Grounded: A New Opera

 

In this time of war in Ukraine and in Israel comes the October 28, 2023, world premiere of Jeanine Tesori and George Brant’s opera Grounded, a co-production of the Metropolitan Opera and the Washington National Opera. Based on George Brant’s single-character play by the same name running just several minutes over one hour, the opera as produced by WNO at the Kennedy Center Opera House expands into a two-and-a-half-hour runtime with a twenty-five-minute intermission. The story concerns Jess, a female fighter pilot during the Iraq war who becomes pregnant and gets grounded. When she returns to duty eight years later, she is placed in what she calls Chair Force of the Drone. Her job is to operate a drone to kill enemy combatants on the other side of the world after her team locates them by satellite. This she does from a chair inside a trailer located in Las Vegas.

 

The Dresser attended the opening night and, in the first scenes of the opera before intermission, felt enthusiastically impressed by the varied and accessible music, clever libretto, the talented singers, and the impressive sets. What followed intermission was uncomfortably long, somewhat repetitious, and dramatically flat.

 

Funded in part by the military contractor General Dynamics, the production features a sizeable orchestra, a chorus of 27, 11 supernumeraries, a cast of eleven singers with five of the eleven either debuting or representing the Cafritz Young Artist Program in minor roles. The set, divided horizontally with a steeply raked stage on the top, initially seemed to the Dresser to be a video when, in fact, live singers were on that upper stage in swirling video imagery representing clouds and what one might see if flying in an aircraft. The stage below eerily projected that underneath experience that news junkies following the situation in Gaza with its miles of Hamas tunnels might have. As the opera unfolds, we learn that often grounding locations situated on the bottom half of the stage—Jess’s home and office headquarters—are claustrophobic places for Jess who wants to be airborne in her jet. As the story progresses and Jess spirals downward mentally, she (mezzo-soprano Emily D’Angelo) sings counterpoint from her home on the lower stage against her double’s dissonant response (soprano Teresa Perrotta) on the upper stage.

 

The Dresser highlights the resources in Grounded because many contemporary opera premieres have limited financial resources and therefore small numbers of musicians and performers and less grand staging. While a fuss was made in New York (specifically documented in The New York Times May 2, 2023) about WNO having General Dynamics as a sponsor and WNO made some attempt on its website to tell prospective ticket buyers that none of its sponsors had any creative input, WNO general director Timothy O’Leary in opening night remarks made sure to thank General Dynamics without further qualifying remarks. This background has gravitas because of a problem with how this story is presented. War manifests as a champion’s game and not so much as a life-or-death struggle affecting all humankind.

 

We are told that the protagonist Jess is an exceptional F-16 pilot in the United States Air Force, both as a warrior and the only female flyer in her squadron. The Dresser has no recollection of Jess’s actual heroism in her F-16 days and once she is assigned to the drone squad, her vulnerability shifts from body to mind. She becomes paranoid in a shopping mall and hyper aware that she and her child are being watched. Her job is boring and colors things gray. So gray that this woman who is now the mother of an eight-year-old daughter crashes the drone that she (Jess) is assigned to use in killing a high-profile enemy. Why? She sees a young female approaching the enemy target and thinks that female is her own daughter. For the sabotage of a $17 million machine, Jess is court marshalled and put in prison. She has failed in her job as a serial killer by killing her weapon.

 

Memorable are Emily D’Angelo as Jess singing “All for the Blue” about her love of flying and tenor Joseph Dennis (Eric, the rancher Jess falls in love with) singing “I Didn’t See You Coming.” The language in these songs is fresh and fun, providing a lift from the ordinary. Jess extols my ride, my tiger, my blue. Eric soars emotionally by feeling the sky in you. In between these songs we hear about fate foolers, war winners, fate cheaters. Eric also sings about the wind in a song that feels like it is going to knock open the door of the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical Oklahoma where the wind comes sweeping down the plain. After all, Jeanine Tesori earned her chops as a composer for such Broadway musicals as Caroline, or Change (2003) and more recently Kimberly Akimbo (2021).

 

The WNO production runs through November 13, 2023. The Metropolitan Opera production of Grounded is scheduled for 2025. The Dresser expects changes will be made for the Met production and that the Washington premier directed by Michael Mayer serves a test run.

 

 

Blown Away by Blue

 

If there is only one opera that an American citizen could ever see, the Dresser believes fervently that opera, a story about race in America, should be Blue with music by Jeanine Tesori  and words by Tazewell Thompson. This is the opera snatched from the Dresser and the Washington DC community and beyond in March 2020 when Covid closed down the Kennedy Center. At long last, the Dresser saw the Washington National Opera (WNO) production on March 19, 2023.

 

Since its premiere July 14, 2019, during the Glimmerglass Festival, many young black men or boys have lost their lives in the hands of white police officers. Tazewell’s poignant libretto begins with a teenage Black boy who becomes a policeman. He and his wife birth a son who grows up protesting police brutality. The Son is shot and killed by a White cop. Bass Kenneth Kellogg, a graduate of the Duke Ellington School of the Performing and Visual Arts who created the role of The Father at Glimmerglass and has performed it consistently in a string of Blue productions across the United States—Seattle Opera, Michigan Opera Theatre, Toledo Opera, Pittsburgh Opera. Kellogg’s performance, along with Briana Hunter’s as The Mother, stands out for  singing and acting. Hunter is the original mezzo-soprano from the Glimmerglass premiere.

 

Despite the tragedy of The Boy’s death, this two-hour-and-fifteen-minute work with one intermission and in two acts is well balanced with moments of levity and love. Yet the emotional balance is achieved in the face of racist clichés that label a significant percent of America’s population as “happy Negroes singing spirituals” or “niggers.” While Thompson intends for audience to view his characters as prototypes—no character has a name—their humanity is palpable and deeply moving. When The Mother tells the Girlfriends about how much she loves her husband (The Father) and that they are going to have a baby, a baby boy, they are wary about her husband being police and warn her that a son will be nothing but trouble. Still, they surround her with their loving friendship and are not a Greek chorus of doom.

 

Likewise, The Father’s fellow officers tease him about how he will become a warden of “baby jail.” Like the Girlfriends, the Policemen show support by letting The Father know they are envious that he will have a son.

 

Tesori’s music is every bit equal to Thompson’s engrossing libretto. The music is tonal, sometimes jazz inflected, and swells with Copland-like resonances. Often the music is accented with surprising percussion such as celesta and strummed piano strings.

 

Tesori is a well-known musical composer (e.g., Caroline, or Change, 2003) and WNO produced her children’s opera The Lion, the Unicorn, and Me in 2013. One thing that was disconcerting—Blue is being performed in the Eisenhower Theater where the orchestra pit is too small to accommodate the percussionists. The percussion section was relegated to a remote location. The size of the orchestra pit probably had some influence over WNO’s decision to make this production a chamber version.

 

Hats off to Tazewell Thompson who also served as the Director. Sets combined projections and furniture moved in and out by the players. The simplicity of the set and the small theater (as opposed to the Kennedy Center’s Opera house) worked very well to create an intimate theater experience. Two performances March 22 and 25 remain. The opera moves next to the English National Opera in London.

 

 

Photos by Scott Suchman

The Important Story of Mary Cardwell Dawson

 

Washington National Opera, much to the Dresser’s surprise, produced a play with music. The Passion of Mary Cardwell Dawson by playwright Sandra Seaton and composer Carlos Simon tells the little-known story of a Black woman in the 1940s who formed and operated the National Negro Opera Company.

 

The germ of this play began with WNO’s dramaturg Kelley Rourke who brought Cardwell Dawson’s accomplishments to the attention of Francesca Zambello, WNO Artistic Director. Zambello, in turn, tapped Seaton and Simon to collaborate using this subject matter. In 2020, Seaton and Simon had created a 20-minute opera entitled Night Trip for WNO’s American Opera Initiative, which the Dresser reviewed with deep appreciation.

 

On January 22, 2023, the Dresser attended Washington National Opera’s production of The Passion of Mary Cardwell Dawson. The setting is Washington, DC in 1943. The backstory is that Cardwell Dawson toured her operatic productions to New York City, Chicago, Pittsburgh, and Washington, DC. In Seaton’s play, the situation is tense—the company is about to open in the out-of-doors on a floating barge in the Potomac River under threatening skies. Even if the performers are willing to sing in the rain, it is unlikely audience will show up and buy tickets. That revenue is vital to the Company’s survival. So, Cardwell Dawson tries to lease an indoor venue, but she is up against segregation practices despite theaters having little luck with white audiences because so many Americans—both white and Black—are away fighting in World War II. Cardwell Dawson stands up for principles and refuses to rent the theater if it means performing for a segregated audience.

 

The centerpiece of this production is that Mary Cardwell Dawson is played fascinatingly by the celebrated mezzo-soprano Denyce Graves. Graves as Cardwell Dawson is coaching several singers on how to successfully perform Bizet’s opera Carmen, a signature role for Graves which she sung worldwide including WNO and the Met. It was mesmerizing to see her teaching how to imbue passion in the performance to the young singers two of whom (soprano Amber Monroe and tenor Jonathan Pierce Rhodes) are current accomplished Cafritz Young Artists.

 

However, the music of Carmen overshadows the original and quite appealing music of Carlos Simon. Because this 70-minute piece is focused on Carmen, there are only three original songs. The most memorable original song is “Rebellious Bird,” and that phrase comes from “Habanera,” a song sung by Carmen with this line, “Love is a rebellious bird that no one can tame.”

 

Mezzo-soprano Taylor-Alexis Dupont plays the singer Phoebe who has landed the coveted role as Carmen much to the disappointment of Isabelle (Amber Monroe). Both singers are memorable for their performances, but Dupont (making her WNO debut) has more opportunity as Carmen to show her singing agility and fiery acting.

 

Zambello first premiered The Passion of Mary Cardwell Dawson in 2021 at Glimmerglass. This performance was done with piano accompaniment. The work continues to be a piece in development. It is worthy subject matter and has great potential.

WNO American Opera Initiative Scores Appreciation

 

 

On January 21, 2023, the Dresser attended Washington National Opera production of three twenty-minute operas in its American Opera Initiative (AOI) at the Kennedy Center’s Terrace Theater in Washington, DC. The purpose of AOI, which was founded in January 2012, is to showcase emerging composers and librettists to ensure the life of opera programs in the future. The Cafritz Young Artist program provided accomplished singers for each of the operas presented. The chamber orchestra of musicians from the Washington National Opera Orchestra ably conducted by Evan Rogister brought these young composers’ scores to life in front of a full house of enthusiastic audience of mostly young people.

 

Musically Oshun by composer B.E. Boykin and librettist Jarrod Lee was the Dresser’s favorite. Through flute and drums, Boykin expressed a west African influence. The libretto featured supernatural spirits that fed into a story about love and redemption. The costumes were eye-catching, especially the red-infused Kente cloth clothing worn by the spirits.

 

Next on the AOI program came another love story. Prejudice against trans people is the timely and important theme of Walken Schweigert’s libretto for What the Spirits Show as set by composer Silen Wellington. However, the Dresser found the music bland and some of the word settings not quite right.

 

Bubbie and the Demon by composer Jens Ibsen and librettist Cecelia Raker offered a hilarious Covid isolation story about an old woman whose latest crossword puzzle has unlocked a demon into her home who she thinks is her long-lost Goth grandson. Her neighbor Karen, however, is terrified and tries to persuade her friend that this scary figure is evil. The music is tailored to the character and pulls from different influences, including Mahler. Soprano Teresa Perrotta provides a standout performance as Karen.

 

Short video interviews of the creative team introduced each of these short operas and the composer-librettist team appeared on stage for a bow after each opera performance. A talk back for this less than an hour program would have helped the audience understand better what they heard and saw.