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  • Sondheim in Waltz Time: A Little Night Music at Opera in the Heights – Houston Press

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    Although Opera in the Heights mounts a most credible A Little Night Music (1973), Stephen Sondheim’s most accessible musical, there’s a pall over Lambert Hall.

    If you’re reading this Saturday, November 22, there are only two more performances, tonight and Sunday matinee, November 23. Three performances of this iconic musical does not make a run. Why this is so might be related to the next news…

    Beloved Maestro Eiki Isomura, who for many seasons has reigned as OH’s music and artistic director, has moved back to Philadelphia for family health reasons. Concurrent with his OH duties, he was – and still is – the opera producer at Temple University. A stalwart captain for Opera in the Heights, he led over 40 productions during his superlative tenure and gave us some remarkable performances that still linger in memory: an incandescent Madame Butterfly in his own Japanese translation; The Little Prince; L’italiani in Algeri; Lucia di Lammermoor; a ‘50s be-bob Elixir of Love; the regional premiere of Scalia/Ginsberg in a co-production with Holocaust Museum Houston; a splendid Amahl and the Night Visitors; a galvanic tango-infused María de Buenos Aires; an intoxicating Die Fledermaus; a charm-filled La Cenerentola; a volcanic Il Trovatore. He was OH’s heart and soul and will be sorely missed. God speed, Maestro. 

    So the baton has been passed to Interim Music Director Carolyn Watson. Originally from Australia, Watson has conducted in the U.S. since 2013 at numerous regional opera and symphony companies from Kansas, Illinois, Oklahoma, Michigan, Indiana and now Texas.

    In her first appearance at Lambert Hall, Watson led a reduced orchestra (a string quartet with piano and clarinet) in a revised score. There are no “Liebeslieder Singers” to wryly comment on the action, but the quartet’s music has been melded onto the main characters, which makes a good compromise. OH just saved the expense of four additional players.

    After the disappointment of Follies (1971) – now certified as one of his greatest shows (“Time heals everything,” as Jerry Herman once wrote) – Sondheim wanted to write a romantic comedy, perhaps even a hit. Now, everybody knows that you can’t sit down and write one, for who knows what the public will respond to, what songs might become standards, or what will play out-of-town to encourage that word-of-mouth excitement to get butts into the seats.

    He and his famed director Hal Prince thought that Jean Anouilh’s Ring Around the Moon would do the trick, a highly stylized comedy of manners. Anouilh refused. Then playwright Hugh Wheeler, now on board as one of the creative trio, suggested Renoir’s social satire film Rules of the Game (1939) or perhaps Ingmar Bergman’s classic Smiles of a Summer Night (1955) with its rueful ambiance set in perpetual sunset. Sondheim overwhelmingly approved Bergman. The Swedish director agreed to the rights, and off the three went to create a show.

    Exceptionally sung and performed by Opera in the Heights, and directed sporadically by Alyssa Weathersby, the musical is its own “theme and variations.” Sondheim loved to challenge himself, often to show off. Instead of a string of numbers that might sound as if the same composer wrote them, how about a musical whose very theme is in waltz time: ¾ meter? Then you can vary it by subdividing it into 6/8 or even 12 beats. It’s a grand idea, and Sondheim conquers it. The score sparkles even in this reduced orchestration. It is quintessential Sondheim with rhyming lyrics that rival the best of W.S. Gilbert of Gilbert & Sullivan fame. 

    A sublime choice for a musical comedy, now re-titled A Little Night Music, like Bergman’s movie, the musical is infused with the theme and variations on love: the loss of it, the want of it, the physical-ness of it, the remembrance of it.

    Stuffy lawyer Frederik (baritone Scott Clark) once had an affair with now somewhat-famous actress Desiree (mezzo-soprano Melanie Ashkar). She plays in the provinces where everyone thinks she’s a star. She was the love of his life, and he hers, but he gave her up. Life upon the wicked stage, you know, is not for stuffy lawyers. Years later he has married a very young Anne (soprano Laura Corina Sanders), still a virgin after months of marriage, but he dreams of Desiree. He sees her at the theater and then visits her for a tryst.

    However, Desiree has a lover, the married toxic brute Count Magnus (baritone Kellen Schrimper), who carries on affairs in full knowledge of his wife Charlotte (mezzo-soprano Riley Vagis). Situations get complicated, of course, and they all meet at the country estate of Desiree’s worldly mother and ex-courtesan Madame Armfeldt (mezzo-soprano Jana Ellsworth), whose many past liaisons have given her “a duchy…extravagantly overstaffed châteaus…fire opal pendants…and a tiny Titian.” Frederik’s son Henrik (tenor Ben Rorabaugh) unsuccessfully beds Petra, but secretly loves Anne. While Desiree’s daughter, Frederika (soprano Whitney Wells) – “I’m illegitimate,” she boasts – learns life’s love lessons at the feet of her soigné grandmother, Madame Armfeldt.

    Jealousy, unrequited love, male pride, feminine wiles, and raw sex – that would be earthy maid Petra (mezzo-soprano Melissa Krueger) and her fling with butler Frid (tenor Anthony Nevitt) – all get deliciously mixed up in this adult romp. It’s too sophisticated for a farce, but as a modern dissection of love and marriage, along with its fools and clowns (a Sondheim specialty), it works wonders.

    The singers are splendid, although soprano Sanders is much too old for virginal teenage Anne. She sings gorgeously, though, as do Clark, Ellsworth, Krueger, Vagis, and Schrimper. But it’s Ashkar who gets the best number, “Send in the Clowns,” her only solo. Believe it or not, this American Songbook standard didn’t make much of an impression during the show’s run until folk superstar Judy Collins recorded it in 1975 on her album “Judith.” Like a meteor in hyperdrive, the song soared to pop heaven and received the 1976 Grammy for Song of the Year. Sondheim was mystified. Why this ballad? Well, why not? It is gorgeous, and simple, and true, and the dark plummy voice of Ashkar runs with it and makes it her own. It’s tremendously effective under her sultry rendition as she realizes that her true love has passed her by. Give Ahskar the Grammy.

    A loving note on OH’s production. What’s up with those teeny surtitles projected stage right and left? You can’t read them. If you can’t decipher Sondheim’s intricately rhymed lyrics or tongue-twisting patter, what good are they? Magnify them! And the constantly changing set design – those boxwoods, those flower urns, that bed – why must we wait while the orchestra noodles snippets of Sondheim for stagehands to rearrange the set after every scene? Give us a unit set, even with that damned bed, for an effortless, cinematic switch in setting. Who needs topiary? Get this show moving!

    With definitive singing and acting, and a small orchestra that effortlessly captures the nuance of Jonathan Tunick’s famous orchestrations, Opera in the Heights’ production of this classic musical – one of the best ever – is very fine indeed. It’s as refreshing as “a weekend in the country.”

    A Little Night Music continues at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, November 22; 2 p.m. Sunday, November 23 at Opera in the Heights, 1703 Heights Boulevard. For more information, call 713-861-5303 or visit operaintheheights.org. $35-$85.    

    This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2025.

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    D. L. Groover

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  • Going Mad With Beautiful Singing: Lucia di Lammermoor at Opera in the Heights

    Going Mad With Beautiful Singing: Lucia di Lammermoor at Opera in the Heights

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    By the time Gaetano Donizetti had written his masterpiece Lucia di Lammermoor (1835) now blazing at Opera in the Heights, he had already composed 35 operas. Most were clunkers, not ever heard again after their Italians premieres. Up till then, three were certifiable successes: Anna Bolena (1830), The Elixir of Love (1832), and Maria Stuarda (1835), but Lucia, and instant hit, put him on the international opera map.

    Donizetti had finally reached the heights he had clamored for. The great Rossini had resigned, living the high life in Paris, and Bellini had recently died. That left Donizetti. After Lucia, more clunkers followed, but so too did his final immortal works, Roberto Devereux (1837), La fille du régiment (1840), La favorite (1840) and Don Pasquale (1843). He would write four more operas before his premature death from syphilis in 1848. He was Mr. Opera for a brief time but didn’t live to see the rise of his successor, Giuseppe Verdi.

    Donizetti’s musical legacy is deep, and Lucia’s melodrama is the epitome of “bel canto” style (“beautiful song”) – long phrases of lush melody that highlight the singer’s vocal technique. But Lucia did something different for its time. There’s subtle psychology under the tunes, intrinsic to the characters’ thoughts and feelings. It’s not just music for music’s sake, it leads us inward into motivation and mental state. Bel canto loves mad scenes and damsels in distress, and Lucia is the paragon, the highlight of them all.

    Adapted by the prolific Italian librettist Saladore Cammarano from Walter Scott’s gothic romance, The Bride of Lammermoor (1819), Lucia is flush with ghosts, plaids, and wilting heroine.

    Virginal Lucia, astonishing soprano Oriana Geis Falla, loves her family’s rival Edgardo, equally astonishing tenor Arnold Livingston Geis. (The singers are married and their mutual affection shows up in spades on stage.) Seeking position and political power, her brother Enrico (baritone John Allen Nelson) deceives her into marriage with Arturo (tenor Bernard Kelly). Believing lover Edgardo has betrayed her, she loses it and kills her husband on their wedding night.

    Going mad in her famous aria, Falla soared lyrically in the preface “Il dolce suono,” (“The sweet sound”) where she fantasizes about marriage to Edgardo, echoing the haunting glass harmonica obligato – substituted by flute here, beautifully piped by Wendy Bergin – then flew skyward in the fiendishly difficulty coloratura cabaletta, “Spargi d’amaro pianto” (“Sprinkle with bitter tears“), in which each repeat of the music is pushed up to 11, with ornamentation to match. It’s a showstopper like none other, a classic of precise technique and ravishing tone; sung, of course, while the character goes bonkers.

    Falla was exquisite all evening, hypnotizing us with flawless intonation, diction, and emotional wallop. With Hollywood stage presence, she’s also quite a beauty. Even dressed in a hideous wedding costume of puffed white sleeves appended to her tartan skirt with a bejeweled cloche hat like a Roaring ‘20s flapper, she dazzled. For an opera singer, she’s the complete package, a star.

    Then, of course, there’s the internationally known finale to Act II, the “Sextet,” the opera’s hit tune. Once you hear it, you’ll know it instantly. The number signifies “opera” in all its grand glory, much like “The Triumphal March” from Verdi’s Aida or “The Ride of the Valkyries” from Wagner’s Die Walküre. The six principals react differently to Edgardo’s surprise appearance at Lucia’s wedding to Arturo. The melody builds and builds, until the chorus inevitably comes in to finish the climax. It’s one of opera’s stunners.

    But don’t overlook Edgardo’s anguished yet ravishing aria in the graveyard, “Tombe degli avi miei … Fra poco a me ricovero,” (“Tomb of my ancestors…soon will give me rest”), as he says his goodbyes to his dead love. Then, naturally, he stabs himself. End of opera.

    Except here in director Alyssa Weathersby’s version. Edgardo’s final “addio to life” is sung with Lucia helping him commit suicide and leading him on to paradise. It’s a bit supernatural and quite unexpected, but it somehow works in context. We don’t mind a little apotheosis when these two singers are just so damn good. Yes, indeed, put them in paradise.

    click to enlarge

    Edgardo (Arnold Livingston Geis) explodes in rage.

    Photo by Pin Lim

    Geis, as Edgardo, is a burly Scotsman with Braveheart hair and a plangent tenor that could swing a broadsword. He cuts through Donizetti’s lyricism with a robust virile voice that is delicate enough to croon while maneuvering through the treacherous bel canto filigree. When he plants his feet and lets loose a fortissimo passage, you’d swear Birnam Wood was on the march.

    Baritone Nelson, as villainous brother Enrico, began a bit rusty but he warmed up considerably during his passionate duet with Lucia where he must convince – browbeat – her into marriage. Bass-baritone Aiden Smerud (last heard as a superlatively wicked Sparafucile in Opera in the Heights’ 2023 production of Rigoletto) as chaplain Raimondo, possesses a sonorous deep-dish voice just right for the keeper of the peace in the ruinous Ravenswood Castle. Why he is manhandled by Enrico’s goons when he tells the brother of Lucia’s love interest is one of director Weathersby’s least distinguished choices. An inspired choice by her, though, occurs during Lucia’s mad scene when the walls of Ravenswood weep blood. Chilling and macabre.

    Mezzo Samantha Taylor doesn’t have that much to sing as Alisa, Lucia’s lady-in-waiting, but she sings what Donizetti has given her with polish and superlative diction. A member of Houston Ebony Opera Guild, tenor Bernard Kelly in the abbreviated role of husband-to-be Arturo sang with clarity; as did tenor Jarrett Ward, a stalwart member of OH’s chorus, as bad boy Normanno, who forges Edgardo’s “Dear Lucia” letter, which sends her over the edge. The chorus was in tip-top shape, although, again, Weathersby directed them in haphazard fashion, giving them too much comedy relief for this opera wreathed in gloom and sadness.

    Maestro Eiki Isomura whipped his orchestra into luscious frenzies or heated romantic passions. Lucia’s mad scene evoked haunting whispers or crazed roulades, all matching Falla’s intense and florid rendition. He and his lead singers brought Donizetti’s antique warhorse into the present, exactly where it belongs.

    Lucia di Lammermoor continues at  2 p.m. Sunday, September 22; 7:30 p.m. Friday, September 27 and  7:30 p.m. Saturday September 28 at Opera in the Height’ Lambert Hall, 1703 Heights Boulevard. For more information, call 713-861-5303 or visit operaintheheights.org. $35-$85.

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    D. L. Groover

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  • The Great One: La Bohème at Opera in the Heights

    The Great One: La Bohème at Opera in the Heights

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    At his introductory remarks at the premiere of Opera in the Heights’ new production of Giacomo Puccini’s eternally fresh and evergreen opera masterpiece, La Bohème , artistic director and maestro Eiki Isomura said that he had recently been asked, Why Bohème again? “Because it’s so good, and everyone loves it. We owe our love for the art form to Bohème.” He’s absolutely right. And Opera in the Heights’ production is very good indeed.

    This striking opera has been in the repertory ever since its world premiere in Turin, Italy, 1896, under the incandescent conducting of young, soon-to-be legendary Arturo Toscanini. It has become the most produced opera in the world and, perhaps, the most beloved. It is easy to see why.

    The story is solid. Think of Jonathan Larson’s phenomenal cult musical smash Rent, or Baz Luhrmann’s sleek and sexy hit movie, Moulin Rouge, and its Broadway adaptation which is still running on The Great White Way, and you’ll understand.

    Based on Henri Murger’s gritty newspaper serial and later novelization, Scenes de la Vie de Bohème, 1847-49, and expertly adapted by two of Italy’s most famous duo librettists, Giacosa and Illica (who would later pen Puccini’s Madama Butterfly and Tosca – two more greats to add to the list of favorite and most produced operas), we are no longer in the realm of fairy tale or high class drama.

    This is everyday life of the poor and struggling. Artists to be sure, but down and out during the Second French Republic in Paris. Rodolfo (tenor Brian Yu) is a poet, who burns his plays to keep his roommates warm in the walk-up garret. Marcello (baritone Kellen Schrimper) is a painter in love with flirty Musetta (soprano Caitlin Aloia). Their relationship is definitely on-again, off-again, on-again. Musician Schaunard (baritone Adam Richardson) brings in enough money from his scant career to supply their food, at least for a few days. “Philosopher” Colline (bass Griffen Hogan Tracy) doesn’t really do anything except, at opera’s end, sell his beloved overcoat to pay for ailing Mimi’s medicine and a doctor’s visit.

    Then there’s Mimi (soprano Ashley Milanese), a tenant in the apartment building who embroiders silk flowers and suffers from tuberculosis. She “meets cute” with Rodolfo in one of opera’s most stunning scenes when her candle blows out in the drafty building. They are instantly smitten, and in a radiant duet they declare their love and go off to meet the others at Cafe Momus for Christmas Eve.

    Opera in the Heights sets the story in ’20s Paris, which does it no harm. Their last production of Bohème was placed in swinging ’60s Paris during the hippie revolution, with an updated libretto that included “groovy,” “bad karma,” and “you’re a downer.” It was a stunner. As is this one, directed with finesse and imagination by Nicole Kenley-Miller, with Jodi Brobovsky’s rotating set with its Van Gogh-esque Parisian townscape and swirling sky background, costumers Shaun Heath and Mary Webber’s flapper dresses, and hair designer Makaela Shade-Alexander’s Louise Brooks-inspired bangs. It all works splendidly.

    Of course, what truly works is Puccini’s radiantly lush score, a paean to young love and its heartbreaks. He washes this opera in unceasing melody that cascades over you, one glorious aria or duet or trio whose tunes have seeped into our consciousness since its premiere. This lavish romanticism with its tinge of verismo was Puccini’s breakthrough work that placed him at the forefront of Italian opera composers after the death of the master, Giuseppe Verdi. He took that mantle and wore it until his career finished with Turandot in 1926.

    But Puccini wasn’t kind to his singers. He demanded force, passion, lyrical legato, and an unbridled emotionalism – all indebted to Verdi’s influence. If you’re supposed to be in the throes of love, your vocal range is going to be high. The singers at Opera in the Heights match Puccini note for note, sometimes going one better. Milanese, as Mimi, is stupendous. Her luscious voice, velvet with impeccable diction, is almost too large for intimate Lambert Hall. Could you hear her in Montrose? Yes. Her quiet passages were quite beautiful, but this is a Metropolitan Opera voice, grand and glorious, able to fill any concert hall. With a reduced orchestration by Bryan Higgins, she soared over everyone. It was beautiful to hear – plangent and dramatic to a fault – but a bit too much in this small space. Just tone it down a bit, if you can. But what a revelation is this young singer. Greatness lies ahead.

    Yu’s voice, while hitting all the treacherous highs in the thrilling score, is a bit too small for Lambert Hall. He had to push it which made him sound a tad reedy and undernourished. He was an ardent lover and conveyed Rodofo’s deep guilt when he can’t bear Mimi’s imminent death and wants to break off their relationship. Although he can’t stand up to the force of Milanese’s volcano, he blended well in their tender moments. Especially good were Schrimper and Aloia as Marcello and Musetta. Both are immensely gifted singers, able to navigate Puccini’s thunderous music while etching fine and real characterizations. Musetta has one of the opera’s great arias, “Musetta’s waltz” or “Quando me’n vo’” (When I go along). With her red boa molting all over the stage and her blond marcelled hair gleaming in Edgar Guajardo’s light, she stopped the show as she flaunted her hen-pecked sugar daddy Alcindoro (baritone Zack Scott Frank) to get Marcello’s attention. She certainly gets his attention – and ours.

    The chorus, under Gregory McDaniel, and the children’s chorus, under Monica Isomura, were in resplendent form, whether as street sweepers, dairymaids, or the populace of Paris out on Christmas Eve with kids clambering for presents or amazed by the parade. It was staged economically, down the aisle and across the front of the audience, using every available space in the theater. Lovely work.

    Then there was the orchestra, under maestro Isomura. I don’t think they’ve ever sounded better. The horns were crisp, the strings deep and resonant, the harp celestial, the woodwinds spirited, the percussion booming. Isomura clearly loves his Puccini, and he threw his heart into this most romantic score.

    If you’d like to experience opera and you’ve never tried it, Opera in the Heights’ Bohème is the perfect starter. It’s opera at its finest: rich, affecting, swoon-worthy, and the best music on stage. This production touches all the bases. Puccini grabs and shakes you. He moves you. You just might like it.

    Note: If you can’t get enough of Puccini’s masterpiece, Houston Grand Opera has programmed it for next season, January 2025. I told you it was popular.

    La Bohème continues at 2 p.m. Sunday, April 7; 7:30 p.m. Friday, April 12; and 7:30 p.m. Saturday, April 13 at Opera in the Heights, Lambert Hall, 1703 Heights Boulevard. Sung in Italian with English surtitles. For more information, call 713-861-5303 or visit operaintheheights.org. $29-$85.

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    D. L. Groover

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  • The Light in the Piazza at Opera in the Heights: That’s Amore

    The Light in the Piazza at Opera in the Heights: That’s Amore

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    In its most sumptuous production in seasons, Opera in the Heights presents the Tony-winning musical The Light in the Piazza (2005).

    Composed by Adam Guettel (grandson of iconic Richard Rodgers), who also penned the lyrics, and with a literate book by notable playwright Craig Lucas (Prelude to a Kiss, Reckless, An American in Paris), the musical floods the theater in all manner of theater magic.

    There’s magic in director Seamus Ricci’s cinematic staging, in the prodigious singing of its talented cast, in the autumnal lighting and minimal sets from Edgar Guajardo, in the dazzling atmospheric projections from Brittany Merenda, in the ’50s-inspired Balenciaga costumes from Shaun Heath and Mary Webber, and in the lush orchestral playing from a quintet of piano (Sarah Spencer), violin (Dominika Dancewicz), cello (Benjamin Stoehr), double bass (Stephen Martin), and harp (Emily Klein) – it’s the harp that seems to be the sonic heart of this show. But the rock at the center of this production must be musical director Stephen W. Jones, who elicits all the emotion and truth out of Guettel’s rather spiky score and adds an operatic sweep to the work.

    Guettel’s music isn’t easy. It’s certainly influenced by Stephen Sondheim in its jagged rhythms and ultra-sophisticated lyricism, but there’s a more-modern chromatic overlay that distinguishes this score from your average Broadway sound. That doesn’t, however, make it sound any better. When the entire cast cries out in “Aiutami” (Help Me), the roof of Lambert Hall rises a foot. But it’s young Fabrizio’s last song, “Love to Me,” that truly hits us in the heart. It’s the most old-fashioned of any of Guettel’s tunes, full of swelling melody and pleasing chord progressions that cry out, Love Song. It’s a beauty of a song, perhaps a classic, and since it comes at the very close of the show, it lifts us like none other does.

    The entire musical is literary and adult, adapted from the 1960 book from Elizabeth Spencer, which would soon be adapted for the screen in 1962 starring Olivia de Havilland, Yvette Mimieux, George Hamilton and Rossano Brazzi.

    Unhappily married Margaret Johnson (plummy mezzo Christina Pezzarossi) from Winston Salem, North Carolina, accompanied with young daughter Clara (heavenly soprano Catherine Goode), visits Florence, Italy, to relive her honeymoon reveries in hopes to revive her failing marriage. When Clara’s hat blows off – in a delightfully surprising meld of projection and live action – she meets Fabrizio (ardent tenor Benjamin Lurye), and the couple are instantly smitten.

    Margaret will have none of this and unsuccessfully attempts to keep her away from this ingratiating Italian and his family: Papa (sweet tenor Alejandro Magallón), Mama (passionate mezzo Megan Berti), brother Giuseppe (robust baritone Scott Clark), and his jealous wife Franca (fiery soprano Lisa Borik Vickers). Clara rebels as best she can against her formidable mother, who harbors a family secret about her daughter, who seems much younger then she is. Over-protective tiger mom grates against Clara’s growing personal awareness, need for love, and her bursting to be free.

    Within Guettel’s sprawling arias, both families are neatly delineated. The Italian Naccarellis sing untranslated – a lovely effect that sets the Americans (and us) apart from them – but we know exactly what they’re saying – we’ve seen Fellini movies before. And he gives Margaret and Clara spiraling melodies that break apart and coalesce as their inner turmoil overtakes them, or the beauty of the Italian art overwhelms them.

    The problem with this show is that OH has only programmed three performances. Two remain.

    For Broadway babies, The Light in the Piazza is a cult hit, a one-off. Houston last saw it during Main Street Theater’s regional premiere in 2009. It deserves to be seen, and attention must be paid. Love conquers all.

    The Light in the Piazza continues at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, February 17 and 2  p.m. Sunday, February 18 at Lambert Hall, 1703 Heights Boulevard. For more information, call 713-861-5303 or visit operaintheheights.org. $29-$85.

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    D. L. Groover

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