director Simon Crookall is providing The HOT Take while abroad in England.  Enjoy!

Tristan and Isolde, English National Opera, London
image1This was a stunning, new production, with designs by the Indian sculptor, Anish Kapoor, famous for his large-scale installations. The set was strikingly dramatic, featuring large abstract structures in the center of the stage, with fabulous lighting by Paul Anderson.  ENO performs everything in English, and the translation by Andrew Porter was clear and simple – the supertitles were almost superfluous. The principal roles are exceptionally demanding, and Stuart Skelton (Tristan) and Heidi Melton (Isolde) did sterling work, with the Act 2 duet a highlight. There was excellent support from Scottish Mezzo-soprano, Karen Cargill as Brangane, and Craig Colclough as Kurwenal, and the orchestra was beautifully conducted by Edward Gardner, with fine pacing and structure, which is essential for this gargantuan work.

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On Sunday we attended Evensong at Westminster Abbey and heard the choir’s final service of the year with music by Purcell, Parry and Howells – his evensong setting written for King’s College, Cambridge.  An exquisite and moving service to bid farewell to eight choristers who were singing for the last time.

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All this and Andy Murray winning Wimbeldon!  Quite a weekend!!

HOT Education’s Summer Opera Residency at Niu Valley Middle School

HOT’s Education Team led an energetic group of keiki this past June through an intensive Opera Residency program!

The Students were guided in all aspects of creating an opera, from costuming, set design, staging, & performing Aida for a live audience!

HOT Education Residency: Aida from Hawaii Opera Theatre on Vimeo.

Learn more about all of our HOT Education programs online today.

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