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CIM Opera Theater explores a Baroque fantasy world of love and magic with student production of Handel’s Alcina

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by Mike Telin
This article was originally published in the Plain Dealer/Cleveland.com

“Fantasy and opera go hand-in-hand really well,” CIM Opera Theater interim director JJ Hudson said during a telephone call. And when it comes to fantasy, the Cleveland Institute of Music’s upcoming production of George Frederick Handel’s Alcina is all about fantasy. “We’re not downplaying the various reversals of fortune via magic — that’s part of the fun, and we want this show to be fun,” says Hudson.

Still, Hudson does think the opera’s plot is a little bizarre. The story takes place on a magical island belonging to the sorceress Alcina, who seduces every man who comes along, only to turn them into rocks or wild animals once she’s grown tired of their company.

Her most recent victim is the knight Ruggiero, which causes his fiancée Bradamante and her guardian Melisso to follow him to the island. Disguised as a man named Ricciardo, she attempts to free Ruggiero with the help of a magic ring. The plan goes astray when Alcina’s sister Morgana becomes smitten with Ricciardo and dumps her lover Oronte. [Read more…]

CIM Opera Theater: Dialogues des Carmélites (Mar. 5) 

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by Daniel Hathaway

CIM opera theater presented Francis Poulenc’s Dialogues des Carmélites in Kulas Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music twice earlier this month in a production directed by JJ Hudson with Harry Davidson and the CIM Orchestra in the pit. I attended the matinee performance on Sunday, March 5.

A theater piece based on such a true story — the mass execution of a convent of Carmelite Nuns at Compiègne during the Reign of Terror in the French Revolution — may seem an odd choice for a student production, but in practice, the piece is a gift for opera departments like CIM’s that are long on female voices.

The dark and serious subject matter may also seem an odd choice for the composer, whose musical style frequently leans toward the popular and theatrical (think of the ending of the “Laudamus te” from his Gloria, where the music seems about to morph into a Cha-Cha!).

[Read more…]

CIM Opera Theater: JJ Hudson directs Dialogues of the Carmelites

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by Mike Telin

Francis Poulenc’s Dialogues of the Carmelites recounts a fictionalized version of the real-life story of the Martyrs of Compiègne, a group of Carmelite nuns who, during the closing days of the Reign of Terror, were guillotined in Paris for refusing to renounce their vocation.

On Friday, March 3 at 7:30 pm and Sunday, March 5 at 3:00 pm, CIM Opera Theater will present Poulenc’s haunting opera directed by JJ Hudson. Harry Davidson conducts the CIM Orchestra. Tickets are available online.

Since 2021, JJ Hudson has been Professor of Opera at Georgia State University and was recently appointed Artistic Director of the Harrower Summer Opera Workshop. His upcoming productions include A Little Night Music for Opera in the Ozarks, Ariadne auf Naxos for Lakes Area Music Festival, and La serva padrona, Dido and Aeneas, and Our Town​ for Georgia State University Opera Theater.

I caught up with the director by phone and began our conversation by asking him about his history with Poulenc’s opera. [Read more…]

CIM Opera Theater:
Cendrillon with Cara Consilvio

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by Mike Telin 

For centuries the tale of Cinderella has been told and retold around the world. This week the magical fairytale will be brought to life when CIM Opera Theater presents Jules Massenet’s charming Cendrillon on Friday, November 11 at 7:30 pm and Sunday afternoon at 3:00 pm in Kulas Hall. Cara Consilvio is the guest director and Harry Davidson conducts the Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra. Click here to read a synopsis and to purchase tickets.

Cara Consilvio leads a multifaceted career as a director and producer of opera, theater, and film as well as dance and choreography. She has produced and directed numerous tribute videos, promotional videos, and behind the scenes mini-docs for the NEA Opera Honors, the NEA Jazz Masters videos, OPERA America, and the American Composers Orchestra.

I caught up with the director by phone and began our conversation by asking her about the opera.

Cara Consilvio: This is my first Cendrillon and it’s always exciting to direct a piece for the first time. It’s a new world that will unfold as you begin researching, but you don’t really understand how the piece works until you’re in the rehearsal room putting it up on its feet.

[Read more…]

CIM Opera Theater shines in Mozart’s The Magic Flute (Mar. 1)

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by Mike Telin 

Is there a more fun-filled, accessible opera than Mozart’s The Magic Flute? Its classic fairy tale plot — good versus evil combined with a search for enlightenment and love — is timeless. Its characters are sympathetic, and it’s filled with beautiful arias and catchy tunes that are certain to cause the most wonderful earworms long after you leave the theater.

[Read more…]

CIM Opera: Glass & Moran’s The Juniper Tree (Oct. 31)

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by David Kulma

If anyone is worried about the future of opera, all they have to do is attend a college production to calm the nerves. There are numerous highly-skilled young people ready to take up the genre’s mantle, as was clear from the Cleveland Institute of Music Opera Theater’s production of The Juniper Tree in Mixon Hall on Halloween weekend. I attended opening night on Thursday, October 31, which was dedicated to the memory of the late Cleveland arts icon A. Grace Lee Mims. Artistic director Dean Southern chose a relatively recent work composed in 1984 by Philip Glass and Robert Moran. With a libretto by Arthur Yorinks, The Juniper Tree takes its plot from a grim tale by the Brothers Grimm. [Read more…]

CIM Opera Theater to begin The Juniper Tree on Halloween

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Murder, cannibalism, a return from the dead, and revenge — basically everything you could want from an evening out. You get all of that in Philip Glass’ and Robert Moran’s The Juniper Tree, presented by CIM Opera Theater beginning on Halloween night, October 31.

Arthur Yorinks’ libretto is based on the Brothers Grimm story, which begins where else but with a stepmother. She worries that her stepson reminds her husband of his own late wife. Her solution? We might call it unique. She kills the kid — gruesomely — then feeds him to her unsuspecting husband in the form of a stew. The boy later returns as a bird, seeking vengeance.

In a phone call, director Dean Southern (above) said he’s long been drawn to the realms of fantasy and horror. “As a kid, I was probably a vampire for Halloween more than anything else.”

[Read more…]

CIM Opera Theater: Stravinsky & Ravel (Nov. 7)

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by Timothy Robson

From November 7-10, Cleveland Institute of Music Opera Theater presented a double bill of Igor Stravinsky’s early Le Rossignol and Maurice Ravel’s L’enfant et les sortilèges in CIM’s Kulas Hall. Dean Southern directed, and Harry Davidson conducted the CIM Orchestra, with sets and lighting by Dave Brooks and costumes by Inda Blatch-Geib. It was a very fine show, both musically and theatrically. [Read more…]

CIM Opera Theater: Chatting with Dean Southern about two short operas

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by Jarrett Hoffman

The template for a good opera, according to Ravel’s L’Enfant et les Sortilèges: fewer humans, more furniture.

The character list begins with a mischievous child and his mom, but soon branches out to include armchairs, a bench, a couch, a stool, a wicker chair, and a grandfather clock. Then the kitchenware, plants, and animals enter the fray.

But are singers okay with being cast as armchairs? That’s one of many questions I recently got to ask Dean Southern, head of the voice and opera division at the Cleveland Institute of Music. We spoke by phone about CIM Opera Theater’s upcoming double-bill, L’Enfant and Stravinsky’s Le Rossignol — a fascinating work in its own right, and more rarely heard than the already uncommon Ravel.

Performances will take place in CIM’s Kulas Hall from Wednesday through Friday, November 7-9 at 7:30 pm, and on Saturday, November 10 at 3:00 pm. Harry Davidson will lead the CIM Orchestra, which will appear in size XL, thanks to the extensive instrumental colors called for by Ravel and Stravinsky.

[Read more…]

CIM Opera Theater matinee: Hansel and Gretel (March 10)

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by Robert Rollin

Meg Linebaugh and Anne Carruthers 2 _ credit Robert MullerLast Saturday’s matinee performance of Engelbert Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel by the Cleveland Institute of Music Opera Theater at Kulas Hall sparkled. An excellent cast, David Bamberger’s fine direction and blocking, David Brooks’ beautiful sets and effective scene changes, Harry Davidson’s expeditious control of the full orchestra and balance with the singers, and Inda Blatch-Geib’s imaginative costumes, all combined to create a beautifully flowing production whose energy never flagged.

[Read more…]

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