VICTOR HERBERT Mlle. Modiste The Ohio Light Opera Michael Borowitz Conductor Steven Daigle Director Mlle. Modiste Music.....................................Victor Herbert BACKGROUND NOTES...............Michael Miller Lyrics.....................................Henry Blossom By the time composer Victor Herbert began work Orchestral Restoration...........Bruce Herman in 1905 on his comic opera Mlle. Modiste, he already Conductor........................Michael Borowitz had fourteen Broadway shows to his credit and a Stage Director.........................Steven Daigle reputation as America’s most prominent composer of stage music. Long frustrated with the demands of The Ohio Light Opera Broadway publishers and producers that he simply Steven Daigle, Artistic Director crank out a bunch of songs and leave the rest to them, CAST: he and librettist Henry Blossom set out on the Modiste Fifi....................................Sara Ann Mitchell project with the goal of creating a new musical/ Étienne....................................Todd Strange dramatic paradigm for American operetta. In his words, Conte de St. Mar.....................Boyd Mackus “A comic opera with any pretense at artistic merit has Hiram Bent...............................Dennis Jesse the two forces [music and drama] so closely related and inter-woven that the audience senses them as one and Gaston.......................................Jacob Allen the same thing. Every situation requires some definite Mme. Cecily..............................Julie Wright sort of music and the song must be logical and part of Mrs. Bent.....................Jessie Wright Martin the natural action.” Thus, decades before Show Boat François....................................Jon Gerhard and Oklahoma!, the two shows that are most often René.......................................... Cory Clines credited with advancing the relevance of the text and Fanchette.....................................Cecily Ellis the integration of story and music, Herbert and Blossom Nanette.....................................Ashly Evans set the ball rolling with their rather audacious treat- Marie.........................................Allison Toth ment, in Mlle. Modiste, of class distinction, gender bias, Bazaar Soloist................................Eve Hehn and societal stereotyping. With Metropolitan Opera star Fritzi Scheff in the CHORUS: title role of Fifi, the hatgirl with dreams of a stage Chelsea Basler, Nate Brian, Erin Daigle, career, Mlle. Modiste opened on Christmas Day of Stephen Faulk, Sahara Glasener-Boles, 1905 and ran 202 performances at Broadway’s Samantha Grenell-Zaidman, Eve Hehn, Knickerbocker Theatre. It was revived on Broadway in Paul Hopper, Kyle Knapp, Jacqueline Komos, 1906, 1907, 1913, and 1929, all featuring Scheff in Matthew Kuehnl, Janelle Lentz, Tania Mandzy, her signature role. In 1926, a silent film version of the Philip McLeod, Owen Reynolds, Raina Thorne, show featured Corinne Griffith in the title role. In 1930, Allison Toth, Logan Walsh. First National Pictures produced a sound version— ■ 2 ■ Composer Victor Herbert (1859-1924) Soprano Fritzi Scheff (1879-1954) Mme. Scheff as “Mlle. Modiste,” Act II titled Kiss Me Again—with Bernice Claire as Fifi, “If I were on the stage,” became the take-away hit Walter Pidgeon as her love interest, and Edward song from Mlle. Modiste and one of the most per- Everett Horton. And, in 1951, NBC screened a formed and recorded of soprano light opera show- television version in which Fritzi Scheff—46 pieces. Étienne, in Act I, intones his frustration at years after the show made her a star—played being unable to bring together “The time and Fifi’s mother to Marguerite Piazza’s title role the place and the girl” (CD I, Track 7), while his and Brian Sullivan as paramour Étienne. aristocratic uncle leaves no doubt in his pompous Herbert’s musical score remains one of “I want what I want when I want it” (CD II, Track the supreme gems in the American operetta 4) that he is not likely to bend in demanding that canon. Fifi’s audition song (CD I, Track 9), as Étienne have nothing to do with a simple milliner. she describes to the wealthy American Hiram In Act II, the French soldiers welcome the Bent her dreams of a stage life away from her returning Fifi—once their little mascot, but now a current mundane existence, is clearly inspired by big singing star—in one of the most rousing march Adele’s Act III audition song in Johann Strauss’ numbers in the literature, “The mascot of the Die Fledermaus. “Kiss me again,” the third troop” (CD II, Track 11). And, as more than ample section in this extended musical sequence called demonstration that her stage career has ■ 3 ■ blossomed, Fifi entertains the guests at a charity of American Operetta, who brought American bazaar with her coloratura waltz “The nightingale sounds and sensibilities to musical theatre and and the star” (CD II, Track 16). paved the way for both the continuing evolution With the 2009 season’s production of Mlle. of operetta (Friml and Romberg) and the devel- Modiste, The Ohio Light Opera celebrates the 150th opment of the modern American musical (Kern, birthday of Victor Herbert (1859-1924), the Father Berlin, Porter, Gershwin, and Rodgers). PLOT SYNOPSIS ACT I—Salesgirls at Madame Cecily’s Parisian her, Fifi rejects marriage proposals—first from hat shop have no luck in interesting the wealthy Gaston and then from Étienne, whose love she American, Mrs. Hiram Bent, in any of the latest returns, but who must wait until she is no longer millinery creations of their boss. Madame Cecily just a shop girl. Fifi announces to Madame Cecily is furious at their lack of salesmanship and laments that she will not marry Gaston and, in fact, is the absence of her prize employee Fifi, who cer- quitting her job to pursue her dream. As she tainly could have secured a sale. So valuable is the leaves, she discovers the envelope and knows young girl to the shop’s success, and so fearful is that fate is smiling on her. Cecily that some rival shop might steal her, that she ACT II—A year later, at a charity bazaar at the has decided that Fifi should marry her milksop son home of Étienne’s uncle, guest Hiram Bent relates Gaston. Needing to keep on good terms with his how Fifi has become a major singing star, paid mother, who provides him with money to support him back for the cash advance, and, in fact, will his high life, Gaston agrees to the union. be performing this very day for the assembled Fifi, however, is being courted by the dashing guests. When Fifi arrives, the uncle forbids her Captain Étienne, whose sister and guardian uncle from singing and from ever marrying his nephew. are scandalized by the thought that their kinsman The strong-willed Fifi swears to him that she will even contemplate such a social mismatch. In the only marry Étienne when the day comes that the shop, Fifi chats with a customer, Hiram Bent, uncle begs her to do so. When Étienne arrives, expressing her longing to leave her job and pursue Fifi changes places with the hired fortune teller a stage career, a move that Hiram encourages. and learns that Étienne’s feelings for her are as With more money than he knows what to do with, strong as ever. Through a bit of cunning, she Hiram slips 5000 francs into an envelope that he wins Étienne’s uncle to her side—he indeed begs knows Fifi will soon discover. Wanting neither to her to marry Étienne. work to support a man nor have a man support Michael Miller This recording presents the complete Victor Herbert musical score and an abridged version of the Ohio Light Opera’s 2009 staged production of Henry Blossom’s spoken dialogue. ■ 4 ■ FROM THE ARTISTIC DIRECTOR much-deserved rebirth for an appreciative For three decades The Ohio Light Opera has audience. This CD set will hopefully give the been dedicated to producing, promoting and operetta aficionado a taste of what makes this preserving the best of the traditional operetta company unique. repertoire. In any summer season, close to 20,000 The support of the College of Wooster, its patrons come to hear and see more than sixty community and nearly 500,000 patrons who performances of seven productions on the have championed the company's dedication to beautiful campus of The College of Wooster in operetta have given OLO a reputation that Ohio. These shows offer the operetta fan a little reaches internationally. In no small way, Albany of everything: a well-known and lesser-known Records has added to the company’s success. Gilbert and Sullivan, a Viennese operetta, a The company and the operetta art form are French operetta, an American operetta and a indebted to John Ostendorf and Albany for revival of a long-forgotten work that is given a their commitment. Steven Daigle FROM THE PRODUCER Every summer for many years, I look for- The work has not been recorded complete ward to my trip out “west” to the always- (there have been a few highlight albums over impressive Ohio Light Opera. Great new surprises the years by RCA, Reader’s Digest—even Rosa await, thanks to the exhaustive work by OLO’s Ponselle recorded “Kiss Me Again!”) Our 2-CD Steve Daigle and Michael Miller and the incredible set includes all the music, plus two tunes for talents of the company and its maestro Michael the comic character François, which were cut Borowitz. Our recordings are made “live” in the for the premiere, and a good helping of Henry sense that tapes roll for an essentially single Blossom’s dialogue. We thought to record the onstage run-through; this happens well into the work with standard stage English spoken and actual performance run. It’s a producer’s dream as sung, avoiding the Maurice Chevalier/Inspector the cast and orchestra know their stuff cold, and Clouseau approach which amuses onstage and the production has had time to gel and develop.