Campbell Vertesi

Saturday afternoon saw the one (and only) performance of the Miami University Giulio Cesare in Egitto.  It was a great success.  I don't think anyone expected to see this scale of production come from a bunch of students!

First things first - the singing was all very good.  Everyone was in fine voice - even your erstwhile sickly blogger -  and to my knowledge we were all happy with our vocal performances.  Particular kudos must go to Ellen Graham (Caesar) and Bryn Vertesi (Cleopatra), who have the bulk of the singing in the opera, and both of whom presented some very moving work.  Dramatically I was happy, too: the singers I had coached really made progress.  I heard particularly strong compliments for Ali Falcone (Cornelia), the youngest member of our cast, who made a strong showing with her first dramatic role.

What was really amazing to me though, was the interest level of the audience.  It never waned.  I'm used to boredom at Handel operas.  I expected at least a couple of snoozers at this matinee performance; but the audience was really with us the whole way.  My Father-in-law, who otherwise wouldn't be caught within a hundred feet of a symphony hall, even came out saying he enjoyed it!  To me, this qualifies as success.  Making Handel interesting and keeping it there for two and a half hours, is a significant dramatic feat.

As for my own performance, I'm satisfied.  My first (and more difficult) aria never found a comfortable tempo, and in the performance it felt like I was singing at half-speed, which doesn't make long phrases and runs any easier.  Still, I made it through with only a couple of unsatisfactory notes.  Mostly I was worried dramatically; it felt like the dramatic idea played itself out about halfway through, and I was left up there with nowhere to go!  My second aria was much better, and though "the moment" took me to a different place than I had intended, I felt engaged the whole time.

Recordings may or may not be coming.  In the end we couldn't get a recording engineer, so we set up a digital video camera.  Last I heard (about 5 minutes before curtain), there were some technical problems with even that recording though, so I'll have to keep you posted.  I'd love to be able to put some video up here! 

This morning we have an open dress rehearsal for Giulio Cesare at Miami University.  Personally, this scares the hell out of me: this will be our first run through without stopping to deal with forgotten lines etc... I don't like working that way.  I keep reminding myself that none of my scenes are in danger of stopping this way, so it's out of my hands, but it doesn't help!  

The truth is, we've put together a solid show with Caesar, and I would hate to see all that effort go to waste with something stupid like a forgotten line of recit. 

For my part, I'm mostly concerned with my first aria, the hard one :) .  There's a run in it that includes a complete pain in the ass setting of a couple of Ebs (Eb is a very high note for a bass).  My usual response is to sing it into my voice by taking the tough bit into a practice room and bludgeoning it until it becomes the most comfortable part of the piece for me; and that's exactly what I did... until two and a half weeks ago, when I got sick!  Now I've had two weeks basically without singing, and I have to come back to this aria and this particular run again.  I'm not all that comfortable back in my voice again,  never mind with tricky technical bits!  

But this is my job.  This morning I'll deal with my little singer bitches, and I'll sing the hell out of that aria, one way or another.  As they say in Italy, I'm going into the mouth of the wolf...

(this is where you're supposed to  say "die, wolf!")

(no, seriously.  Italian tradition.) 

In the last few days I've taken on some new roles for our production of Giulio Cesare - acting coach and fight coordinator.  I am a highly trained professional at neither, but somehow I've managed to make myself useful in both areas.

I started by helping out one of the cast members with her characterization.  This is her first major role, so there were a lot of questions that she didn't know to ask herself.  In fact, I found the whole process very helpful for my own acting.  It was like a review of all the steps that I should be taking with every character I approach.  Disclaimer of course, that I'm not any kind of great actor... but I have taken acting classes for longer than I care to recall, so I have a wealth of tricks and techniques in my bag.  At least, we had a great time doing this work together.  At most, maybe we both learned something.

The fight coordinator job is the most laughable, though.  At least I've been trying to act for several years - the most fight instruction I've received was at Central City last summer!  Now, it was good teaching to be sure... but it hardly qualifies me to coordinate a show!  That being said, I was the closest thing we have to a qualified fight type, and the "combat" isn't particularly tough, so I offered myself up for the job.

For you non stage-types, "stage combat" is loosely defined as any time two characters make physical contact onstage in any way that might cause physical injury.  Obviously, things like swordfights and other cool combat tricks are included, but so is every push, shove and fall in the show.  There are all sorts of tricksy ways to do these things safely and convincingly, most of which are a bit counter-intuitive. 

We figured out (often as a group process), the best way to manage the few shoves and grabs in the show.   The most violent thing we dealt with was having Cleopatra thrown to her knees - but the most tricky was pushing her over afterwards, with her hands tied.  You see, your first instinct is to stop yourself with your (tied) hands - in exactly the way that can potentially sprain a wrist, or conk your head on the floor.  In truth, this one isn't 100% done yet - I wrote to my Central City fight coordinator tonight for advice.  Tricky stuff, this minor falling!

So now I'm some kind of amateur acting teacher and fight coordinator.  I wonder if that's enough to get me a raise?  :) 

Last week we started rehearsals for Giulio Cesare, with Miami University.  I don't remember if I've posted about this before, so I should give a little backgrounder.

Bryn and I have talked for a long time about the idea of "making your own opportunities".  Basically, since work is hard to come by and so valuable at this stage of an operatic career, it's very useful to be able to create your own performance opportunities; ie by producing an opera yourself.  This has been something I've considered doing for some time now, but magically the "bass advantage" has kept me busy enough that it hasn't been necessary.  For sopranos of course, it's a whole different story.

So Bryn took it upon herself to put together a production this year.  Miami University doesn't do a spring opera (turns out this year is a semi-exception, but that's another story), so she knew many of the singers there would be available - and of course, she would never want for a bass!   Together with one of her closest friends (who was looking for a role to prepare for her own graduate work), Bryn spent months putting together a production of Handel's Giulio Cesare.

It is a fully staged production with chamber orchestra, directed by Bryn's teacher, Alison Acord.  Roles are played by our colleagues at Miami, and of course, by your humble blogger.  It goes  up at the Oxford Art Gallery on April 21st of this year.

All this to explain that we started rehearsal last week, and I've been learning ever more about ancient Egyptian history.  I play Ptolomy XIII (Theos Philopator), Cleopatra's younger brother, her husband, and king of Egypt.  This character is, at the time of the opera, about 15 years old, historically.  This presents me with some new challenges.

As a bass, 99% of the characters you have to play are older men.   The youngest in the popular repertoire is definitely Colline - who is my age, at youngest.  Consequently, I've spent plenty of time learning how to act "old".  Your center of gravity shifts, you have a different style of motion, you don't move as much, in fact.  Character traits for old people can be things like a tremor, a limp... things that definitely don't work with a younger character.

So here I am, throwing out all those old physicalizations to find new ones.  Some things are easy -your center of gravity for instance, is much further forward as a young man than as an old one.  I get to fidget with this role, but I have yet to decide how.  One thing I like to do is to find small characteristic 'tics' for a role.  These tics can be directly associated with the character's position in the show (Sparafucile the assassin absent-mindedly fidgeting with his knife), or they can be personality-based (high priest Sarastro breathing through his nostrils when he's trying to keep his control).  These things can act as anchor points for the audience - a visible reinforcement of who this person is.

 But what do I do for a young man?  A young, brat king, what's more?  I'm still working on it... will keep you all posted!