Singers, do not fear: New York City Opera is still here. Despite all of the management and financial problems that have plagued the company for the past few years, “the people’s opera” is doing everything it can to survive and ensure its future. The company has been known for, among other attributes, its steadfast support of rising singers—and that commitment continues this month as City Opera begins the operatic portion of its 2011-12 season.
The biggest news of the season is that, for the first time since 1966, performances will not be taking place at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. But this information requires context for those who are not familiar with the full story. Paul Kellogg, the former general manager and artistic director, retired after the 2006-07 season. Gérard Mortier had been named his successor in February 2007, effective with the 2009-10 season, but Mortier resigned in November 2008. Two months later, in January 2009, George Steel was appointed the new general manager and artistic director.
At the same time, following a normal 2007-08 season (“normal” had been fall and spring seasons totaling about 16 productions), City Opera devoted the 2008-09 season to operas-in-concert and other events around New York while its Lincoln Center home (the David H. Koch Theater, formerly the New York State Theater) underwent a $107 million renovation to enhance the orchestra pit, create aisles, and improve the acoustics. Back in the theater for the 2009-10 season, the first under Steel, the company presented a total of five operas in fall and spring seasons. In 2010-11, the season again consisted of five operas in fall and spring seasons, plus a concert series.
Then, in May 2011, Steel announced that City Opera was going to leave Lincoln Center and perform in different venues around New York. “[Performing in the Koch Theater] is much too expensive,” he says. “The very good news is that traveling around the city, space to space, gives us tremendous artistic advantages. We can match the theater to support the work that we want to do, and we are out in the city, a town with 200 theaters—a huge opportunity to find the right work for the right space.”
With the move out of Lincoln Center, rehearsals are taking place in venues around the city, and the company’s administrative offices have moved to Lower Manhattan. “There won’t be a giant change to our practice. Co-locating our offices with our performance spaces is not necessary,” Steel explains.
In addition to leaving Lincoln Center, a savings of $5 million each year, City Opera has been taking two other major steps to save money. One is a restructuring of its administrative staff, including the elimination of over 40 percent of the full-time positions; the other is a renegotiation of contracts with two unions: AGMA (American Guild of Musical Artists, representing the singers, chorus, ballet, and stage managers) and local 802 of the American Federation of Musicians (representing the orchestra). Steel estimates that all three steps will save $10 million every year.
Along the way, the company lost two members of its music staff, Director of Music Administration Kevin Murphy and Music Director George Manahan. Murphy left to become a full-time professor at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music (where his wife, soprano Heidi Grant Murphy, is an adjunct professor), but agreed to remain on City Opera’s staff as casting adviser.
Manahan, appointed music director in 1996 by Paul Kellogg, saw his position eliminated for what Steel describes as “practical” reasons. “It would be wrong to say that his not being with the company has no effect, and we miss George terribly,” Steel says. “But he was not free to conduct anything this season, and the shows were going to be taken over by guest conductors in any event.” Given the size of the company, Steel did not find it essential to retain the music director position, but does hope to bring Manahan back to the podium as soon as possible.
As further cost savings for 2011-12, the fall season consisted of a concert of songs by Rufus Wainwright in November, with just the spring season devoted to four operas, receiving 16 performances between February and May: Jonathan Miller’s new production of Verdi’s La traviata, conducted by Steven White (a co-production between Glimmerglass Festival and Vancouver Opera); Wainwright’s first opera Prima Donna in its New York premiere, conducted by Jayce Ogren; Christopher Alden’s new production of Mozart’s Così fan tutte, conducted by Christian Curnyn; and a new production of Telemann’s Orpheus, conducted by Gary Thor Wedow (as far as Steel knows, the first full-length opera by Telemann ever to be staged in New York).
The plot of Prima Donna, set to a French libretto co-authored by Wainwright and Bernadette Colomine, details a day in the life of an aging opera soprano, Régine Saint Laurent, who is preparing for her comeback in 1970s Paris and falls in love with a journalist. Originally intending to compose the work for the Metropolitan Opera, Wainwright dropped those plans in October 2008 because of conflicts over the libretto and a proposed production date. Instead the Manchester International Festival in England gave the premiere in July 2009.
Wainwright is in good company. City Opera has been a champion of new American opera since its founding. Although not a world premiere production, the performances of Prima Donna follow a long line of American operas that, thanks to the company, were first seen in New York. Among them: William Grant Still’s Troubled Island, Copland’s The Tender Land, Jack Beeson’s Lizzie Borden, and works by Moore, Floyd, Moross, Menotti, Musgrave, and Foss.
Orpheus, with an anonymous libretto based on du Boulay’s Orphée, combines the main German text with passages of French and Italian from operas by Handel and Lully (the music is still Telemann’s). It was only in the late 1900s that the manuscript score was discovered. Steel speaks highly of Telemann’s skills as a theater composer and is pleased that City Opera audience members will have the chance to become more familiar with his theater music.
This range of Romantic, Contemporary, Classical, and Baroque operas—as well as the number of debuts this season—demonstrates that City Opera is continuing its commitment to a varied repertoire and to rising singers. “New York City Opera remains one of the greatest champions of young American singers in the world,” Steel says, without any hesitation. “This season is no exception.”
Singers pass through a casting department comprising a primary team of Steel, Steven Blier, and Kevin Murphy. “We have a casting department that is the equal of any in the country, and the casting of our operas is something I am enormously proud of,” Steel says. He praises Blier’s and Murphy’s strong opinions, instincts, knowledge of voices and repertoire, and solid decisions. The casting process will remain almost identical going forward, except for a few new people on staff.
One area that is changing due to the departure from Lincoln Center, but in a positive way, is the audition process. Poor acoustics are no longer an issue. “The primary difference is that our auditions won’t take place in the David H. Koch Theater,” Steel says. “At the Koch, one of the biggest challenges for singers, and for us in casting, is that the auditorium is so enormous that, in a sense, the first thing we had to listen for—or, at least, that I listened for—was the size of somebody’s voice. Given the huge scale of the theater, there were lots of incredibly fine singers who were just not appropriate. Now, we know what show we’re casting and we have lots of different locations, so we can work with a lot of different singers. Loudness is not as critical an issue as it has been in the past.” Auditions will most likely be held in rehearsal spaces or in the theaters where the company is performing.
So, where are the new performance locations and how did Steel choose them? La traviata and Prima Donna will both be staged in the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s (BAM) Howard Gilman Opera House. “BAM is the only 19th century-style opera house in New York, which makes it the ideal location to hear and perform La traviata,” Steel says. “Rufus Wainwright’s opera fits with BAM’s tradition of presenting contemporary work, and the opera is a valentine to 19th-century French opera.” The opera house has hosted performances by prestigious artists over the years, including Enrico Caruso. It seats more than 2,100 people in the orchestra, mezzanine, and balcony sections.
Così fan tutte will be presented in an intimate theater, the Gerald W. Lynch Theater at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in Manhattan. It is a member of CUNY Stages, a consortium of 16 performing arts centers located on CUNY campuses across New York. The theater has hosted events for Lincoln Center Festival, New York City Opera, Great Performers at Lincoln Center, the Metropolitan Opera Guild, and Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, not to mention television and film specials. Between orchestra and balcony sections, there are over 600 seats.
Orpheus will take the company to El Teatro Theater at El Museo del Barrio in East Harlem, a theater that Steel considers “acoustically ideal to hear early music.” Seating up to 599 people, the venue is recognized as a Landmark Quality Venue by the Municipal Arts Society and the City of New York Arts Commission for a series of 30-foot murals and Art Deco interior. In fact, El Teatro was originally intended to be a children’s theater, so the artwork is taken from Scenes for Children’s Literature, created by Willy Pogany.
Will this arrangement of performances around New York be the formula for future seasons? “In the broadest outline, it looks a little bit like the future. We will grow and do more productions as soon as we can afford to,” Steel says. He expects that City Opera will perform in different venues and possibly acquire a permanent home base.
Whatever the future actually holds for the company, the bottom line for now, for singers, is that City Opera is doing what it has always done best. It is making room on its roster for rising talent, supporting the performance of early music, and exposing the public to new works—also invaluable experience for the singers involved. This might be the best attribute of the 2011-12 season’s programming—even while facing numerous challenges, the company is staying true to its mission.
