Opera at Tenkara Karate

You may have noticed the unusual room in earlier rehearsal photos. We are rehearsing in a karate studio.

Riversongs at Opera Memphis

Tomorrow night at Clark Opera Memphis Center, our kids camp will premiere a new version of Sid Selvidge's opera RIVERSONGS. The show is about the flood on the Mississippi in 1927. Alas, it has become a propos.

Staging Rehearsal

David Neal (on right) has come in at the last minute to learn Simone, the oldest relative in the Donati family. He has done a great job learning two operas quickly.

Nelson Sheeley (seated) is the director. He is also directing Pirates of Penzance at the same time. He looks like he's straight out of central casting for "Theatre Director."

Bob Orth

Our Schicchi, Bob Orth, has arrived, fresh from performing Nixon in John Adam's NIXON IN CHINA.

Here he is pondering a fine point of staging with our director, Nelson Sheeley.

Set model

Perhaps because of growing up with some model trains, I love set models. Here is Garett Wilson's model for the double bill. It is a traditional setting. Apparently the TRAVIATA they are doing here is set in 50s Rat Pack Vegas, so I guess this balances things off.

Narco corridos

A sad article in the Telegraph about how musicians in Mexico are being killed because of their connections to the drug trade. Having a narco corrido, or drug ballads, written about you is apparently a mark of prestige for a drug lord. Music is being taken deadly serious there. And we complain about our budgets and audiences.

Porgy in Paris

One of my colleagues is in a production of the Gershwin's PORGY AND BESS in Paris at the opera comique. He sent this postcard which is one of the more unusual ways I've ever seen to market the opera, which as far as I recall, has no small furry animals in it, except for Porgy's goat.

"Porky(pine), I'se your woman now..."

Inconvenient Truth, the Opera

We are all going to have to go to LA SCALA in 2011 and see the new opera being created based on Al Gore's INCONVENIENT TRUTH. I think it's really important for opera to be relevant, so I am going to try to stifle my giggles and...

Tut by Marcus Hummon

Last week the Tennessee Performing Arts Center in Nashville hosted a staged reading of Marcus Hummon's new show, TUT. The rock opera/oratorio tells two stories, one about the Pharoah and the other about the discovery of Tut's Tomb in the 1920s by Howard Carter. From the start, the piece is being told through musical storytelling and choreography by Abdel Salaam. The effect reminded me of Orff's CARMINA BURANA.

Marcus is one of the most talented musicians on the planet.

Golf Tournament

Earlier this week we had a golf tournament to support Opera Memphis. It happened to fall on Wagner's Birthday, May 24th.