I first saw Talise Trevigne as Jemmy in Guillaume Tell at the Caramoor International Music Festival in 2011 and loved her singing. I later saw her Ophelia in Hamlet in 2015 and wrote, “The mad scene was a feat of singing and acting that will long live in this reporter’s memory” (www.taminophile.com/2015/05/all-is-not-well-in-denmark.html). I regret missing her well received Cio-Cio-San, her Iris by Pietro Mascagni, her Pip in Jake Heggie’s Moby-Dick, and her Clara Harris in David T. Little’s JFK, among other notable performances.
This past July, I saw her in the Glimmerglass Festival’s production of Porgy and Bess, directed by Francesca Zambello. Opera Today opined, “Ms. Trevigne brought committed acting to the mix [as Bess], and she found all the necessary extremes to this unstable, emotionally volatile character” (www.operatoday.com/content/2017/08/american_master.php). And I wrote, “Her Bess was lost and wild and vulnerable and lonely, a perfect match for Porgy. She sang the role just as beautifully and expressively as we expect, and looked as sexy as Bess should” (www.taminophile.com/2017/07/when-god-made-cripple-he-mean-him-to-be.html).
I was thrilled to meet Trevigne in person one morning during the run of Porgy and Bess and to chat at length with her.
First let’s talk about Bess. You called it a “bad girl” role. Is she really all that bad?
I like that Bess is complicated. I think Porgy and Bess is sometimes just sort of tossed off, but these characters, this story . . . . Once you really start diving into the story, you’re like, “Wow, this is hard.”
What’s interesting about Bess is portraying the potential of happiness and not just the doom. It’s very easy to play doom and gloom. It’s only sad and bittersweet if you see the happiness, the possibility, the hope. I’d always thought of Bess as this horrible person. She’s lucky Porgy takes her in at all, and then she just leaves him?
I was angry with her and I always thought her to be this callous, shallow, selfish person. But she’s a product of her circumstances and she’s trapped in a rat race. I think that she has four men in her life—Crown, Sporting Life, Porgy, and the drugs. She comes off as so flippant and strong, because that’s what people with low self-esteem do. She does what she needs to do to survive, but she is broken—she is a day-to-day survivor.
I don’t think she thinks anything through. I think she thinks about “How am I gonna make it today?” Until she meets Porgy—and then, for a moment, there’s hope.
Sometimes I think about having the perfect little house with the white picket fence and an idyllic and simple life. About 60 days into that, I’d be saying, “OK, I need to go and do something. This is old.” I think Bess has that. I think there’s a bit where she stops and thinks, “Maybe I can do this.” Here’s this man who is so kind and he sees something in her and begins to show her that there’s something better in her.
But ultimately, when you are an addict, unless you remove yourself from that situation, those circles, those people, you’re drawn back in. And that’s what happens. Porgy gets taken off, and she panics—trigger. In comes Sporting Life—trigger. Out comes the happy dust—trigger.
I like how Francesca [Zambello, who directed the opera] refers to Catfish Row as a heaven or a hell. It depends on your story, how you see it. She’s never been out. She doesn’t leave. She’s there. She’s stuck in the same trappings. So the happiness was doomed from the start.
Normally, I just sing high notes and die in the bed or I stab myself. I love those girls, they’re beautiful. Francesca said to me, “You know, people don’t see you as this kind of character. They see you as the lovely ingénue.” And I said, “Yeah, I know.” And she said, “So, prove them wrong.”
Do you see yourself doing the big Bel Canto heroines?
I’ve been asked to take a look. I’ve done Lucia. I also did Amina many moons ago. That’s my comfort zone—that and the French rep. It’s easy for me to sort of hang out there vocally.
I love Juliette, although I don’t sing her anymore. I love Manon. The French rep has some high extension but sits nicely in the middle, and that’s kind of where I’m comfy. So that’s my reset instead of Mozart.
Do you sing much Mozart?
I don’t. Someone asked me if I would move on to either Donna Anna or Donna Elvira. Probably it would be Donna Elvira more than Donna Anna. I think my temperament is more Elvira.
But I’ve done a lot of Pamina. A few years ago, while I was doing a Pamina in Hawaii, I was learning Butterfly. It was great to line up the Cio-Cio-San with Pamina. I don’t do a lot of German repertoire. What feels comfy is more Strauss, which is not really German, but the Italian version of German.
Would you do the Marschallin?
Maybe one day.
My friend asked me to describe your voice. How would you answer that question?
My manager and I were just having this conversation not long ago. She said people are confused. I think a lot of people still hear me as Pip, as the ingénue. I still have that champagne sparkle at the top, even though my voice has grown.
I call myself a lyric soprano with a high extension. The timbre of my voice, combined with the range that I have, I think might startle some people. People don’t expect it.
I love that Pip is always a part of me, and it’s part of my story. But people forget that Moby-Dick started in 2010. I think people forget that time passes. I also have a son now, that changes everything.
Now is the time I’m sort of testing things out. I love Cio-Cio-San, but it’s a role like Violetta. You can do it, then you can step away, let it marinate for a little bit, and then you come back.
And then there’s the nerdy side of me that likes to sing contemporary music and create new things. I learned to sing through chamber music and art song. There was a big chamber music program at Manhattan School of Music, which is probably where my love of contemporary music and new works comes from, because that’s kind of how I learned to sing.
Judith [Skinner, a longtime friend, who played Maria in Porgy and Bess] always calls me when I’m stressed out learning the new works, and I’m in tears, and she’s like, “Didn’t I tell you? You’re only supposed to sing dead composers!” But I like a challenge. I like keeping my mind facile.
I found mention online about your teaching at an arts academy in the Bronx.
Oh, at the Riverdale Y. They have a big musical theatre community up there for the kids. These kids work hard. My son was going to summer camp there, and I was working out there. The woman running the summer arts academy needed help and found out that I’m an opera singer. I agreed to help with the caveat that I’m not a voice teacher. So for a couple of summers, I helped her with the casting and taught some classes and lessons.
I am a big advocate of outreach in any way, shape, or form. If we don’t educate them, we’re all dead. The art form dies. So if I see some kids who want this and they are super passionate about it, I’ll help. Maybe when they’re a little older, I’ll tell them how hard it is.
But I never want to squash anyone’s dreams. I think that everyone should have some sort of passion in his life, whether it becomes a professional career or not. I don’t know any musician who has ever regarded taking piano lessons or singing in a choir or traveling as a waste of time. Music is a gift to all of us.
I love just talking to people, because most people don’t know an opera singer. They say, “You’re an opera singer? But you’re, like, normal.” And I say, “Yeah, and I clean my own toilets too.” [The day her Grammy nomination was announced, Trevigne tweeted a photo of her cleaning her bathroom while holding the framed nomination certificate.]
Moving forward, I’m not quite sure how I want to be involved in outreach, but I am certain that outreach is important and that I want always to be active in it. I think forward to the day when I step off of the stage—I always try to think of ways my career path can evolve. I want to be on the other side of the table, making sure that our art still happens. I’m not sure that I want to teach. I think I could be more instrumental in other ways.
What would hold you back from teaching?
I make my own instrument work. I just don’t know that I have the gift of helping someone else. I’ve been really, really blessed to have some phenomenal teachers. I was really, really, really lucky, because I know that it’s kind of the luck of the draw when you come in as a young singer to a conservatory. You hope that you connect with a teacher and it works, but a voice teacher/singer relationship is a marriage.
I’ve observed that successful singers usually haven’t had to overcome vocal problems or bad teaching, but very often people who are good teachers excel because they’ve learned from overcoming those problems.
Yes, absolutely. I can see the joy of helping someone improve. I love helping with kids because it’s great to see their excitement grow and their confidence grow—it’s so rewarding. The one bit of advice that I would give to any young singer is just remain flexible and resilient, work on your craft, stay in your lane, don’t worry about what everyone else is doing, and don’t compare yourself to anybody else.
It’s not an easy life. We give up a lot for it. I sometimes say, “Oh, my God. I just don’t know what I would do after this.” But I’ve come to a realization: when I walk away, I’m going to be fine because I love this, I’m committed to it, I give it 100 percent.
Things have happened already that I never thought would happen, and I’m excited to see what the next leg of the journey is going to be—but I have no preconceived notions about when it’s going to be, how it’s going to be. I go one performance at a time and I respond to the audience. That’s why we do it.
