by Mike Telin

Giacomo Puccini’s first staged work, Le Villi (The Wills or The Fairies), with libretto by Ferdinando Fontana, received its premiere in Milan on May 31, 1884 in its original one-act version. The opera is based on Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr’s short story, Les Willis, which in turn was based on the central European legend of the vila. On Friday, October 18 at 7:30 pm in Tucker Hall at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church and Sunday, October 20 at 4 pm in the Polish-American Cultural Center, Opera Circle will present Le Villi. This weekend’s performances will be Opera Circle’s first production of any Puccini opera.

“I have a great respect for Puccini. I think he was a genius,” says Opera Circle executive director and co-founder Dorota Sobieska (left). “But it is easy to take that genius on a superficial level and create a production that is very nostalgic. While that is acceptable, I think there is much more to him. To approach Puccini seriously you need a more in-depth look into the resources that are available in order to get a bigger perspective on him and his times.”

Sobieska, who holds a doctoral degree in English from Kent State University (with an interdisciplinary dissertation on British Romantic poetry, music, and philosophy of art) says that Romanticism has always spoken to her. She sees the opera as an extended Lied. “It is written in what I [describe] as the greater romantic lyric that dominates the romantic era. I think of Puccini as a lyrical composer, but this opera is not only lyrical in terms of the musical line, but it’s lyrical as a story. It reminds me of the greater romantic lyric pieces like Schubert’s Der Erlkönig.” [Read more…]