OPERA OUT LOUD ! STUDY GUIDE 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS Welcome Letter & Performance-Day Checklist . 3 Opera OUT LOUD Playlist . 4 Meet the Cast . 5 Italian (1786) — The Marriage of Figaro . 7 Italian (1832) — The Elixir of Love . 9 Italian (1839) — The Daughter of the Regiment . 10 Italian (1917 –18) — Gianni Schicchi . 11 German (1791) — The Magic Flute . 12 French (1867) — Roméo and Juliet . 14 French (1863) — The Pearl Fishers . 15 French (1875) — Carmen . 16 French (1883) — Lakmé . 17 English (1879) — The Pirates of Penzance . 14 Operatic Voices . 19 Registers of the Voice, Vocal Training, Voice Types . 21 Voice Types Based on Size & Quality . 24 Famous Opera Singers (Music, History) . 26 A Checklist for Opera Singers (Science, Music) . 28 Musical Terms (Music) . 29 The Orchestra & Conductor (Music) . 33 The Conductor’s Score . 34 A Short History of Opera (History) . 35 Timeline of the Great Operas (History) . 39 Opera As Collaboration . 40 How Sound is Heard (Science) . 41 A Singer’s Body (Science) . 42 Evidence of Learning . 43 Tour Sponsors . 44 2 WELCOME! Dear Music Educators and Administrators, For twenty-five years, Nashville Opera has brought live pro - fessional opera performances into area schools. Nashville Opera ON TOUR has reached over a quarter of a million stu - dents and adults across Middle Tennessee, and this pandemic year we get to expand on this tradition by offering virtual con - tent for the first time. To best prepare your students for their exciting operatic experience, we provide a study guide to assist you. Inside you’ll find basic information about the art form and musical terminology as well as interactive activities and projects to deepen students’ understanding and enjoyment. By connecting opera to your music and general classroom curriculum, we hope to provide ways to collaborate with teachers and arts specialists. All of the activities in the guide are tied directly to the Tennessee Curriculum Standards and are labeled with the GLE number, if they exist, or the standard code. We are exceptionally proud this year to present study guide content written by Joy Calico, Cornelius Vanderbilt Professor of Musicology at the Blair School of Music. The entertaining and scholarly sections detailing OUT LOUD’s arias and operas (pages 7 – 14) are Dr. Calico’s wonderful contribution to the guide. We hope you enjoy as much as we do! This guide is designed to benefit both the student and educator through its interdisciplinary approach to opera education. The activities provided in the teacher guide assist students to actively listen and observe live opera. We encourage you to use this guide to augment your existing plans in the many disciplines included. You are welcome to copy or adapt any part of this guide to enhance learning in your classroom. The arts have always been a vital part of a young person’s educational experience. Thank you for partnering with Nashville Opera and giving us the opportunity to share the magic of opera with your students! We look forward to our virtual performance at your school and know your students will enjoy the show. If you have any questions, please contact me! Best, Performance-Day Check List Hannah Marcoe Education Program Administrator m Be ready with your students to watch [email protected] the performance at your booked time slot. 615.832.5242 m Have post-show Q&A platform ready to switch to immediately following your streamed performance (if requested). 3 OPERA OUT LOUD PLAYLIST Bizet CARMEN “L’amour est un oiseau rebelle” . Mezzo Mozart TH E MARRIAGE OF FIGARO “Se vuol ballare” . Baritone Donizetti THE ELIXIR OF LOVE “Quanto e bella” . Tenor Donizetti THE DAUGHTER OF THE REGIMENT “Chaçun le sait” . Soprano Bizet THE PEARL FISHERS Duet . Tenor/Baritone Duet Mozart TH E MARRIAGE OF FIGARO “Non so piu cosa son” . Mezzo Gounod ROMEO AND JULIET “Ah leve-toi soleil” . Tenor Delibes LAKMÉ Flower Duet . Soprano/Mezzo Sullivan THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE “I am a Pirate King” . Baritone Puccini GIANNI SCHICCHI “O mio babbino caro” . Soprano Mozart THE MAGIC FLUTE Papageno Papagena duet . Baritone/Soprano 4 MEET THE CAST The cast is made up of Nashville Opera’s Mary Ragland Emerging Artists. These performers come from all over the country and stay in Nashville for three to four months to take part in our training program. They are part of The Three Little Pigs as well as our mainstage production of Rossini’s Cinderella. We asked our singers some questions so that you can get to know them! Rebekah Howell, soprano From Houston, Texas, but lives in Gallatin, Tennessee Has sung with Chautauqua Opera, Opera Colorado, Opera Louisiane What is your favorite holiday? Thanksgiving What is your favorite food? Chicken wings Do you play any instruments? Cello and piano Favorite movies? You’ve Got Mail, The Incredibles (1 & 2), Toy Story, Brave What’s a little-known fact about you? One of my thumbs is shorter than the other! Emily Cottam, mezzo-soprano From Salt Lake City, Utah Has sung with Seagle Music Colony, Tri-Cities Opera, AIMS in Austria Do you have any pets? I have two cats: a brown and white tabby named Max and a gray kitty named Meonji ( 먼지 , pronounced MOHN-ji, which means “dust” in Korean!) What do you like to do for fun? I like to draw, play Animal Crossing, and practice my instruments! Where’s the farthest place you’ve ever traveled? South Korea Frederick Schlick, tenor From Reading, Pennsylvania, but lives outside NYC Has sung with Pensacola Opera, Tri-Cities Opera, City Lyric Opera NYC What’s the weirdest job you’ve ever had? Once upon a time, I sold large printers to major corporations. What do you like to do other than sing? I like cooking, photography, yoga, playing the piano (poorly) and playing a videogame or two What’s a little-known fact about you? I co-own an Antique Furniture Company! 5 Christopher Curcuruto, baritone-bass From Sydney, Australia Has performed with Opera Australia, Pittsburgh Festival Opera, Fort Worth Opera Farthest place ever traveled? Milan, Italy. From Sydney, that is over 10,000 miles and takes over 24 hours of travel! Do you have any pets? I have a puppy named Kuzco (like the charac - ter in Disney’s “The Emperor’s New Groove”) Interesting fact about yourself? Before I became an opera singer, I was an actor, a writer, a radio presenter, a cook, and a lawyer! Hannah Marcoe, Education Program Administrator From Dallas, Texas but lives in Nashville, Tennessee Pets? I have a dog named Peanut! Favorite movies? My Big Fat Greek Wedding, and Home Alone Favorite food? Pasta and seafood What do you do for fun? Sing and lots of arts and crafts! 6 ITALIAN Mozart THE MARRIAGE OF FIGARO (1786) Le Nozze di Figaro “Se vuol ballare” sung by Figaro (baritone) “Non so piu cosa son” sung by Cherubino (mezzo) Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) and his older sister Maria Anna (1751-1829), nicknamed Nannerl, were born in Salzburg, a city in modern-day Austria. They were child prodigies. Their father Leopold (1719-1787) was responsible for their musical training and took them on numerous European concert tours together. Maria Anna was said to be especially proficient on the harpsichord and the fortepiano (an early version of the piano), and there is some evidence that she was a composer as well, as her brother referred to her compositions in his letters, but no scores sur - vive. Instead, as was typical in mid-eighteenth-century families of a certain social status, Maria Anna stopped performing in public once she reached the marriageable age of eighteen. Her younger brother’s career continued with numerous successes, but he was never able to secure the job he wanted most: a full-time position at a prominent court. His many attempts across the far-flung houses of the Habsburg Empire in Milan, Florence, and Naples were unsuccessful. Instead, he worked as a gigging musi - cian, and made his money giving concerts and composing new music on commission. By the 1780s his earn - ings would have put him comfortably in the middle class, but he still coveted the prestige of a court position. He finally received such an appointment at the Imperial Court in Vienna under Emperor Joseph II in 1787. It paid well but was a part-time position only, composing new dance music for his annual balls. His opera Le Nozze di Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro) from 1786 aptly reflects the historical moment in which he lived. The opera is based on a comic play of the same name by French playwright Pierre Beaumarchais. Two servants, Figaro and Susanna, are engaged to be married and team up with the Countess to outwit the Count’s attempts to exercise his droit du seigneur (the master’s right to sleep with his servant girls on their wed - ding nights). Female solidarity across class divisions and the servants’ delivery of comeuppance to the master scandalized the French theater censors with its repudiation of aristocratic privilege. The censors required Beaumarchais to make revisions before it could be performed, but even the acceptable version was later de - scribed by Napoleon as “the [French] Revolution already put into action.” Lorenzo Da Ponte (1749-1838) adapted the libretto from Beaumarchais’s play. He was a prolific Italian poet at the Viennese court who was Jewish by birth but converted to Catholicism, and even took Minor Orders in the priesthood. His success in Viennese court circles is indicative of Joseph II’s open-mindedness toward Jewish-born individuals following a period of renewed repression in 1740-1780. Da Ponte was librettist on the three operas many consider to be Mozart’s finest: Figaro, Don Giovanni, and Così fan tutte.