by Kelly Ferjutz
Special to ClevelandClassical.com
Screwball comedies of the mid-20th Century may well have been inspired by the zany 1866 operetta La Vie Parisienne, which ran for 136 performances. Judging from Ohio Light Opera’s wildly entertaining production (I saw the show on Saturday, July 16), composer Jacques Offenbach surely knew what he was doing. If you want to laugh a lot and have your mood lifted by fast-paced dancing and singing, this show is for you. [Read more…]
by Kelly Ferjutz
special to ClevelandClassical.com
As a general rule, elevators go up and down, conveying people or goods from one level to another in a given building. The elevator on stage for OLO’s production of Have a Heart, however, goes backwards. It takes the happy audience (plus cast and crew) straight back to early 1917, and the premiere production of Jerome Kern’s then-new musical. It’s a delightful journey, one you won’t want to miss. [Read more…]
by Kelly Ferjutz
special to ClevelandClassical.com
Many aspects of Ohio Light Opera’s productions are moving forward along with their repertoire, which is expanding beyond the traditional Gilbert & Sullivan oeuvre and the European Operetta into an exploration of early American musicals and Broadway masterpieces of the Golden Age. [Read more…]
by Kelly Ferjutz, special to ClevelandClassical
Before opening night, director Julie Wright Costa freely admitted that Yeoman of the Guard was her “very fave of all of Gilbert & Sullivan’s creations.” Having appeared in several productions of it through the years, she was eagerly looking forward to putting her own vision onstage at Ohio Light Opera. And what a splendid vision it is! With a bit of help from conductor J. Lynn Thompson, the production zipped right along, while still allowing everyone time to breathe. [Read more…]
by J.D. Goddard
On Friday, July 10, after the customary singing of God Save the Queen, the curtain went up on the second performance of Ohio Light Opera’s Ruddigore in Freedlander Theater at the College of Wooster, and the audience was immediately swept into the action in the Cornish town of Rederring. Gilbert and Sullivan’s 1887 operetta has a rather baffling story line and a whimsical musical style. [Read more…]
by Kelly Ferjutz, Special to ClevelandClassical
Steven Daigle (left) has been at the helm of Ohio Light Opera since 1999. But not even a Superman could successfully choose and direct all seven full-scale productions in the eight-week summer season at The College of Wooster. This season, Daigle will be in charge of four of the seven shows, and three members of his company will each direct one.
I sat down with Daigle, associate director Julie Wright Costa, principal guest director Ted Christopher, and Jacob Allen — all four of whom are teachers specializing in the lyric theater tradition — to ask questions about their careers and their lives at OLO.
Kelly Ferjutz: Could you each share your thoughts about shows you’re directing this season?
Steven Daigle: I’m directing four of the seven productions. Our repertory is shifting in the direction of a musical theater, which has a different emphasis than operetta. They all have their difficulties, but the biggest one is time constraints — there’s a lot to do after choosing a piece before you present it to the audience. Building sets is time-consuming and expensive. We’re trying to economize where possible, without hurting our quality. Maybe we build less complex sets at times. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
Ohio Light Opera will produce 58 performances of 8 shows this summer in Freedlander Theatre at the College of Wooster, kicking off its season with Lerner & Loewe’s Brigadoon on Saturday, June 13 at 7:30 pm.
Founder James Stuart originally had a summer Gilbert & Sullivan festival in mind in 1979, but since its inaugural season in Wooster, OLO has evolved to embrace a wider range of light opera, including European operetta and American musical theater. OLO is now under the leadership of artistic director Steven A. Daigle and general director Julie Wright Costa.
The mix of operettas and Broadway shows to be performed in 2015 by the 40 members of the vocal ensemble includes Cole Porter & Abe Burrows’ Can-Can, Ogden Nash & Kurt Weill’s One Touch of Venus, George & Ira Gershwin’s Oh, Kay!, Gilbert & Sullivan’s Ruddigore and Yeoman of the Guard, and Franz Lehár’s Friederike. [Read more…]
by Kelly Ferjutz, Special to ClevelandClassical
“The majesty and grandeur of the English language,” as Henry Higgins put it to Eliza Doolittle, is on glorious display in My Fair Lady, currently on the boards at Ohio Light Opera in Wooster. In a word, this production is magnificent. I’d say perfect, but someone would be sure to quibble. But still, it must be more difficult to produce a stellar version of what is arguably the ‘world’s most popular musical’ than to do a fabulous version of something that no one has ever seen or heard until that very moment. (One can easily confirm this popularity by the number of audience members singing or humming along, under their breath, so to speak, right along with the performers.) [Read more…]
By J.D. Goddard
On Tuesday, July 1, the house was full and the audience bustled with excitement for Ohio Light Opera’s opening performance of Pirates of Penzance in Freedlander Hall on the campus of Wooster college. The customary standing and singing of “God save the Queen” set the tone for the afternoon’s English fare. As the curtain raised we were immediately swept into the action, a rocky seashore on the coast of Cornwall, town of Penzance.
The Pirates of Penzance tells the story of Frederic, a young apprentice who was mistakenly indentured to a band of pirates in his youth. At the end of his servitude, Frederic decides to leave the pirates and devote his life to their extermination. He meets a bevy of beautiful maidens, instantly falling in love with one of them, Mabel. Unfortunately, the pirates reappear and take the maidens captive, leading to a series of increasingly ridiculous plot twists. [Read more…]
by J.D. Goddard
On Tuesday afternoon, July 2, at Friedlander Hall on the campus of The College of Wooster, the Ohio Light Opera presented their opening summer performance of Johann Strauss Jr.’s The Gypsy Baron. The scoring and the nature of the piece led many critics to consider it neither a comic opera nor a lyric opera, and thus an operetta. Whatever you call it, during the composer’s lifetime The Gypsy Baron enjoyed great success, second only to the popularity of Die Fledermaus. This was a time when Vienna was awash in the beloved waltzes of Strauss Jr. and audiences turned out in droves to hear his always engaging melodic waltz themes while dancing the evenings away.
For today’s audiences, however, staging an operetta such as The Gypsy Baron, with its predictable story line, romantic happy ending, concealed identities and syrupy dose of social satire can prove to be a daunting task. Ignaz Schnitzer’s libretto (English translation by Ruth and Thomas Martin) utilized the usual stock operetta types: feuding Hungarians and gypsies, a buried treasure and a notable absence of genuine mirth. [Read more…]