Tag: Opera

Serinette: an opera in two acts

July 15th, 2024

Composer Harry Somers (1925-1999) was commissioned by Lawrence Cherney, Artistic Director of Music at Sharon, to write the music in 1983. The story was to draw on the colonial era history of the Sharon Temple and the Quaker sect the Children of Peace. Seven years later, Serinette was complete and premiered on July 7, 1990 at the Sharon Temple.

July 7, 1990: Harry Somers celebrates at the Serinette premiere

Serinette July 7-28, 1990:
Conductor: Victor Feldbrill, Director: Keith Turnbull
Costume and Set Designer: Sue LePage
Singers: Kristine Anderson, Lynn Blaser, Benjamin Butterfield,
Jeffrey Carl, André Clouthier, Leslie Fagan, John Fanning,
Carol Ann Feldstein, Dennis Giesbrecht, Aline Kutan,
Brian McIntosh, Erik Oland, Jackalyn Pipher, Laura Pudwell

Harry Somers chose James Reaney to write the libretto: “Knowing James Reaney’s plays and his exceptional collaborations with John Beckwith, I was absolutely confident that he would produce a libretto that was suitable for setting to music. I knew that it would be dramatically rich in character and situation, and eminently theatrical. I’ve often been struck by how he uses simple and basic means to achieve a wide variety of theatrical effects, and how he uses a comparatively small cast with the greatest versatility.” [1]

James Reaney first learned about the Sharon Temple and the Children of Peace on a summer visit: “In 1944, while working at a farm labour camp in Holland Marsh, I received permission to walk into nearby Newmarket on business. Curiosity led me to take back roads; I was soon lost, and suddenly a pivot, a spiritual one, whirled into my life. Yes, I had lost my way, but I had also discovered an old square building made of wood and hundreds of panes of glass. It was the Sharon Temple, and as the years went by, its culture and religion became an obsession with me.”

“From John Beckwith, Keith MacMillan and Helmut Kallmann, I learnt that the musical and poetic tradition, as well as the left wing politics, of anglophone Canada started here. This was the site of the first commune based on Christian principles in Ontario, and these people created many original hymns, built the first organ, were the first to educate women in the crafts, and were the first to break down the barrier between artisan and artist. David Willson will always be one of my great folk heroes. [….] So, when Harry Somers asked me to write a libretto about nineteenth century life in Sharon, I leapt at an oft wished project, but decided not to be solemn.” [2]

Notes:
[1] and [3] Harry Somers quoted in Serinette Program Notes, June 3, 1990.
[2] James Reaney quoted in Serinette Program Notes, June 7, 1990.

From Act I Scene 4: Three Quakers: John Fanning, Benjamin Butterfield, Jackalyn Pipher, July 1990

Serinette Act I Scene 3: Leslie Fagan, the Bird Girl, among the Jarvis guests, July 1990

Wild finch (The Bird Girl) design by Sue LePage (1990)

From Act I: Scene 3 The Bird Box

MRS. JARVIS:  Mr. Jarvis, don’t let them start dancing. Quiet! I was about to show the ladies how this small barrel organ – the serinette you gave me, remember? – has taught our wild finch over there in that cage to sing Rossini. Sam Junior – take that sheet off that cage. Shhh!

(With great authority, Sam Jr. starts pulling the cover off the cage. The serinette begins to play, but its music goes wild as Sam inadvertently opens the door of the cage and the Bird Girl escapes. From being a bunch of voyeurs around a bird prison, the cast fan out to catch that bird! Improvise or compose chase music here. Colin and Ann do not take part in the chase. Eventually, Sam Jr. catches the bird and she is brutally shoved back into her prison and her cage is covered. As before, Sam Jr. ceremoniously pulls off the cover and as he does so, a singer in yellow dances in and repeats vocally the Rossini aria. Applause. Cover restored. Dancer off.)

LADY TWO:  What else can it sing, Mrs. Jarvis?
MRS. JARVIS:  A month ago, that bird could not sing a thing worth listening to.
LADY ONE:  Oh, play another one, Mrs. Jarvis. Pray do. How many do you have on each barrel? Of this bird box?
MRS. JARVIS:  Two per barrel and we got twelve barrels! This is ‘O cessate di piagarmi, togliatemi la vita ancor.’ Hush!

(As the Lilliputian music sounds, the men retreat a bit.)

( ( ( 0 ) ) ) Audio excerpt from the 2001 revival recording

A concert revival of Serinette was held at St. James’ Cathedral, Toronto, Ontario with performances on May 31 and June 2, 2001, and a subsequent recording made at the Glenn Gould Studio is available from the Canadian Music Centre.

The text for James Reaney’s libretto can be found in Scripts: Librettos for Operas and Other Musical Works, John Beckwith, ed., Coach House Books, 2004.
Katy Clark on “The Beckwith Connection: An Afternoon of Big Hits from the Reaney and Beckwith Songbook”

November 14th, 2023

November 5, 2022 — Katy Clark (soprano) accompanied by Charmaine Fopoussi (piano) at Museum London.

November 5, 2023 — Thank you all for coming to Wordsfest at Museum London to hear Dr. Katy Clark and ensembleperform selections from John Beckwith and James Reaney’s musical works, including four operas, poems set to music, and radio collages.

Dr. Clark drew on her research from her thesis on “Regionalism in the Operas of John Beckwith and James Reaney” to eloquently lead us though the six decades of Beckwith and Reaney’s musical collaboration.

Congratulations to the singers — Katy Clark (soprano), Paul Gambo (baritone), Charmaine Iormetti (soprano), and London Pro Musica— and musicians —Charmaine Fopoussi (piano), Gary McCumber (clarinet), and Patrick Theriault (cello) — for their wonderful work on these selections:

The Great Lakes Suite (1949) — Lake Superior, Lake Michigan, Lake Huron (poems by James Reaney)
“Serenade” (1950) (poem by Colleen Thibaudeau)
Night Blooming Cereus (1959) — A Plant Song, Houses in Heaven, Scene 3 Recitative (James Reaney)
The Killdeer (1960/1961) — Waltz, Excerpt from Act 2, Scene 4,
Credits music (James Reaney)
Twelve Letters to a Small Town (1961) — To the Avon River above Stratford, Canada, Instructions: How to Make a Model of a Town (James Reaney)
The Shivaree (1979) — Daisy’s Aria (James Reaney)
Crazy to Kill (1989) — Down the Avenue of Trees (James Reaney)
Taptoo! (1994) — Loyalists’ Song (James Reaney)

Our grateful thanks to Wordsfest’s Josh Lambier and Greg de Souza and Museum London’s Lisa McDougall for their expertise and support.
Happy 10th anniversary to London’s Words Festival!

Composer John Beckwith (1927-2022)

( ( ( 0 ) ) ) Listen to the live-stream recording of the lecture here.

November 5, 2023: London Pro Musica performs the Loyalists’ Song from Taptoo!

For more about John Beckwith and James Reaney’s musical partnership, see John Beckwith’s lecture “James Reaney and Music”from November 5, 2016, and his 2012 autobiography Unheard of: Memoirs of a Canadian Composer.

The James Reaney Memorial Lecture series celebrates the life and work of Southwestern Ontario poet and dramatist James Reaney, who was born on a farm near Stratford, Ontario and found a creative home in London, Ontario.
2023 James Reaney Memorial Lecture: The Beckwith Connection

October 17th, 2023

Join us on November 5, 2023 at Wordsfest at Museum London for the 14th annual James Reaney Memorial Lecture — The Beckwith Connection: An Afternoon of Big Hits from the Reaney & Beckwith Songbook.

Curated by London soprano Katy Clark, the 2023 Reaney Memorial Lecture celebrates playwright and poet James Reaney’s collaborations with a great Canadian composer, the late John Beckwith (1927-2022). Katy Clark leads a chamber ensemble into wonderful music from Beckwith as well as words from James Reaney (Jamie) and Colleen Thibaudeau. We will also celebrate the friendship of two creative couples – Jamie and Colleen and John Beckwith and Pamela Terry, as well as their families. Katy will be joined by London Pro Musica Choir, Paul Grambo, and guest artists.

Beckwith wrote four operas with Reaney, whom he met at the University of Toronto in the late 1940s. They shared a deep interest in creating and telling authentically Canadian stories with local references – both literary and musical – and universal messages.

Four Beckwith-Reaney operas: Night-blooming Cereus (1960), The Shivaree (1982), Crazy to Kill (1989), and
Taptoo! (2003)

Screenshot

About the presenter
Soprano Katy Clark has sung as a soloist and chorister with companies across North America. She is a DMA candidate at the University of Toronto, where she studies with Nathalie Paulin, and holds a Masters degree in Voice Performance from the University of Michigan. In addition to her work as a performer, Ms. Clark is the founder and artistic producer of the London-based opera company Village Opera.

When: Sunday November 5 at 2:00 pm

Where: Museum London, 421 Ridout Street, London, Ontario N6A 5H4

Register to attend in-person or join us online via Zoom at the Words Festival event page: https://wordsfest.ca/events/2023/2023-james-reaney-memorial-lecture-the-beckwith-connection
John Beckwith and James Reaney’s first opera

October 12th, 2023

Night-blooming Cereus revival by Opera Nova at the University of Victoria, 1992

Night Blooming Cereus, a chamber opera in one act, is one of several musical collaborations between poet and playwright James Reaney(1926-2008), who wrote the libretto, and composer John Beckwith (1927-2022).

In his autobiography Unheard of: Memoirs of a Canadian Composer, John Beckwith had this to say about his first opera:

“Furthering my ambition to compose an opera, I had the great good luck to find a librettist — a writer who understood music. James Reaney shared my love of opera, and early in our friendship in student days we spoke of perhaps collaborating on an original work. In early 1953 I received from him a draft of Night Blooming Cereus. The one-act opera he imagined taking shape as a sort of southern Ontario miracle play. It turned out to be the first of four operatic works we produced together over succeeding decades…”[1]

“[…] We worked on it slowly through the mid-1950s, almost entirely by correspondence, while starting to raise families and work on tenure, he in Winnipeg and I in Toronto. No one seemed interested in staging it, but we were fortunate that CBC Radio offered a broadcast production, and, encouraged by its success, repeated it the following year. In the season 1959-60 we were supported by a small committee of friends to raise funds for a live staging of our own.”[2]

James Reaney describes meeting the demands of the composer for more variety of metre in the draft libretto of Night Blooming Cereus as being “galvanized into, at the time and for me, incredible labours of counting syllables, making parallel lines exactly the same length and finding good clean, clear and sonorous rhymes… From those Manitoba fall nights…I date my birth as a craftsman in words.” [3]

( ( 0 ) ) Listen to Night Blooming Cereus (1960 CBC Radio broadcast) on Centre Streams at the Canadian Music Centre.

“Night Blooming Cereus” image by designer Louis de Niverville, Toronto,1960.

In Scene 2 of the opera, lonely Mrs Brown tends to her house and her Night-blooming cereus, which is due to flower that evening.

(The dishes are put away, the cupboard door closed, the dishwater somehow disposed of. She gets the broom from behind the stove.)

SWEEPING
Look at the faces on the floor
In the wood of the boards they are
Faces of dust I sweep with a broom,
Sweeping the dust in this room.
Sweeping sweeping sweeping sweeping
Has a sound like weeping
If I kept all the dust I’ve swept
It would be she I have wept
Whose face appears more often than not
In the dust and the fire and the knot,
And the blowing rain on the window
And the tree branches’ shadow
Contain your face there! and again there!
My lost girl in dust in the air.
But it is best to go on sweeping
Over the faces better than weeping.
Here is the face of an old man peeping.
Here is the face of a young man reaping.
Here is the face of an old woman sweeping.

(A bit tired with so much activity, she sits in the rocking chair.)

ROCKING
Rocking rocking, rocking rocking
Very very slowly
What I have been doing rocking,
Most of my life lately.

Sewing at a shirt or stocking
As quickly as I can
And what the people to me bring
I sew at while rocking

Like selling footsteps to all houses
My stitches go through cloth
Of caps and nightgowns and blouses
Dresses, handkerchiefs and vests.

I sew for everyone here,
I the restless stillness,
My thread looks through cloth for tear
And the butcher’s apron.

The sewing connects each one
To myself except for her.
She walks about beneath the sun
Without my sewing snow.

As the white snow fills fields and lanes,
Till they cover me all.
Upon my old and long-used bones
Rocking and sewing fall.

Page from Reaney’s draft of the libretto for Night Blooming Cereus (see John Beckwith’s 1997 book, Music Papers: Articles and Talks by a Canadian Composer, page 219)

[1] John Beckwith in Unheard Of, page 246
[2] James Reaney in his essay “An Evening With Babble and Doodle: Presentations of poetry”, Canadian Literature 12 Spring 1962, pages 37-43
[3] John Beckwith, James Reaney on Music, 2016 James Reaney Memorial Lecture
Composer John Beckwith (1927-2022)

December 20th, 2022

Canadian composer John Beckwith passed away on December 5, 2022. A longtime friend of James Reaney, they collaborated on several small ensemble musical collages to accompany Reaney’s poetry and also on four operas: Night Blooming Cereus, The Shivaree, Crazy to Kill, and Taptoo!.

For a full appreciation of John Beckwith’s life and music, see his son Larry Beckwith’s tribute in Opera Canada: https://operacanada.ca/march-9-1927-december-5-2022-canadian-composer-john-beckwith/

Composer John Beckwith (1927-2022)

More about John Beckwith

For more about John Beckwith’s life and career, see his autobiography Unheard Of: Memoirs of a Canadian Composer from 2012.

The John Beckwith Songbook concert was held in honour of his 94th birthday in March 2021.

John Beckwith on “James Reaney and Music”, November 5, 2016 at Museum London.

((( 0 ))) You can stream archived recordings of John Beckwith’s music at the Canadian Music Centre:
https://collections.cmccanada.org/final/Portal/Composer-Showcase.aspx?lang=en-CA
Canadian Opera Anthology includes Daisy’s Aria from The Shivaree

March 27th, 2021

Daisy’s Aria from John Beckwith and James Reaney’s 1982 opera The Shivaree is now part of a two-volume anthology of soprano arias from Canadian operas produced by Counterpoint Music Library Services.

Based on the work of soprano Dr. Stephanie Nakagawa, the two-volume anthology is a resource for singers and performance companies and features selections from 21 Canadian operas.

In collaboration with the Canadian Music Centre, Dr. Nakagawa plans to create anthologies for each voice type.

UBC Public Scholar Dr. Stephanie Nakagawa performs “I Need You Guillaume” from Victor Davies and Maureen Hunter’s 2007 opera Transit of Venus, one of the arias from her collection of music from Canadian operas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRulssBwJXw

Daisy’s Aria from The Shivaree

Caralyn Tomlin (Daisy) and Avo Kittask (Quartz) in The Shivaree, Comus Music Theatre, St. Lawrence Centre, Toronto, 1982.

In The Shivaree, Daisy is abandoned by her lover Jonathan and accepts the marriage proposal of a much older man, William Quartz. The story gives a Canadian rural setting to the Greek myth of Persephone borne off by Hades. In the aria, Daisy regrets marrying Mr. Quartz and longs for Jonathan to rescue her.

Daisy: Oh Jonathan, why have you forsaken me? Is there still time – to take me away?

ARIA
Jonathan, you were a strange young man.
You never could decide if I was yours,
So Jonathan, I tried to make you decide
By letting Mr. Quartz keep company with me.
But if flowers and leaves keep company with winter,
They soon find they’re stabbed with an icy splinter.
My heart’s like the lane and the fields in fall,
Rusting and stiffening with cold until all
Lies buried in colourless snow,
Jonathan!
Walk above the snow
Where the garden was —
Walk above the snow
That covers me up,
Jonathan!
That covers me o’er.

Cover for James Reaney’s libretto for The Shivaree, which premiered at the St. Lawrence Centre on April 3, 1982.
The John Beckwith Songbook on March 7

March 1st, 2021

Join us on Sunday March 7 for The John Beckwith Songbook — a concert celebrating the music of Canadian composer John Beckwith in honour of his 94th birthday.

Presented on the Confluence Concerts You Tube Channel, this celebration of John Beckwith’s song repertoire features three programs encompassing nearly all of his music for solo voice, including folksongs and songs set to poems by ee cummings, Miriam Waddington, and Colleen Thibaudeau.

The programs premiere at 2:00, 5:00, and 8:00 pm EST on March 7 and will be available on YouTube until March 21: https://www.youtube.com/c/ConfluenceConcerts

John Beckwith also collaborated with James Reaney on four operas: Night Blooming Cereus, The Shivaree, Crazy to Kill, and Taptoo!.

For more about the concert and John Beckwith’s music, see William Littler’s article in The Peterborough Examiner. John Beckwith shared this story about collaborating with James Reaney:

“Jamie lived in London and I lived in Toronto so our collaboration was almost exclusively through correspondence,” he recalls. The composer Richard Strauss and his librettist Hugo von Hofmannsthal carried on their famous collaboration much the same way. And like Strauss and Hofmannsthal, Beckwith and Reaney had their disagreements: “I wanted the leading character in our first opera to have a cat,” recalls Beckwith. Reaney replied tersely: “Cut the cat.”

Advice for potential opera composers? “You have to get a good book or you won’t have an opera. I’ve had students come up to me asking ‘What should I do for words?’ I tell them to get to know some writers.”

( o ) See also John Beckwith’s lecture on “James Reaney and Music” from November 5, 2016: https://jamesreaney.com/gallery/john-beckwith-on-james-reaney-and-music-november-5-2016-at-museum-london/

Page from Reaney’s draft of the libretto for Night Blooming Cereus (see John Beckwith’s 1997 book, Music Papers: Articles and Talks by a Canadian Composer, page 219)
John Beckwith honoured on his 90th birthday

March 9th, 2017

February 23, 2017 — The University of Toronto Opera Division honoured composer John Beckwith with an evening of music from four of his operas — The Shivaree, Night Blooming Cereus, Crazy to Kill, and Taptoo! — all with librettos by James Reaney. The concert was held at the Arts and Letters Club of Toronto.

On March 8, the University of Toronto Faculty of Music held a 90th birthday celebration for former dean John Beckwith, and he presented a lecture on Canadian music since 1967. Congratulations on your 90th, John!

More concerts featuring John Beckwith’s music are planned:

♦ On March 23 his Fractions for microtonal piano and string quartet (2006) will be performed at Schulich Hall, McGill University.

♦ On April 28, New Music Concerts in Toronto will present a program he is curating, featuring his Avowals (1985) and the premières of two mixed instrumentation chamber works: Quintet (2015) and Calling (2016).

((( ♦ ))) Archived recordings of John Beckwith’s music, including several Beckwith-Reaney works, are available for streaming at the Canadian Music Centre’s Composer Showcase.

((( ♦ ))) John Beckwith on James Reaney and Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7I7cIjO4hA

Composer John Beckwith speaks on “James Reaney and Music” at Words Fest in London, Ontario, November 5, 2016

John Beckwith at Words Fest in London, Ontario, November 5, 2016

Composer John Beckwith: https://www.musiccentre.ca/node/37279/biography
James Reaney Memorial Lecture November 5 at Museum London

October 11th, 2016

Join us on Saturday November 5 at 4:30 pm at Museum London to hear composer John Beckwith speak about his 40-year collaboration with poet and dramatist James Reaney.

John Beckwith and James Reaney became friends during their student days at the University of Toronto in 1946, and a shared love of music drew them to collaborate on several operas, plays, and musical collages. Four operas Night Blooming Cereus (1959), The Shivaree (1982), Crazy to Kill (1988), and Taptoo! (1994) are among the most notable.

Composer John Beckwith: https://collections.cmccanada.org/final/Portal/Composer-Showcase.aspx?lang=en-CA

Archived recordings of several Beckwith-Reaney works are available for streaming at the Canadian Music Centre‘s Composer Showcase.

When: Saturday November 5 at 4:30 pm

Where: Museum London, 421 Ridout Street North, London, Ontario

Admission is free; James Stewart Reaney, James Reaney’s son, will introduce the speaker.

Our thanks to Wordsfest and the London Public Library for their support of this event. The annual lecture series celebrates the life and work of Southwestern Ontario poet James Reaney, who was born on a farm near Stratford, Ontario.

From John Beckwith’s 1997 book, Music Papers: Articles and Talks by a Canadian Composer (page 219): Page from James Reaney’s draft of the libretto for Night Blooming Cereus, with notes on the central character, Mrs. Brown (Faculty of Music Library, University of Toronto).
Composer John Beckwith’s music at the Canadian Music Centre

September 16th, 2015

Composer John Beckwith (Photo courtesy the Canadian Music Centre)

James Reaney was fortunate to have composer John Beckwith set many of his poems to music: The Great Lakes Suite, A Message to Winnipeg, and Twelve Letters to a Small Town. Beckwith and Reaney also collaborated on longer operas Night-blooming Cereus, The Shivaree, and Crazy to Kill.

To listen to original recordings of Beckwith-Reaney works, visit the Canadian Music Centre‘s Composer Showcase.

James Reaney and John Beckwith, Summer 2003, in London, Ontario. Photo by Colleen Reaney

Note from Susan Reaney: In his new memoir, Unheard Of: Memoirs of a Canadian Composer , John Beckwith recalls his career as a composer, including his collaborations with James Reaney. The book is available from Wilfrid Laurier University Press.