I’ve been doing some angsting out loud over questions of sustainability and the viability of the Opera Workshop in the community, which is sort of the inevitable result of the dust clearing on a financially difficult year. When the excitement over the summer’s artistic successes begins to pass, what I’m left with is the practical realities in front of me, which never seem to get any easier and which were especially rough this year, on all fronts. But before I let myself do a really deep dive into those unavoidable realities, I want to take a long moment to express my gratitude to everyone who made Dido and Aeneas such an incredible experience and probably my favorite opera we’ve done to date. Because no matter how much hand-wringing and hair-pulling I’m doing over the practical, business-y aspects of this thing, that gratitude is REAL. [Read more…]
Ten out of twelve
I love this little mini-documentary Paul made about our “10 out of 12” rehearsal day on Tuesday! Featuring Alexa King and Andrea Tuthill as well as all the cast! Get a taste of what’s in store, and join us at Eastworks tonight through Saturday at 8:00PM to hear this and more with our complete orchestra! 💜
Dido & Aeneas: Week 5!
Last video blog before tech begins early tomorrow morning at Eastworks! A million, million thanks to All Saints’ Episcopal Church, South Hadley for their kindness and hospitality! Though we will admit we are so looking forward to air-conditioning! So looking forward to lights! So terrified that TECH IS ALREADY UPON US! 😭
This is happening.
Program delivered to the printer. Just realized I still have to create a vlog for this past week. 😭😂🤣
Audiences, I hope you will appreciate the inclusion of summaries for each scene. It took a long time.
Scatter roses on her tomb
I’m here at home, getting ready for today’s rehearsal (I still can’t believe I’ve finished staging!!) where we’ll do a bunch of runs of the last scene we staged yesterday so we can put it on video for our lighting designer (Alexa), a chorus & orchestra rehearsal, and finally a stumble-through of Act II. Tomorrow morning, we’ll do our first stumble-through of the whole show. That we’re here already, almost a week away from tech, feels like a miracle, yet there is no question of what we’re doing to do with our time.
One of the things that’s been absolutely wonderful about this year’s process is the addition of our musician/coaches Shayne and Wallie to the mix, which is what allowed us to bring teen violinists into the project for the first time. In some ways, this opportunity is unique to Purcell, whose music is much more playable for students than any of the stuff we’ve done in the past. But it’s also a testament to the two of them, specifically, and what they bring to the table. [Read more…]
Dido and Aeneas: Week 4!
Hey friends! I’m now heading into the fifth week of directing this year’s summer opera, Dido and Aeneas. If you’ve been following along, you know we’ve been keeping a video diary chronicling our process to give you a glimpse of both our hard work and the fun we have. Here’s the latest installment! This week, we celebrated one student’s legal name change, battled more hot weather (and also a storm!), started and nearly finished staging Act II, and began having some real rehearsals with our orchestra.
Tickets are on sale now for ATS Opera Workshop: Dido and Aeneas, coming to Eastworks in Easthampton, August 2-4!
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