Meet Our Singers: STEFANO SECCO, Pinkerton

Today we hear from our opening night Pinkerton, Stefano Secco. Originally a drummer, as a tenor Secco has mastered the technique the Italians call ‘squillo,’ using a vocal edge to slice through the sound of a large orchestra. (No unamplified human voice could possibly outshout a huge opera orchestra, like the one in Butterfly; but with squillo, a singer can make himself heard among all those instruments.) We spoke, in a mix of Italian and English, about his career and about this curious character of Pinkerton, whom audiences cheer for his tender love-making, at the end of Act One, and boo for his thoughtlessness, superficiality, and cowardice at the end of the opera.

Welcome to Seattle! Since this is your first time singing here, could you please tell us a little bit about yourself?
Yes, I was born in Milan. It was strange I became a tenor because I started as a drummer. I was playing blues, rock, a little bit of jazz, as a 16 year-old.

So you were a kid in Milan, the opera capitol of the world...did you grow up listening to opera, as well?
Yes, my passions, as a kid, were opera and drums. I was a drummer, and then I decided to study singing, and I realized that I was a tenor, just from how my voice extended up when I vocalized. I used to listen to Verdi, Puccini, Donizetti, and also French repertory, which is what I now sing.

Doug Jones (Goro), Stefano Secco (Pinkerton), and Brett Polegato (Sharpless) rehearse a scene from Madama Butterfly
Alan Alabastro, photo

So did you ever sing rock, or jazz and blues?
No. I studied at the Conservatory for a year, and about 6 months with Franco Corelli, who was living at the time in Monaco. And then I won the 1995 Competition for Young Opera Singers of Europe, and then made my debut in Rome. My first roles were Rodolfo, the Duke in Rigoletto, Alfredo in La traviata, and Edgardo in Lucia. And French opera...the first was Nadir in Pearl Fishers. Then Manon, and Faust, which I sang with Patricia [Racette, our Butterfly] in San Francisco.

Catherine Cook (Dame Marthe Schwerlein), Patricia Racette (Marguerite), and Stefano Secco (Faust) at San Francisco Opera
Cory Weaver, photo

And you sang Pinkerton in San Francisco...
Yes, and many times in Italy. I sang it at the Puccini Festival at the composer's home in Torre del Lago.

And what about the "heavier" Puccini roles, Cavaradossi and Dick Johnson and Calaf?
Yes on Cavaradossi, no to Calaf, and Dick Johnson--maybe. Next month I make my role debut as Don José in Carmen, in Venice.

Don José, that will be fun, that's a heavier-duty sing than Nadir. Do you anticipate moving into those bigger, "spinto" tenor roles in the coming years? You don’t have exactly the same voice as Corelli, but all of us at Seattle Opera were impressed by your squillo when we first heard you.
Yes, but squillo is a technical matter. With Corelli, there was the technique but also a corpo di voce [body of voice] of a good size.

And you need that corpo di voce for those big tenor roles--Radames, Otello.
Maybe with age I'll gain more corpo di voce. But squillo, being technical, is what it is, it's simply part of your voice...it's not like you apply a different singing technique for different types of roles.

Have you always been able to use squillo?
Yes, even when I was 16, it was possible, as soon as my voice had changed. But it isn't easy. Sometimes I have to think about it as a kind of head voice. [Demonstrates chest voice] This is very, very simple. [Demonstrates squillo] Not so simple, this!

What’s your favorite moment in this opera?
The love duet.

Stefano Secco and Patricia Racette rehearsing the love duet
Alan Alabastro, photo

At fifteen minutes, it's one of the longest love duets in all opera.
Especially for Puccini: such long, wide phrases. It requires a great deal of breath control and legato. [Demonstrates singing a long phrase from the duet on a single breath, and then interrupting the same phrase with lots of little gasps, which ruins the effect.] Not this!

It’s wonderful you get that space to slow down your breathing and indulge, in that duet. Do you find the rest of this opera--the wedding scene, for example--much choppier, more disjunct?
Much of Butterfly is very sparkling music: light and high and bouncy, parlando, like the carefree Duke in Rigoletto. But the duet is very, very legato.

Now as tenor, normally you play the hero.
Not in this opera. Pinkerton, I’m sorry to say, is a very, very bad guy! I think he is empty, superficial. As a person, he is like the Duke, even more so. It's a very modern personality type. It can be difficult to show this with the voice, but that’s what he’s like.

He sings about regret and remorse in his Act Three romanza “Addio, fiorito asil...”
Ok, maybe...but still he is selfish, he's singing just for himself, not for the others.

And what other tenor character would run offstage before the final scene, crying “Fuggo, son vil!” [I'm fleeing, I am a coward!]
You know, in the original version he didn't even sing that aria. So there he was REALLY superficial.

Do you worry about whether or not the audience will like Pinkerton?
I think maybe the audience loves Pinkerton at the end of Act One, after all the tender words he sings in that love duet.

Yes, it's Butterfly's wedding night, and he turns out to be a good lover.
Yes, because of that he wants to find a way to make love with tenderness, to caress her. But it’s not true. It’s just a kind of seduction, a joke.

We know he doesn't take their union seriously, because he's said as much to Sharpless. But do you think he's just assuming that she, too, understands that this 'marriage' isn't going to last? Without his having to say it?
Maybe. She was a geisha before.

Perhaps he thinks that since she was a geisha, maybe she’s immune to falling in love.
Yes. Sad, but it could be.

Stefano Secco (Pinkerton), Sarah Larsen (Suzuki), and Patricia Racette (Cio-Cio-San) in rehearsal
Alan Alabastro, photo

Pinkerton is an American created by an Italian.
By a Toscano [man from Tuscany]!

Many have asserted that Butterfly is really an Italian woman playing at being Japanese. Do you think the same is true of Pinkerton, that he's an Italian pretending to be American? Or is there anything particularly American about this character?
There are things that are very American for me: [sings] “America forever!” He has this attitude: Don’t worry, be happy! Oh, that’s wonderful! Nice to see you! So...maybe. I don’t know if the love duet is very American. That may be more Italian-style.

Do you think there's a chance for redemption with Pinkerton?
I think he will reflect a great deal on what has happened. He is ashamed: "It’s my fault, it’s my fault." So maybe some things will be better with his new wife and son. But the tragedy is extremely strong. At the end of the first act, the audience loves Pinkerton. At the end, they HATE Pinkerton. "Boo!"

Have you ever been booed, as Pinkerton?
Yes, in America! When I hear booing, I know I've accomplished my goal!

Meet Our Singers: SARAH LARSEN, Suzuki

Before rehearsal the other night I checked in with Seattle Opera Young Artist and extraordinary lyric mezzo Sarah Larsen, who's had a busy year with us singing the roles of Mercédès in Carmen, Charlotte in Werther, and now Suzuki in Madama Butterfly. We talked about all sorts of intimacy—the joy of singing intimate harmonies, close relationships between sopranos and their devoted mezzo confidantes, and the camaraderie among Young Artists.

 

 

 
You and your roommate Andrew Stenson, fellow Minnesotan, have had big years: Carmen, Werther, now Butterfly for you and recently a Met debut and "Save the Day" cover performance as Orpheus for Andrew. Florangela Davila of KPLU did a story on the two of you last fall. Is it easy for young singers to be close friends, or do you end up in competition with each other?
Interesting question. Yes, Andrew and I met at Glimmerglass in the summer of 2010 and were also there in 2011. Since we're both from Minnesota we immediately had to be best friends.

Oh! So last summer, after he'd already spent a year in Seattle, he must have told you where all the good restaurants are and so on...
You know, I was accepted into the Seattle Opera Young Artists Program after auditioning three years in a row. Andrew kept saying, “You should come to Seattle!” and I told him: “I'd love to, but it’s not really my choice!” But this year has been great, I lived with Andrew and Lindsay Russell, another Seattle Opera Young Artist. None of us are the same voice type, so we’re not directly in competition with each other. And Andrew is one of those people who’s just naturally talented and nice, so as much as you want to be jealous of him, you can’t, because he deserves everything that’s happening. I’m proud of him and really happy for him, and I hope he takes the rest of us up with him!

Sarah Larsen as Charlotte and Andrew Stenson as Werther in last fall's YAP production
Alan Alabastro, photo

We most recently heard him as Ernesto in Don Pasquale. But you weren't in that production.
No, during that time I was traveling—I did a couple of auditions, saw my voice teacher, and worked on Suzuki with Lynn Baker [one of the YAP coach-accompanists] in New York. She was here this winter, we did a recital together, and I really loved working with her so I asked her to coach me on Suzuki because I knew she'd whip me into shape.

Speaking of Suzuki, what research have you done to play this very special role?
Before I wanted to be a singer I wanted to be a dramaturg. So I read everything I could get my hands on in terms of the source material—the play, the story, articles. It’s interesting, the things they decided to put into the opera. Kate Pinkerton’s part is much more prominent in the original material. But in terms of the role, when I told everyone I was going to sing Suzuki they all said, “I hope you have good knees!” Lynn Baker put me in touch with Michael Phillips, a director and dancer in New York, and I went over for a coaching with him—we basically set up an obstacle course in his apartment and worked on walking, kneeling, standing, serving, picking things up. I’m happy I did that, because without it I would have been lost on the first day.

Sarah Larsen in rehearsal for Madama Butterfly
Alan Alabastro, photo

Is it like doing yoga?
[Laughs] It’s definitely along the lines of yoga. I’m more conscious of my whole body while doing these movements. If I’m not, I’m going to go home hurting, especially on our raked stage. I had worked so hard on getting up without starting with one of my legs first—I wanted it to be seamless, but then I got on the raked stage and all that went out the window.

Patricia Racette, who sings Butterfly, was saying that the control and economy of movement necessary for these characters can be physically exhausting.
You need to be focused. But it’s easy to develop tension when you’re constantly thinking, "This hand needs to be this way for this amount of time.” You have to be aware of your body as a whole, how everything fits together.

Sarah Larsen in rehearsal for Madama Butterfly
Alan Alabastro, photo

Now, Suzuki stays loyal to Butterfly even after everybody else in Japan has rejected her. I asked Patricia why, and she joked, “I don’t know, Puccini didn’t give Suzuki an aria!” In your fantasy, what would that offstage aria for Suzuki be like?
I find a lot of similarities in the relationships between Suzuki and Butterfly with Neris and Meda in Cherubini’s Medea, which I sang at Glimmerglass last summer.

She's also a mezzo who's the servant to a high-powered soprano?
Yes. Their stories are almost parallel.

Ok, but unlike Butterfly, when Medea's tenor husband turns out to be a jerk, Medea kills her kid, not herself...
Fine, there is that big difference. But in terms of the loyalty factor for the mezzo, it’s the same. Neris has a great aria in Medea where she sings, "I’ll always be faithful to you; no matter how many tears I may weep I will still always be there for you." When I was working on Butterfly, I had Medea in my mind, because they’re so similar. At the end, Suzuki knows what Butterfly is going to do, she knows it’s wrong, but it’s not her place to directly intervene. That's why she takes this loophole, of pushing the child onstage. If anything is going to stop Butterfly from killing herself, this is going to be it.

Everyone loves the “Flower Duet” you and Butterfly sing at the end of Act Two while scattering flowers around the house to prepare it for Pinkerton’s arrival. Is that piece difficult, musically?
I love the Flower Duet because it reminds me of Così fan tutte. Any time I am singing in 3rds with someone I am the happiest person ever. It’s like the feeling you had in your school choir, but on a more intimate scale. You have to listen and clock their body movement, how they’re approaching different sounds, so you can match them. It’s like a sport.

Sarah Larsen (Suzuki) and Patricia Racette (Cio-Cio-San) in rehearsal for Madama Butterfly
Alan Alabastro, photo

Do you sing a lot of love duets? As a mezzo...
No, no one wants to sing duets with us mezzos.

What about Lakmé and Mallika?
Oh, I love the Lakmé Flower Duet. It's the same thing, in 3rds...

Puccini was ripping that off in Butterfly!
Yes, and Così is all that kind of writing for the two sisters.

What about operas where you’re in love with the tenor, in Werther, or in Rossini...
It’s interesting with Werther, I think we had a total of about 2 bars where we were singing together. I’ve been exploring Rossini...I’m used to letting the soprano hold the reins, where she makes the decisions of how long the high notes should be, so it’s really weird for me to be in charge, when I sing with the tenor.

Oh, I see, the higher voice is the one that’s more apparent to the audience, so it always leads. Do you ever sing a duet with a baritone or a bass?
Well, there’s “La ci darem,” from Don Giovanni, but it’s different.

Sarah Larsen (Mercédès) and David Krohn (Dancaïre) in last fall's Carmen
Elise Bakketun, photo

You're singing the only mezzo role in Puccini (except Il trittico). Do you wish he, or Verdi for that matter, had written more for mezzo? What Italian rep do you sing the most?
I do a lot of Handel. I always warm up with it every day, no matter what role I’m singing. Right now I’m working on Ariodante...I just sang the aria 20 minutes ago.

Nice warmup!
I need to make sure I can do that. If I can do the coloratura in that, then I can do anything that day! And if I can’t do the coloratura, then the day is probably not going to be so good.

Is there anything else you sing in Puccini?
I think there’s a mezzo role in Edgar...

What about Verdi?
I love Verdi, but as a lyric mezzo I only sing Meg Page, Maddalena...I spent two seasons with Sarasota Opera, which is doing a Verdi cycle, at least one Verdi opera each year. There I did I lombardi and Giovanna d’Arco, and I learned so much. They’re a little dense—you really have to spend time with the score to understand what’s going on. And I was in the chorus for Un giorno di regno at Wolftrap, when Brian Garman conducted that there.

On that note, tell us about your upcoming plans!
Yes, next fall with the Seattle Opera Young Artists Program we’ll be doing Un giorno di regno! I play Giulietta di Kelbar. I’m really excited, she’s a young girl, so I get to wear a pretty dress, which doesn’t always happen. And we'll do a Verdi concert after that, in honor of his bicentennial.

What are you doing this summer?
I’ll be in Santa Fe, with Lindsay Russell and our dog, Sherlock. I’ve never been there before, and any time I tell people I’m going to Santa Fe they get this mystical, happy, content look in their eyes. So I’m really excited.

Madama Butterfly: Director's Talk with Peter Kazaras

Sit in on a staging rehearsal as director Peter Kazaras introduces you to the "two great couples" who alternate as Butterfly and Pinkerton. Kazaras also shares his thoughts about other exciting artists involved in making this traditional production really sing.



Learn more about Madama Butterfly on the Seattle Opera Website

A Seattle Opera Madama Butterfly Photo Retrospective

Today’s post is by Monte Jacobson, who became a member of Seattle Opera’s chorus in its first season in 1963, sang in every production until May 1996, and has attended every production ever since.

I had the pleasure of appearing as a geisha in all Seattle Opera’s productions of Madama Butterfly from 1970 to 1995. While looking forward to our next production, I've found myself reminiscing about many of the different Butterflys who have graced our stage.

September 1970
MARCELLA REALE, American soprano, International Series
Photo by Des Gates

Ms. Reale was a very passionate, yet delicate Butterfly. The fact that she celebrated her two hundredth performance of Butterfly on opening night was apparent from the ease and total involvement she was able to bring to the role. She really impressed her fellow performers and brought tears to our eyes in her Act II aria, "Che tua madre." [Monte Jacobson is shown to Ms. Reale's left.]

September 1977
SUNG-SOOK LEE, Korean-American soprano, International Series
Photo by Des Gates

Ms. Lee was young and pretty and was able to convey a wealth of meaning through every gesture. She had a light, flexible soprano with lovely pianissimi; her lower register, however, was sometimes uncertain and lacked the support Puccini's long phrases demand of his heroine. Melinda Bargreen stated in the Seattle Times, "Lee's Butterfly is a woman of grace and passion, girlish coquetry and stark realism. Her characterization has both charm and depth...the sort of performance that allows opera to work as theater."

May 1982
ATSUKO AZUMA, Japanese soprano, International Series
Photo by Chris Bennion

Well known in the opera world as an outstanding singing actress, Ms. Azuma exhibited a deep understanding of the role and brought to it a delicate authenticity. I admired her interpretation and felt it suited her extremely well vocally as well as dramatically. I remember her being so attentive to every detail in order to give an authentic Japanese portrayal, that she even took the time to instruct the geisha girls in the proper way to walk and move their hands. Her performance brought to mind the classic movie Rashomon.

May 1989
BARBARA DANIELS American soprano, Gold Series
Photo by Mary McInnis

Ms. Daniels was another wonderful singing actress, and she brought much passion and warmth to the role. She sang the role with a full, lush voice. Her portrayal tended to be more Westernized than those of the sopranos who preceded her. [Ms. Daniels is shown here with tenor Marcello Giordani, her Pinkerton.]

January 1995
ELENA FILIPOVA, Bulgarian soprano, Gold Series
Photo by Greg Eastman

Ms. Filipova’s appearance marked her debut with the company and she was called on very short notice to replace the soprano originally contracted for Cio-Cio-San. I remember her powerful voice, well suited for the demands Puccini makes of his heroine; yet she was able to spin out the pianissimo high notes that soared over the orchestra’s climaxes. I agreed with Seattle Post-Intelligencer’s reviewer R.M. Campbell when he wrote. . . “she is a singing actress in the best sense of that word . . . and conveys the sweetness, determination and honor of one of Puccini’s great heroines.” Her Trouble in this photo is Gabriella Schwarz, daughter of the Seattle Symphony Maestro.

ELIZABETH HYNES, American soprano, Silver Series
Photo by Greg Eastman

Ms. Hynes was a Seattle area resident and she opened the 1993 New York City Opera season with the American premiere of the original 1904 Brescia version of Madama Butterfly. She had performed this role for many companies in the US. I remember that she was very intense in her portrayal and was able to make every emotion believable and real.

January 2002
SHERI GREENAWALD, American soprano, Opening Cast
Photo by Gary Smith

Sheri Greenawald was well known to Seattle audiences for her portrayals of Natasha in War and Peace in 1990, Eurydice in 1988, and other roles. She was named Artist of the Year in 1998 for her performances of the title role in Florencia en el Amazonas and Mimi in Bohème. Her performance in Seattle Opera’s 2002 Madama Butterfly was her debut as Cio-Cio-San. She was able to focus intently on each scene’s content by making the drama in the music real and convincing. Her final scenes were emotionally gripping.

MARIE PLETTE, American soprano, Alternate Cast
Photo by Gary Smith

Marie Plette is best known for her Wagnerian roles in Seattle Opera’s Ring such as Freia, Ortlinda and Gutrune. As Cio-Cio-San she brought a youthful voice and charm to the role that conveyed her vulnerability and trusting, childlike nature as the fifteen year-old geisha. She was a passionate Madama Butterfly in the Act I love duet alongside the Pinkerton of Jay Hunter Morris, who is singing Siegfried at the Met as I write this.

I'm looking forward to hearing the well-known, experienced Butterfly of Patricia Racette and the professional U.S. debut of Ausrine Stundyte next week! To be continued...

May 2, 2012: GiveBIG to Seattle Opera!

Next Wednesday, May 2, Seattle Opera will participate in GiveBIG 2012. GiveBIG is a 24-hour community-wide challenge to give generously to non-profit organizations through The Seattle Foundation website. Last year, the first GiveBIG on June 23 raised more than $3.5 million in a single day through 18,800 donations from individuals.

On May 2 you can double your gift! Every dollar of new or increased gifts that you donate through GiveBIG to Seattle Opera will be matched by the Brian Marks and Carol Maione Challenge Grant Fund (up to $50,000).

How does GiveBIG work?

• Donations must be made through the Seattle Foundation website between 12:00 a.m. (midnight) and 11:59 p.m. on May 2, 2012, to count toward GiveBIG.
• Win a Golden Ticket: Every hour there will be a drawing for a $100 Starbucks gift certificate (for you) and a bonus $1,000 to Seattle Opera (attributed to you).
• At the end of the day, Seattle Opera will receive a pro-rated portion of the $500,000 “stretch pool.” (For example, if we receive 5% of the total donations, we will receive 5% of the “stretch pool.”)

What will my gift do for Seattle Opera?

• $50 (doubled to $100 by the Brian Marks and Carol Maione Challenge Grant) provides music and story time programming for early learners at a local library branch.
• $100 (doubled to $200) allows one child to attend Opera Camp through a scholarship.
• $200 (doubled to $400) covers the entire cost for two costumes on the Young Artists Program tour through the Pacific Northwest.
• $300 (doubled to $600) provides 75 Experience Opera students the opportunity to see a working rehearsal or a final dress rehearsal.

What will I receive for my gift to Seattle Opera?

• Knowledge and satisfaction that you personally helped Seattle Opera’s mission to create musically extraordinary, theatrically compelling opera in the Pacific Northwest.
• Donor benefits exist at each level of giving to enhance your opera experience. They include discounts and invitations to rehearsals, backstage tours, and receptions. Please note that benefit levels will be determined by the amount of the original gift, not the amount after it is doubled by the Challenge Grant. (If you are already a Seattle Opera donor, any amount you contribute during GiveBIG will be added to your annual total to determine your membership level.)

Help Seattle Opera stand out on the biggest day of the year in Seattle philanthropy.

GiveBIG!

Meet Our Artists: Maestro JULIAN KOVATCHEV

Julian Kovatchev makes his Seattle Opera debut conducting Madama Butterfly. We spoke the other day about what he learned from his mentor Herbert von Karajan, about his work conducting in German (Dresden and Berlin) and Italian opera houses large (Verona) and small (Lucca), and about what a company of performing musicians has in common with a flock of birds.

Welcome to Seattle Opera, Maestro! This is your first time conducting for us and your first time in Seattle.
Yes, really it’s my first production in the States.

You did conduct a few performances of Madama Butterfly in San Francisco...
Right, but that was very quick, another conductor had led the rehearsals. I am very happy now to be here!

Tell us a little about yourself and your background. Where were you born?
I was born in Bulgaria, and grew up in Germany.

Born in Sofia? You’ve worked there, as a conductor...
Yes, but that was much later. I came over to Germany when I was 11 years old, with my parents, to a town in Bavaria near the Austrian border, just a few kilometers from Salzburg.

So your parents were able to leave the Eastern Bloc...
Yes, it was possible at that time as a musician to come over to Germany. You paid 10% of your income every month to the government in Bulgaria; musicians, doctors, people like that could go. So we moved there, and when I had finished my studies in Salzburg, I learned violin, I came to Berlin to play with the Berlin Philharmonic for five years, while studying as a conductor at the Hochschule für Musik in Berlin.

I read that you were five the first time you performed.
Yes, my first concert! It was with my mother at the piano, in front of soldiers. I have a copy of an old documentary film, the Cinéjournal that was made, you know, when they used to play little news features before showing movies, and the last episode on this one was my appearance. It’s very funny.

Julian Kovatchev at Madama Butterfly rehearsal
(Alan Alabastro, photo)

So your parents were both musicians.
Yes, my mother was a pianist and my father a violinist. I started playing with my father when I was 3 ½ years old. And he brought me every night to hear the performance at the Sofia Opera House.

You grew up speaking Bulgarian, and then learned German...what other languages do you speak?
Also Russian, and Italian, and English. But it’s not important how many—what’s important is if you have something to say!

Now in Berlin, you worked and studied with legendary conductor Herbert von Karajan. How old were you?
I was not even 19 when I came to Berlin, in the late '70s, and I was lucky enough to work with him for many years.

He recorded a complete cycle of Beethoven symphonies after that—
Yes, the last one, I am playing in that! If you hear any wrong notes, that’s probably me! [laughs] I am thankful for my destiny. He dedicated a lot of time—I still cannot explain why—with me, alone, to discuss conducting, which I was studying then. It was incredible for me. I think he loved Bulgaria, he worked with many Bulgarian artists, and he went there often.

Herbert von Karajan
Portrait by Ernest Haas

What are some of the most important things you learned from him?
If someone has influenced me, musically, it was Karajan. It’s difficult to put it into words; but his will to discover something new every day. You know, conducting is a very complex profession; you have to be half a psychologist.

And conducting opera? You were playing in the symphony, originally.
Yes, I grew up in the symphony, as a player and a conductor, and slowly came into opera. I conducted my first opera in Italy in ’85, it was Janacek’s Jenufa in Trieste. Then I did more and more operas. Now I split my time half-and-half between symphonic music and opera.

Did you work on operas with Karajan?
Yes, with the Berlin Philharmonic we did opera in Salzburg for Easter, and some recordings.

People often talk about how he did his own completely idiosyncratic readings of operas—you know, how the Karajan Parsifal is not like any other Parsifal you’ve ever heard.
But compare his early recordings with recordings he made later of the same works, and they sound completely different. He was very symphonic in everything; he liked a big sound, and he was crazy about technology—you know, he was the first person to promote cds! He changed the world’s opinion about sound. He did so many things, not only music. His foundation, medical research, his work in cinematography...he was basically the music director of all Europe. There was a joke he used to tell about himself, that when he got into a taxi in Munich the driver asks, “Where to, Maestro?” “You can take me wherever you want; I have to go everywhere.”

Now let’s talk about you and your career. You conducted your first opera in Trieste, and you’ve conducted there a lot.
Yes, I was principal guest conductor there for a while.

And in Lucca, where you’ve taken this position at the Teatro del Giglio?
That’s a very new thing, they’ve ask me to become Artistic and Musical director.

So you choose all the repertory and cast everything.
Yes, it’s nice because of the responsibility of Lucca’s being Puccini’s home town. We share productions with other theaters in Italy, including Livorno and Pisa. It is not so big a theater, less than a thousand seats, but it’s very old, and just 100 meters from the Puccini house.

The Teatro del Giglio in Lucca

At the other extreme of scale, you conduct every summer at the ancient Roman amphitheater at the Arena di Verona.
Yes, I feel very much at home in Verona, it is a special place. For the last six or seven years, every summer I work at the Arena and in the winter at the Teatro Filarmonico, where there is a big opera and concert season. In January/February of this year we just did Pagliacci with Zefirelli. I have a small theater in Lucca and the biggest theater in Verona!

A summer performance at the Arena di Verona

Is it difficult to conduct in such a huge place?
It takes a bit of experience. You have to concentrate, and anticipate. Sometimes, for example, the chorus is divided, to the left and the right; sometimes you cannot even see them. But the acoustic is very, very good. The public hears everything wonderfully.

Have you conducted other big outdoor spectacle events?
In Busetto, yes, we did Verdi like that. But I am very happy now to work indoors a lot at Staatsoper Berlin and in Dresden, at Semperoper. We did Tosca there recently, and I go back soon for more Tosca, La boheme, and Traviata.

Maestro Kovatchev in action

In the program for our upcoming Madama Butterfly simulcast on May 5, you say “There are so many different emotions in each moment of this opera, and only a genius like Puccini could include them all in this wonderful music.” Could you tell us more about how these emotions play out?
Yes, this is not about this bar or that bar, it is the entire opera. Some singers, some sopranos, cannot perform Butterfly because they cannot go through all these big emotions. It is so difficult to control yourself sometimes. Even as a conductor. I spoke with Karajan about this; he wrote a book, Controlled Ecstasy, about how this happens—you cannot rehearse it. With magnetism, with all the musicians together during the performance, in that moment you can feel cold and hot, the hearts are all beating together, like a flock of birds, which suddenly fly together, to the left or the right [gestures]. In this Butterfly we have magnificent singers; Patricia [Racette] puts all her heart and soul into the performance. I sometimes wonder how she can keep control and sing so fantastically, while feeling these emotions. I get involved also, especially at the end. And in the intermezzo. There’s never a moment when you can relax. Other operas have recitative or something, but when this begins you have to see the end from the beginning.

There are moments in Butterfly when it gets slower, or quieter, but that’s usually when things are getting more tense onstage.
Yes. We need these moments of silence; it makes what is happening in our fantasy more special, more strong. Not everything has to be perfectly clear. Everybody in the audience must take the emotions into themselves. It is not that you have to feel exactly what is happening onstage. It is inside you, how you reflect on your life. That’s how it’s possible for all of us to be involved, all the audience, together. The music begins where the words leave off. There are separate worlds for everybody, individually, in the audience. You can see and hear the story, but you put the music into yourself and go out with your own emotions, applied to your life and your own feelings.

Maestro Kovatchev and Seattle Opera General Director Speight Jenkins at a Madama Butterfly rehearsal
(Alan Alabastro, photo)

What would you say to an opera-goer who claims not to like Puccini?
Interesting question. Some people may have a problem with classical music in general. But to them I say, you don’t know what you’re missing. There’s nothing to fear about this. And many young people know much more classical music than they think. All you have to do is watch television commercials, and you know all of Carmen. Each year we do a radio broadcast on RAI from Arena di Verona, a big gala, with music from operas and also music by rock stars. Music is music. My car is full of rock and pop. There are many more young people now going to Arena di Verona, because of what they hear.

Yes, I’m pleased to say that here in Seattle, for our first-ever simulcast, we have some 7000 people who have already pre-registered to attend Madama Butterfly for free at Key Arena on May 5.
Yes, that is fantastic! What a night it will be!

Meet Our Singers: CARISSA CASTALDO, Kate Pinkerton

Singing Kate Pinkerton in our production of Madama Butterfly is Carissa Castaldo, who also appears in Act One with the chorus of geishas who accompany Cio-Cio-San’s entrance. Carissa, who spent several years with the Metropolitan Opera Chorus, spoke to me about the differences between choral and solo singing, about the complicated emotions of Kate Pinkerton’s scene, and about the great costumes she gets to wear in this production.

 

 
Welcome! You’re making your mainstage soloist debut with this production. But it isn’t your first appearance with Seattle Opera.
No, that was last fall in Carmen, I was in the chorus.

Where were you before that?
I’d been singing with the Metropolitan Opera Chorus. My debut there was War and Peace. The chorus in that opera is only on for certain blocks of time—I didn’t really get a sense of the whole opera, because when the chorus is on, it’s all about the chorus, but then we leave and it’s all about the soloists.

How many shows total did you do with the Met?
9 or 10. I was there for four seasons, not in the regular chorus but the extra chorus. And I loved it.

What do you love the most about singing in an opera chorus?
It gives you the opportunity to sing every genre, every language, every composer. When you’re a soloist, you’re sort of stuck with just what suits your voice.

Which was your favorite of the operas you did with the Met?
The one that sticks out the most was probably Peter Grimes.

Did you do that with Patricia Racette?
Yes, in 2007, she played Ellen Orford.

Ellen Orford (Patricia Racette) and Peter Grimes (Anthony Dean Griffey)
Photo © Ken Howard/Metropolitan Opera

Of course! I saw the HD simulcast of that.
I actually loved that production—I know not everyone did. It was modern, very visual, a big black wall with lots of windows. I remember when I watched the HD, they’d be panning across the rows of chorus, and I’d think, “Ok, I’m gonna see me—” but then they’d cut. You could see half my face at one point!

Did you get to know Patricia at all?
No, it’s really a very different situation at the Met. There’s so much going on in that house, at once, that the chorus has a lot of rehearsal and staging without any of the soloists. Some of the singers may be singing someplace else, and often you don’t see the real conductor until the dress rehearsal. It all works, but...

It’s quite an adjustment, then, to come work at a stagione house like ours, where everybody is concentrating on one opera at a time.
Yes, and it’s nice to be able to have a closer relationship with the director and conductor. Only one time, in my years with the Met, did the conductor come in for a musical rehearsal with the chorus.

Carissa Castaldo (center) as part of the Seattle Opera Chorus in the October 2011 production of Carmen.
Photo by Elise Bakketun

What is the difference between singing as a member of the chorus and singing as a soloist?
It’s a huge difference. The opera chorus is a combined group of soloists who have to learn how to make a unified, blended sound. You sing in a different way, technically: you use more head voice. It’s all about not sticking out. When you’re the soloist, it’s “stick out as much as you can!” To get over the orchestra and the chorus and everyone who’s singing around you.

Besides more use of head voice, are there other technical differences, in choral singing?
This may not be the same for every singer in the chorus, but for me, technically, using more of a rounded sound. If you put more of your voice into the mask, the front of your face and nose, it gets more of a pointed direction, it can ‘ping’ really well out into the theater. In the chorus, that’s not so great.

So it’s more about placement.
Yes, if you focus the voice a little bit back. Not all the way back, so that you’re swallowing your sound, but a little bit, it gives it that nice rounded sound, that’s what you need to get that blend. It can change based on who you’re sitting next to...if the person next to you has a brighter voice, for example. You blend with the people you’re near.

When we did Orphée et Eurydice a month ago, it was funny, conductor Gary Thor Wedow had to twist their arms to get the chorus members NOT to blend. He would tell them, “You’re monsters in hell in this scene, make horrible, ghastly, hellish sounds!” And it took them a while to get it the way he wanted, they were so used to making this beautiful blended sound.
When I first moved here from New York, I knew I wanted to stay in the opera chorus, because that’s what I really loved doing. And I came to see the Lucia here, before I was hired, and I was totally taken aback and impressed by the sound of the chorus. The focus of this chorus is making a prominent, beautiful, round sound on the stage, and I have to say, I think it’s better than most choruses that I have heard.

Costume Design Coordinator Melanie Taylor Burgess and Costume Shop Manager Susan Davis look over Kate Pinkerton's costume.

Let’s talk about Kate Pinkerton. First, tell us about your costume.
It’s beautiful. Typical late 19th century American woman, with a corset, bustle, a parasol...she has a hat over the wig, which is light brown and blondish hair, curled up. You hardly see the hair under the hat, the hat is a little bit exaggerated, with a bow. But it’s understated, compared to some Kate Pinkertons; it’s not that she’s really going to ‘pop out’ on the stage. And I think that goes with the whole production, which is very simple and elegant. Her costume is obviously very different than the kimonos...

Do you have kimono-envy when you come onstage?
Not so much, because I have a kimono in Act One! I’m a geisha accompanying Cio-Cio-San in the wedding scene.

Tell us about that look.
There’s the geisha wig—waxed-out sides and top, the beautiful hairpins with jewels hanging from them, and then the kimonos are just gorgeous. I think that’s my favorite part of the whole opera, getting to wear one.

What is Kate thinking about when she’s onstage for that tense scene in Act Three?
Well, we’re still working through this. My original thoughts have changed a bit since we began staging. I think that she’s obviously a very strong woman. According to the book—

The novella by John Luther Long that inspired Belasco.
Yes. Pinkerton has been stationed again in Japan. That’s why they come back. So Kate goes with him because they’re moving there for a period of time. And she has no idea that he had this Japanese wife, let alone a child. So they just arrived yesterday and so today, this morning, in the scene I’m in, not only did she just find out that he had a wife, but a child, too? And we’re going to take this child from the woman and raise him on the American base. I’m assuming this is a big surprise to her. And any woman at the turn-of-the-century who could say, “Ok, I’m going to live up to my duty as a wife and accept that this happened...” She even says to Suzuki, “I’m going to raise him like he’s my own son.” I think that says a lot about the character. She’s very strong. Peter Kazaras, our stage director, wants her head always up, wants her to stand her ground. It’s almost a business deal for her at the beginning of the scene. And think of a woman at the turn-of-the-century going over to Japan. She had no idea what to expect—the houses, the way people look, everything about the culture is all brand-new. And here she is walking into this woman’s house to take her child from her. Which is my husband’s child as well.

I would think you’d be reeling from this discovery. Astonished.
Yes, there’s lots of time in the scene, she doesn’t necessarily sing a lot, there’s time when she’s off to the side and I hope I’m able to portray that she’s searching within herself to find strength. Realizing what has happened in the past, wondering what else he has been hiding from her. In my mind, Kate doesn’t have any children of her own yet. It’s almost hard for her to realize she’s now becoming a mother. That’s one of the reasons she starts trying to be more business-like, but when Butterfly comes out she gets very touched. She sings, “Povera piccina,” you poor thing, will you ever forgive me? When she sees Butterfly grieving, it’s not something that she thought of on her own—she’s only had a short time to process the situation herself—but to see a mother’s pain, giving up her child...not that she cracks and falls apart on the stage, but it hits home to Kate, when Butterfly says “You’re the luckiest woman in the world, and I hope that my unhappiness does not affect your future,” that’s when it really hits home to Kate Pinkerton that this is a real, feeling human who is making a huge sacrifice. And Kate is pretty much just doing her duty as a wife. I don’t think she has much of a choice of what to do in this situation. It’s not like today, where she could just tell Pinkerton, “I’m going back to America, see you later!”

Chorister Lucy Weber (left), Michael Todd Simpson (center, as Escamillo), and Carissa Castaldo (right) in Seattle Opera's 2011 production of Carmen.
Photo by Elise Bakketun

It must be hard to forget everything a modern person might think and feel and figure out what an American woman of a hundred years ago would be thinking. I’ve always wondered if there wasn’t something a bit condescending about “Povera piccina,” you know, oh, the poor little [foreign] person.
Well, Peter wants that to be heartfelt. It could come off that way, haughty, but he wants Kate to show a sentimental feeling when Butterfly turns to her and wishes her well with her life. He doesn’t want the stone-cold Kate Pinkerton, which you sometimes see. He has me say that directly to Butterfly, out of a recognition of the pain she must be going through.

Have you read Butterfly’s Child yet, this new novel that tells about how Kate and Frank take little Benji back to their farm in Illinois? Or have you worked out for yourself what happens to them next?
I think it’s probably a hard transition for everyone. I understood that they were stationed in Japan, so it’s not that they’re taking the child back to America immediately. Either way it’ll be tough, it isn’t Kate’s child, they’ll have a hard time getting acceptance in the community...I don’t know, I’m interested to read the book!

Meet Our Singers: BRETT POLEGATO, Sharpless

Today we check in with baritone Brett Polegato, who sings the role of Sharpless in Madama Butterfly. He first sang at Seattle Opera in Heggie's The End of the Affair in 2005 and returned for Iphigénie en Tauride in 2007. Brett talks about what Sharpless is doing in Japan, the role of Dandini in Rossini's Cinderella, which he'll sing for us next season, and being a Twitter-savvy singer.

The last time we heard you in Seattle was in the fall of 2007, for Oreste in Iphigénie en Tauride. Have you been keeping busy since then?
It’s hard to believe Iphigénie was five years ago. I've done a lot of different things in that time. Basically I’ve been moving into more dramatic repertoire. I did my first Eugene Onegin and my second and third, all in the same year. Two years ago I was in Russia at the Bolshoi doing Wozzeck. I just came from Calgary, from a production of Moby Dick, Jake Heggie's wonderful new opera. It’s an incredibly sympathetic role, the role of Starbuck. He is the first mate on the Pequod, answering only to Captain Ahab, and is caught in a very difficult position because he needs to represent his men and follow his instincts, but also obey Captain Ahab. Starbuck is really torn between his need to reason with Ahab—he sees that destruction is imminent, given Ahab’s obsession—but also needs to be obedient. Of all the characters in the show, he’s probably the most sympathetic because of that conflict. I’ve done a number of Don Giovannis since then...standard productions, but also a quite modern production. I also did the two operas I’ll be doing here—Butterfly now and Cinderella next season. Both were in Toronto, and strangely enough the same sets we're using here. My Sharpless costume still has my name in it—and it still fits! The show was three years ago, so I’m very happy about that.

William Burden as Pylades (left) and Brett Polegato as Orestes (right) in Iphigénie en Tauride.
Photo by Bill Mohn

Tell us about Sharpless. We don't find out all that much about him in the opera...
You know, I love characters that don’t have any back story. So often with pieces that are based on literature, people recommend that you read the book to find out more. And I do, but I also like to look at the piece and not try to impose things that aren't in the score. Onegin is a good example because there was a book and then a play, Moby Dick the same, and while I often go back to the source after I’ve created a character, it’s kind of nice to fill in the details yourself. With Sharpless, what intrigues me about him is that here’s this American man, in the early part of the century, who has come over to Japan. Why did he decide to leave America to go to a country that’s very private? The customs and the deportment of the people are very private. He’s single. I don’t think he’s that old, maybe mid-40s. I think there’s something in his past or in his being that is very private, and he feels drawn to the Japanese culture of privacy as opposed to the more open American culture. I'm also intrigued by the position Sharpless is placed in in this drama. He's obviously Pinkerton’s representative, he has to fulfill Pinkerton's orders, and with very few exceptions he never speaks his mind. In the first act he tries, very kindly, to warn Pinkerton of the results of his actions, of his frivolity, and in the third act for about 30 seconds he lets loose and says, “I told you this was going to happen.” But it’s fascinating for an Italian opera that he never really expresses what he feels about the whole situation. It’s not because he doesn’t have an opinion. I think that’s his character.

So what is his opinion?
As someone who has lived in Japan for a while, he understands the ramifications of certain actions, he understands the protocol. In Act 1, he guides Pinkerton through the wedding ritual; he’s obviously told Pinkerton, "These are the people you need to pay off, this is how you need to entertain the family once the ceremony has taken place, this is the kind of house you need to have," all those superficial things. But he also knows the culture, the social expectations, and I think he’s trying to translate that for Pinkerton, who does not have the cultural awareness that Sharpless has. On top of that Pinkerton has a very carefree attitude. He says, “a traveling American should go and enjoy the fruits of every country he visits.” So not only are their cultures very different, but Pinkerton’s interpretation of the American culture is quite extreme.

Brett Polegato in rehearsal for Madama Butterfly
Photo by Alan Alabastro

Does Sharpless know that this is going to end the way it does?
Well, when Sharpless says, “Let’s drink to your family back home,” Pinkerton responds, “Yes, and to the day when I will have a real wedding with a real American bride.” That’s pretty much the last thing that they say to each other. Up until then I think Sharpless worries that Pinkerton didn't know what he’s getting into, but after that comment, I think Sharpless realizes for sure that this is not going to end well. Now I don’t for a minute think he realizes just how badly it’s going to end...but he knows there’s going to be some damage control in the future.

What's your favorite part of this opera to perform?
The letter scene, because it’s so exquisite, dramatically. It’s the easiest scene to act because it doesn’t require any acting. Just reading that letter, knowing what it contains, and seeing Butterfly next to you, is heartbreaking. And Puccini, being a genius, gives a hint of the Humming Chorus, and even though my character doesn't hear the music, and even if he did, he wouldn't know what it entails yet because it happens later, when that starts in the orchestra it always devastates me. It’s an incredibly well-written scene.

Brett Polegato (Sharpless) rehearses a scene with Patricia Racette (Butterfly)
Photo by Alan Alabastro

You're here now doing a serious role in a very dramatic tragedy. But next year, we'll see you as Dandini in Cinderella, Rossini's brilliant comedy. Which type of show is more congenial to you?
I think by nature I’m a much more dramatic, serious person. Yet during my career I’ve done a lot of comedic roles. In fact, there are companies that only hire me to do comedy because that’s all they’ve ever seen me do. I think part of the success I've had is that I don’t play comedy, I play it seriously. I usually play the sidekick, you know, people like Papageno and Dandini. And I tend to play them quite naively, which is funny. As someone once said to me years ago, “They have to be childlike, but not childish.” And I think that’s the difference. As soon as you start becoming childish on stage, it pushes the audience away. But when you are just innocent, that’s funny. Because you respond to situations in a way that a more experienced person wouldn’t, and so the audience, who is more experienced, sees those moments as charming.

Julianne Gearhart, who sang Amour in Orphée et Eurydice for us last month, said that comedy may be funny to the audience, but it's never funny to the characters. They're just living their lives.
Yes, and it’s also never exaggerated. I’m a very economic actor, meaning that I don’t move on stage unless there’s a reason to. I’m quite still, and I think that works well in comedy because comedy needs to be very precise. A gesture or a turn of the head or one specific move reads much stronger, in a comic moment, than a lot of semaphoring.

Do you have a favorite comedic role?
I love Dandini. I don’t know if he’s my favorite, but he’s so likeable. He’s like Papageno in that, but he’s not quite that innocent. He also has a lot more to do. Unlike Papageno, he gets the chance to be mean at times—he’s quite mean to Magnifico. He has nothing to lose; from the get-go, he knows he’s prince for a day. With all the other characters, the stakes are quite high. But with Dandini, regardless of what happens, he knows he’s going back to being a valet the next day, so he can do whatever he wants when he's portraying the prince, and no matter what he does the prince can’t get back at him. He probably knows he’s going to get it the next day. But he gets it every day!

Brett Polegato as Henry Miles in The End of the Affair
Photo by Bill Mohn

On another note, I've noticed you're an active tweeter.
When we were doing Cinderella in Toronto, a friend of mine said, "You really should get a Twitter account—four other singers in this cast have accounts." It’s a great way for people to learn a little more about you without having to seek you out. It's a nice way to stay connected with people. I would say I am a mild Twitter user. Yesterday I tweeted about the view from my apartment, and I tweet a lot about books because I’m an avid reader. I hope people will realize that while I adore singing, my entire life is not singing.

Do you ever receive tweets from fans?
Yeah, and it’s interesting to compare who follows me as a result of shows I’m doing. For instance, I was recently doing a Wagner concert in the UK and I got about 60 new followers, which is a lot for me. So even in Twitter, Wagner fans are legion and devoted. And I connect with authors through it, and with friends. Unlike Facebook, where it is really friends that connect with you, with Twitter I’m always surprised to find people I don’t know. You’ll log on and someone in Australia is following you. Was it a recording they heard? Were they at a show? Or…

You mention you're an avid reader. So, what are you currently reading?
I am reading a wonderful book called the Snow Child, by Eowyn Ivey. It’s based on a Russian fairytale called the Snow Maiden, and I’m not finished yet but it’s about a couple who have recently lost their young child—the woman had a miscarriage—and they moved to Alaska in the early '20s to get away from the memory, and one night during the snowfall, they build a snowman—a snowgirl—and in the morning when they wake up, it’s gone. And then they see glimpses of this young girl. It’s the story of how this girl who lives in the woods comes into their lives, and she disappears every summer, so you’re never quite sure if it’s in their imaginations or whether this girl actually exists.

Madama Butterfly: Speight's Corner with Patricia Racette

In our latest behind-the-scenes video, General Director Speight Jenkins sits down with soprano Patricia Racette to discuss her abiding love of Puccini and the universal appeal of the iconic title character. Includes footage of singers in rehearsal.



Learn more about Madama Butterfly on the Seattle Opera Website

Meet Our Singers: DOUG JONES, Goro

Madama Butterfly starts with Goro, showing Pinkerton the house he’s rented and demonstrating all the shoji screens. (“Where’s the bridal chamber?” asks Pinkerton. “Here or there, it depends,” answers Goro, prophetically.) So we’ll start meeting our Butterfly cast with tenor Doug Jones, who returns to our stage, and to this wonderful role, which he also sang in Seattle Opera’s last production of Madama Butterfly in 2002.

 

 
Doug, last season we saw you as Monostatos, and now Goro...in your career you get to play lots of evil characters.
Not so many! But some.

Where do you rank Goro, in terms of wickedness? Is this “marriage broker” (you might also call him a pimp) the most evil character you play?
Nah. He’s neither/nor. He’s an opportunist. What happens in this opera isn’t his fault. I mean, it is, but it isn’t. Who’s more culpable, Pinkerton or Goro? Goro maybe should know better, but Pinkerton has no idea.

I remember last year your Monostatos was like Alberich, we understood how he’d gotten to be this depraved figure.
Right, and Goro is just trying to make a buck! Sure, he’s going to try and come back and sell her again, for lots of money, and all her sisters and her nieces. And get Sharpless as a customer.

Christine Brandes (Pamina) and Doug Jones (Monostatos) in Seattle Opera's 2011 production of The Magic Flute.
Photo by Alan Alabastro

That’s the thing that seems the most horrifying to a Westerner, although I guess...
It was a different culture, and I suppose either you accept it or you don’t. Nobody is forcing her to get married. That’s the problem! Nobody can force her to get married.

Is Goro well-connected in the geisha world?
Oh, yes, those are the best ones to offer up as brides. They’re the ones the sailors want.

What happens to Goro after the events of this opera?
He probably has a heart attack at some point. He’s drinking a lot...

Milk-punch and whiskey?
No, scotch. He’s adapted to Western fire-water. And he probably smokes. He’s probably gonna have a heart attack in about five years time and die.

Does he even figure out what happens to Butterfly? You’re not in Act Three.
Ah, but his spies. He has fingers in every pie. We were talking about that the other day in rehearsal: does he know about the letter Pinkerton sent Sharpless? Why do Sharpless and I arrive at Butterfly’s house at the same time, in Act Two? Am I stage-managing that so that Sharpless will see she has a good option, in Yamadori, and will try to convince her to marry him?

Ashraf Sewailam (Pistol), Weston Hurt (Ford), Steven Goldstein (Bardolph), and Doug Jones (Dr. Caius) in Seattle Opera's 2010 Falstaff.
Photo by Rozarii Lynch

That’s right, Sharpless says to her, afterwards, “Butterfly, I think you should marry that rich Yamadori!” Say, who’s been paying the rent on Butterfly’s house these past three years?
The libretto doesn’t say. We think it might be Sharpless.

Tell us what you remember about Seattle Opera’s previous Butterfly production.
The rake was so steep! I remember asking for ski poles, because it seemed like a very sharp slope to me. That was the first show in the Mercer Arena, and our dressing rooms...well, let’s just say it was a different situation, with curtains instead of doors...it was fine. I remember my hair was dyed dark black and spikey.

Morgan Smith (Yamadori), Doug Jones (Goro), and Richard Stilwell (Sharpless) in Seattle Opera's 2002 Madama Butterfly.
Photo by Gary Smith

How many times have you done this opera?
This is my fifth. The first was in Belfast, and we did the Brescia edition, with the longer Act One. You know, with Butterfly’s drunken Uncle Yakuside and all that. There’s more music, it goes on for a while. I’ve never done it since...I understand why people prefer to not do that version. I’ve done it in Austin, and in Hawaii. And now twice in Seattle.

Hawaii, fun! What’s it like to work on an opera in Hawaii? Is it sort of, “We rehearse until 1 pm, and then we go and surf!”
No!!! We rehearse till 1, and then you go and eat a lot of great sushi.

Are you a Puccini fan?
Yes, we know all his tricks, we know the music and what’s gonna happen, but still it’s hard not to be moved!

What’s your favorite Puccini opera?
Turandot, because the silly tenors have the most prettiest music they will ever get to sing. [Demonstrates]: “Addio amore, addio razza...” There are some wonderfully sentimental moments for Ping, Pang, and Pong, in their big scene, reflecting on the lives they’ve left behind, and wondering wouldn’t they like to go back to those earlier quiet, peaceful lives. They have a moment of real honest reflection. I honestly don’t think they would want to retire—they like being in the center of power too much—but what pretty music they sing there.

Doug Jones (Beppe) and Nuccia Focile (Nedda) in Seattle Opera's 2008 Pagliacci.
Photo by Rozarii Lynch

True, because a lot of the the roles you play, as a character tenor...
[Quotes a line of Goro’s, sung on a monotone]: “C’è. Entrate.” Doesn’t send your pulse racing!

You sang a pretty tune as Beppe in Pagliacci—
Yes, he’s got that little arietta. But Turandot, they’ve got the best music. And it’s a great opera!

David Belasco in the Pacific Northwest

Puccini first encounted the character of Butterfly when he went to a performance of the play by David Belasco (left), Madame Butterfly (they changed the name to “Madama” for the opera because it’s more singable) in London in 1900, starring Evelyn Millard. Following the performance, the composer reputedly charged backstage to demand that Belasco let him make the play into an opera; as the playwright recalled in his memoirs, “I told him he could do anything he liked with the play and make any sort of contract he liked--because it is not possible to discuss business arrangements with an impulsive Italian who has tears in his eyes and both his arms around your neck.”

The name of David Belasco, a hugely important figure in the theater world a hundred years ago, survives today in three different contexts: buildings, operas by Puccini, and the early history of the cinema. You can still go to the Belasco Theater on Broadway which, as of this writing, is showing a play about Judy Garland, End of the Rainbow. And there are theaters named after Belasco in other cities, too. As for Puccini, of course we’re gearing up now for Madama Butterfly, but eight years ago at Seattle Opera we were fortunate enough to hear a terrific production of Puccini’s La fanciulla del West, based on Belasco’s hit play The Girl of the Golden West—the first western, and the first great opera Puccini wrote which doesn’t end with the soprano’s death! And if you like silent films, it’s uncanny how many of the movers and shakers in the first generation of the movies—D. W. Griffith, Cecil B. DeMille, Mary Pickford, the Barrymores—worked with and learned from Belasco. When you actually read Belasco’s plays, which are way too dated to perform nowadays without Puccini’s music to make them palatable, the exhaustively comprehensive stage directions indicate that he was the “control-freak” type of director who didn’t want to leave any room for actors, stage managers, or even props personnel ever to question his intentions—the play was to be performed exactly this way, every time. He’d have had an easier time making movies.

The 34 year-old Belasco, left, with fellow playwright Clay M. Greene, photographed in 1887

Belasco’s most significant contribution to the history of theater is actually in lighting design. A generation before Belasco, Richard Wagner was the first theater artist to insist on a darkened auditorium for his shows (so the audience wouldn’t be distracted by what everyone was wearing, or who was talking to who. “Eyes up here, on my stage!” said RW). But Wagner’s lighting tools were crude at best, and often malfunctioned. Belasco pioneered the use of more sophisticated electric lighting equipment, which became a tremendous art form of its own during the twentieth century. In fact, in his original Madame Butterfly play, there was a fifteen-minute-long scene with no dialogue, during which the sun set, the stars came out, then faded, and the sun rose again—an abbreviated version of the night Cho-Cho-San and Trouble spend waiting for Pinkerton to arrive. Apparently, the lighting effect was so spectacular it floored audiences completely, a hundred years ago. (Another reason why this play will never be performed today! Luckily, in the opera, that scene is half as long—plus Puccini wrote the beautiful “Humming Chorus,” followed by an incandescently beautiful orchestral sequence, for that scene.)

Publicity photo of the final scene from Belasco's Madame Butterfly, with Blanche Bates as Cho-Cho-San, Frank Worthing as Pinkerton, and an unidentified child as Trouble. Puccini and his librettists changed the child's name to "Dolore" (Sorrow).

I’ve always been intrigued by Belasco, and I was thrilled to find a delightful Life of David Belasco biography (written by the playwright’s friend William Winter in 1915) when I was rooting through boxes of completely random, ultra-cheap books at last year’s “Friends of the Seattle Public Library Book Sale at Magnuson Park.” (This spring’s sale is in two weeks). I knew Belasco was born in San Francisco in 1853—in fact, most of the characters and events in The Girl of the Golden West are based on his experiences growing up among the ‘49ers—but I had no idea that he also spent some of his youth up here in the Pacific Northwest, chiefly in Victoria. Two episodes of Belasco’s eventful boyhood in British Columbia are simply too bizarre and fascinating not to share with you here, so let me quote from the biography by Mr. Winter, first the tale of Belasco's early schooling:

"He was early sent to a school called the Colonial, in Victoria, conducted by an Irishman named Burr, remembered as a person whose temper was violent and whose discipline was harsh. Later, he attended a school called the Collegiate, conducted by T. C. Woods, a clergyman. When about seven years old he attracted the attention of a kindly Roman Catholic priest, Father --- McGuire, then aged eighty-six, who perceived in him uncommon intelligence and precocious talent, and who presently proposed to his parents that the boy should dwell under his care in a monastery and be educated. Strenuous objection to that arrangement was at first made by David's father, sturdily Jewish and strictly orthodox in his religious views; but the mother, more liberal in opinion and more sagaciously provident of the future, assented, and her persuasions, coincident with the wish of the lad himself, eventually prevailed against the paternal scruples..."

As an adult, Belasco's habitual clerical dress earned him the moniker "The Bishop of Broadway"

But by the time he was ten, young Belasco was done with the monastery. Mr. Winter continues the tale:

"He had inherited a gypsy temperment and a roving propensity, he became discontented with seclusion, and suddenly, without special cause and without explanation, he fled from the monastery and joined a wandering circus, with which he travelled. In that association he was taught to ride horses "bareback" and to perform as a miniature clown. A serious illness presently befell him and, being disabled, he was left in a country town, where he would have died but for the benevolent care of a clown, Walter Kingsley by name, who remained with him,--obtaining a scanty subsistence by clowning and singing in the streets for whatever charity might bestow,--and nursed him through a malignant fever, only himself to be stricken with it, and to die, just as the boy became convalescent. Meantime Humphrey Belasco, having contrived to trace his fugitive son, came to his rescue and carried him back to Victoria, to a loving mother's care..."

Belasco's early career as an actor had him performing roles large and small, classical and contemporary, including King Louis XI of France, a popular villain in nineteenth-century melodrama

For any writer, the most important rule is “Write what you know,” and little wonder that successful writers like Belasco, who created over a hundred plays and crafted the structures behind two extraordinary operas, led wild lives. The more a writer has experienced, the richer his or her writing.