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Home , Crossing (opera), Rod Gilfry

FREE! Paul Crewes Rachel Fine Plácido Domingo James Conlon Christopher Koelsch FOR ALL AGES Dance Artistic Director Managing Director Eli and Edythe Broad Richard Seaver Sebastian Paul and General Director Music Director Marybelle Musco Sundays President and CEO PRESENT with Debbie Allen & Friends Matthew Aucoin’s EVERY SECOND SUNDAY OF THE MONTH IN CONCERT ® Crossing Three-time Emmy Award- winner Debbie Allen is back for MUSIC AND LIBRETTO BY the third season running with Matthew Aucoin her wildly popular Dance inspired by the poetry and prose of Sundays, an exhilarating series CONDUCTOR of FREE, outdoor dance events Matthew Aucoin for the whole family! Members of the LA Orchestra

May 13 | 12pm – 2pm Principal Cast (in order of vocal appearance) AFRICAN DANCE Accompanied by live ROD GILFRY...... WALT WHITMAN drummers. BRENTON RYAN ‡ ...... JOHN WORMLEY June 10 | 5pm - 7pm DAVÓNE TINES * ...... FREDDIE STOWERS VOGUE LIV REDPATH † ...... MESSENGER Celebrate Pride and unleash your inner diva as you learn the * LA Opera debut LA Opera Off Grand and Matthew Aucoin’s basics of Voguing. † Member of LA Opera’s residency made possible by a generous grant from Domingo-Colburn-Stein Young Artist Program The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation July 8 | 5pm – 7pm ‡ Alumnus of LA Opera’s Domingo-Colburn-Stein Young Artist Program Additional support from Contemporary Opera Initiative SALSA SUNDAY chairpersons Barry and Nancy Sanders and a consortium Taught by Debbie Allen herself! PRODUCTION STAFF of generous donors STAGE MANAGER Erin Thompson-Janszen Crossing was commissioned by the American Repertory Theater. The A.R.T. also produced the August 12 | 5pm – 7pm work’s first production, in cooperation with Music Theatre Group. The premiere took place on May ASSISTANT STAGE MANAGER 29, 2015, at the Shubert Theater in Boston, Massachusetts. BREAK THE FLOOR Melissa Tosto The libretto by Matthew Aucoin includes selections from Walt Whitman’s poems “Crossing Brooklyn HIP HOP ENSEMBLE PREPARATION Ferry,” “O Captain! my Captain!”, and “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d.” The opening of , Jeremy Frank the final chorus is Mr. Aucoin’s own translation of lines from Dante’s Purgatorio. Other phrases in the final chorus are inspired by the poetry of Federico García Lorca and Wallace Stevens. Join us for an introduction to MUSICAL PREPARATION Hip-Hop class with a fun and Miah Im Published by Associated Music Publishers, Inc. (BMI) energetic routine. MAY 25-26, 2018 Bram Goldsmith Theater

CONNECT WITH US Running time: one hour and 40 minutes, with no intermission. 310.746.4000 | TheWallis.org/DanceSundays

P10 PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE About the Production About the Artists

MATTHEW AUCOIN BRENTON RYAN LIV REDPATH (Messenger) LA Crossing Synopsis (Composer / Librettist / (John Wormley) LA Opera: Opera: Second Apparition in Conductor) LA Opera: Last Gastone in La Traviata (2014, Macbeth (2016, debut); soloist in Crossing is an operatic and work in brutal conditions Once in the hospital, Whitman season, he began a three-year debut); Spirit/Sailor in Dido and Nosferatu (2016); Olympia in The fantasia based on Walt for years on end. Was it pure strikes up a friendship with a tenure as Artist in Residence. He Aeneas (2014); Léon in The Tales of Hoffmann (2017); Whitman’s experiences as generosity, pure selflessness? volatile young soldier named made his mainstage conducting Ghosts of Versailles (2015); Frasquita in Carmen (2017); Anna Akhnaten several roles in Hercules vs. Nabucco a volunteer nurse during Or did Whitman feel some need John Wormley. As the war drags debut with (2016) by in (2017). Amour in , followed by Rigoletto (2018). He also Vampires (2015); Beppe in Pagliacci (2015); Orpheus and Eurydice (2018); Countess Ceprano in the American Civil War. The to escape his own life—or to on, their relationship grows conducted his own new score for Nosferatu (2016) Monostatos in (2016); Pedrillo in The Rigoletto (2018). A member of the Domingo-Colburn- opera delves into Whitman’s know himself better by putting deeper and more complicated; for LA Opera Off Grand. Career highlights: Composer- Abduction from the Seraglio (2017). He is an alumnus Stein Young Artist Program, she will return as Gretel in psyche, exploring what might himself through a Dante-esque Whitman never could have conductor: Matthew Aucoin’s music has been of the Domingo-Colburn-Stein Young Artist Program. Hansel and Gretel next season. Career highlights: In have led a middle-aged New challenge? expected either the love or the performed by cellist Yo-Yo Ma, members of the Career highlights: The ’s engagements this February, the made her Seattle Symphony Yorker to drop everything betrayals that await him. Chicago Symphony, Chamber Orchestra, season include Spoletta in Tosca at the Metropolitan debut in Vivaldi’s Gloria and her Los Angeles Zurich’s Tonhalle Orchestra, , Opera, Monostatos in The Magic Flute with Opera Philharmonic debut in their collaboration concert with Alabama Symphony, American Repertory Theater, Philadelphia, Korngold’s The Ring of Polykrates with the Academy Awards. This summer she will perform Boston’s A Far Cry, countertenor Anthony Roth the Dallas Opera and the Dancing Master in Ariadne Naiade in Ariadne auf Naxos with . She Costanzo, tenor Paul Appleby and violinist Jennifer auf Naxos with Santa Fe Opera. Highlights of previous recently sang Echo in Ariadne auf Naxos at Opera Koh, among others. This season’s premieres include a seasons include debuts with the Theatre of Saint Louis and Héro in Béatrice et Bénédict On Crossing new piece for string quartet, premiered in April by as Pedrillo, with as Janek in The at Aspen Opera Center. She earned her master’s BY COMPOSER MATTHEW AUCOIN the Brentano Quintet, and a new work to be Makropulos Case, with as Gastone, degree at Juilliard as a Kovner Fellow, singing the title premiered in June by Chanticleer. In recent years, he with Opera Theatre of Saint Louis in the U.S. premiere role in Les mamelles de Tirésias and the Queen of the “But for the opera…I could into a new musical landscape. of need—that his poetry is not, has made conducting debuts with the Chicago of The Trial by Philip Glass, with Lyric Opera of Chicago Night in The Magic Flute. She debuted at Carnegie Hall never have written Leaves Whitman’s “melodies” surge or is not exclusively, a vigorous Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, in Wozzeck, and Henrik in A Little Night Music with in Poulenc’s Gloria and at Alice Tully Hall in Handel’s La of Grass,” Walt Whitman boundlessly, spilling over the side assertion of what he is, but rather Leipzig’s Gewandhaus Orchestra, Salzburg’s Houston Grand Opera. He was the winner of the Birgit Resurrezione. (LivRedpath.com) reminisced late in life. It’s of the page; his exclamations are the expression of a yearning to Mozarteum Orchestra, Los Angeles Chamber Nilsson Prize at the 2016 Operalia competition. (BrentonRyan.com) LA OPERA ARTISTIC perhaps surprising that the wild and craggy. His poetry is both be what he is not, or to reconcile Orchestra, Bari’s Teatro Petruzzelli, Juilliard Opera, Music Academy of the West and Rome Opera AND PRODUCTION STAFF quintessential American poet, the waterfall and the rocks on opposing aspects of his identity. Orchestra. This summer he will conduct Doctor DAVÓNE TINES (Freddie VICE PRESIDENT, ARTISTIC PLANNING the writer whose signature which the water crashes. The person/persona/personality Atomic at Santa Fe Opera. (MatthewAucoin.com) Stowers) LA Opera: debut. Career Rupert Hemmings bard-call is a “barbaric yawp” “Walt Whitman, an American, one highlights: Mr. Tines created the ARTISTIC ADMINISTRATOR rather than a refined warble, “What is it, then, between us?” of the roughs” is the living product ROD GILFRY (Walt Whitman) role of Freddie Stowers for the Samuel Gelber spent his formative years— With this resonant question at of this need. LA Opera: Herald in 2015 world premiere of Crossing PRODUCTION DIRECTOR before setting off to cross a the climax of Crossing Brooklyn (1986, debut); 158 at American Repertory Theater. Michelle Magaldi The bass-’s performances ORCHESTRA PERSONNEL MANAGER wild, apparently “formless” Ferry, Whitman asks many things So, in Crossing, the Walt Whitman performances of 28 roles to date, including the title roles of this season include debuts with San Francisco Opera Brady Steel poetic frontier—absorbing the at once: what is his relationship who walks the stage is not that (2000) and The in the world premiere of Girls of the Golden West by MUSIC LIBRARIAN bel canto of Donizetti, to his contemporaries, his familiar poetic persona. Rather, Barber of Seville (1991, 1997) John Adams, at the Opéra National de Paris in Kaija KT Somero Bellini, Rossini, and the young fellow men and women? What this is Whitman as I imagine and Papageno in The Magic Flute (1993, 2002). He Saariaho’s Only the Sound Remains, at the Brooklyn LIBRARIAN’S ASSISTANT Verdi. I share Whitman’s opinion is his relationship to you, the he might have been to himself, will return next season in ’s the loser. Academy of Music as Freddie Stowers and at the Baltic Melisandra Dunker that the essence of opera reader, whoever you may be, starting from a midlife crisis Career highlights: The baritone created the role of Sea Festival in Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex. Other PRODUCTION STAGE MANAGER Aci, has nothing to do with the whenever and wherever you may which prompts his radical, heroic Walt Whitman at the 2015 premiere of Crossing at appearances of the season include Handel’s Chelsea Antrim Galatea e Polifemo at National Sawdust and concerts COMPANY MANAGER stuffy salons and social one- be reading his poem? And what decision to drop everything and American Repertory Theater. Acclaimed worldwide in opera, musicals, recitals and cabaret, he has with Gustavo Dudamel and the Los Angeles Philharmonic Nicki Harper upmanship of the Americans is the relationship between the volunteer in the war hospitals. created 12 leading roles in world premieres, of both Schumann’s Das Paradies und die Peri and ASSISTANT COMPANY MANAGER who imported it to contradictory elements of his Naturally, this Whitman is a including, recently, Thomas Adès’ The Exterminating Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, also performing the Dominic Domingo in the 19th century: opera own self? The phrase “between fictional creation. Crossing is a Angel at the Metropolitan Opera and Jake Heggie's latter on tour in New York, Washington, D.C., Paris and HEAD COACH, DOMINGO-COLBURN-STEIN YOUNG ARTIST PROGRAM is a primal union of animal us” itself has a double meaning: musical fantasia which imagines It's a Wonderful Life at Houston Grand Opera. Other London. Past highlights include Adams’ El Niño with longing, as expressed in what is the relationship between and realizes the many forces— recent appearances include Brett Dean's Hamlet at the London Symphony Orchestra and Los Angeles Nino Sanikidze, DMA True Fire SUPERTITLE PREPARATION / CUER sound, and human meaning, as us, and what stands between us, generosity, insecurity, longing, the Glyndebourne Festival, Cosi fan tutte with the Philharmonic, Saariaho’s with the Orchestre National de France, Oedipus Rex at Lisbon’s Teatro Linda Zoolalian expressed in language. Indeed, keeping us apart? selflessness, bravery, unfulfilled Los Angeles Philharmonic, with the San Francisco Symphony, Kismet at the Vienna Nacional de São Carlos and Only the Sound Remains Whitman considered opera the sexual desire, a need to escape his Volksoper, and Anna Nicole at Covent Garden and at the Finnish National Opera. pinnacle of human expression, In the moment that Whitman asks own life, a boundless kindness— Opera. Future engagements include something beyond the powers this question, he is in a state of that caused a man named Walter Ariadne auf Naxos and Così fan tutte with Santa Fe of language alone. And in his unknowing; he wants to know, Whitman, Jr., to forge an indelible Opera, It’s a Wonderful Life with San Francisco best poems, Whitman operates and needs to know. Crossing embodiment of the American spirit Opera and Heggie’s Dead Man Walking at the Met. like an opera composer: he emerges out of my sense that in his poetry. (RodGilfry.com) carries the English language Whitman wrote his poetry out

P12 PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE PERFORMANCES MAGAZINE P13