6 days till opening. Orchestra arrives. Two days in the rehearsal hall, then it’ll be time to fit this: … into this: We’ve done it before, and we’ll do it again. This music is as beautiful as I imagined. Granted, I’m pretty familiar with it by this time, but it’s still exciting to be surprised
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Curioser and Curioser
Here’s your glimpse inside our first unbroken sprint through the entire opera! Enjoy this slideshow from this afternoon’s Curious Women run-through. In street clothes, in the rehearsal room, but with plenty of verve :) NOTE: Updated on 6/9 with images from final room run. Into the theatre on Saturday!
Read MoreBackstage Buzz, the Wolf-Ferrari Episode
Tuesday, June 7 at 7:30 pm – Free, no reservation required We get to sit down with some of the fabulous people behind The Curious Women at Tuesday evening’s Backstage Buzz artist panel discussion. We’ll ask conductor Gary Wedow what it feels like to handle orchestra parts that were probably touched by Toscanini, we’ll find
Read MoreA Musical Memorial Day Weekend
An unexpected (and lovely) surprise for my Memorial Day weekend: I thought I’d be spending it with Wolf-Ferrari, but tonight and tomorrow night, I have some additional companions… WTOC alum Paul Appleby was invited by Garrison Keillor to sing on A Prairie Home Companion at Wolf Trap this weekend, and I was in turn invited
Read MoreCurious Women via YouTube
A blast from the Wolf-Ferrari past, with Arturo Toscanini conducting the NBC Symphony Orchestra* in 1947: *The NBC Symphony Orchestra was established especially for conductor Arturo Toscanini, and it performed weekly radio concert broadcasts from 1937 till 1954. A few words from Samuel Chotzinoff, NBC music chief during those years: “A medium already existed that
Read MoreWolf-Ferrari meets Mad Men
Sketches for the eponymous curious women and the gentlemen who frequent the men’s club. Courtesy Camille Assaf, costume designer. Click through to our Flickr photostream to see all the costume sketches for The Curious Women.
Read MoreThe Music of The Curious Women
A guest post by Gary Wedow, conductor of Le donne curiose: For a very short period of time before the outbreak of WWI the operas of Wolf-Ferrari were among the most popular and most performed in the world, championed by Verdi and Boito; the Metropolitan Opera premiere of Le donne curiose was conducted by Toscanini
Read MoreThe Curious Music
It’s probably not a surprise that the printed music for a rare opera is just a touch hard to read… Actually, the string books are in pretty good shape, but the wind parts… well, let’s just say that conductor Gary Thor Wedow is keeping a positive outlook by reminding himself that it’s possible that these
Read MoreBandìe xe le donne!*
Digging into an opera that hasn’t been produced in this country for 99 years is a fascinating, somewhat masochistic way to spend one’s time. But every day, this charming little-known piece is coming more and more into focus. Today brings a dilemma in fine-tuning the synopsis: What does one call this charming place where the
Read MoreInspector in the Rear View Mirror
Now that was something. And just like that, it’s over. Years of writing, tweaking, editing, workshopping; and a few short weeks of rehearsing and performing. After tonight’s recording patch session (iPhone photo at left), and tomorrow’s load out to Boston Lyric Opera, we let go and let fly. And move on to three more operas
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