Dayton Opera presents “Porgy and Bess.”
WHERE: Schuster Center, Second and Main streets.
WHEN: 8 p.m. Oct. 23 and 29, and 3 p.m. Oct. 31.
TICKETS: $36-$92. Discounts available for seniors, students and Wright-Patterson Air Force Base personnel.
MORE INFO: (937) 228-3630 or www.ticketcenterstage.com.
Dayton Opera history
Dec. 13, 1960: A group of opera aficionados lays the groundwork for the first professional opera company in Dayton.
1961-62: The first season. The first productions were “Tosca” and “The Barber of Seville” in 1961, “Faust” and “Rigoletto” in ’62.
May 31, 1962: The company is incorporated.
First budget: $30,000. In recent years, it has been closer to $2 million.
Attendance: has grown from 3,000 to 20,000.
Debut at Schuster Center: After more than three decades at Memorial Hall, the company made its debut at the Schuster Center in 2003 with an acclaimed staging of Verdi’s “Aida,” its largest production ever.
Opera Star Gala: Also in 2003, the annual Opera Star Gala was inaugurated. Performers have included Denyce Graves, Deborah Voigt, Angela Brown and Ruth Ann Swenson.
2006: The company brought a nontraditional production of “Madame Butterfly” to the Schuster, with designs by Jun Kaneko. Ticket buyers came from 19 states to see it.
Sound familiar?
“Porgy and Bess” has been produced twice before. That puts it far down the list when it comes to Dayton’s most-produced operas:
“Madame Butterfly,” 9 times.
“Tosca:” 8
“Carmen” “Barber of Seville,” “La Boheme,” “Faust” and “La Traviata:” 7
“Lucia di Lammermoor,” “Die Fledermaus” and “Rigoletto:” 6.
“Don Giovanni” and “Aida”: 5
“Il Trovatore,” “The Magic Flute,” “Turandot” and “I Pagliacci:” 4 times.
Lesser known titles that have been done just once: “Ballad of Baby Doe” by Douglas Moore, which was produced in 1988; “Paul Laurence Dunbar — Common Ground” by Adolphus Hailstork (1995); “Little Women” by Mark Adamo (2005); and “Susannah” by Carlisle Floyd (1995).
Stars shared stage with DAYTON opera
Those heard in Dayton productions have included Martina Arroyo, Placido Domingo, Robert Merrill, Roberta Peters, Jerome Hines, Erie Mills, Samuel Ramey, James Morris and Mary Jane Johnson.
Under current leader Tom Bankston, the company has fostered the careers of rising performers including Vivica Genaux, Lester Lynch, Megan Monaghan, Cynthia Lawrence, Scott Piper, Anna Christy, Jennifer Rivera, Andrew Garland and Indira Mahajan. The company’s artist-in-residence program, a professional training program, was established in the 1987-88 season.
Besides The Opera
“From Porgy to Barack,” an exhibit of original art by 12 black artists from the Miami Valley, will be displayed in the Wintergarden of the Schuster Center. Artists include: Olu Bandele, Larry Collins, Abner Cope, Dwayne Daniels, Bing Davis, Donivan Hahn, Terrance Hammonds, Kevin Harris, Annisa Lewis, Velma Morris, Althea Murphy-Price and Ellen Price.
“Touring Catfish Row: The Robert Breen Production of ‘Porgy and Bess,’” an exhibit of historic memorabilia from the 1952 European tour of “Porgy and Bess,” also will be shown. Items are from the Robert Breen Papers in the Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee Theatre Research Institute of Ohio State University. Beth Kattelman is exhibit curator.
Luke Dennis will provide a 20-minute overview of the opera starting an hour before each show.
Dinner by the bite and refreshments will be available in the Wintergarden. Complete dinners are served by Citilites. Call (937) 222-0623 or e-mail citilites@ schustercenter.org.
DAYTON — The Dayton Opera is 50 years old this season. “Porgy and Bess” is 75.
The shared celebration will begin Saturday, Oct. 23, with the first of three performances at the Schuster Center.
It took four decades before the jazz- and blues-flavored work by George Gershwin, DuBose Heyward and Ira Gershwin earned the official designation of “opera,” rather than something less — folk opera, Broadway musical or operetta.
Although La Scala in Milan and the Volksopera in Vienna presented it in the 1950s — an American tour boasting William Warfield, Leontyne Price, Cab Calloway and, in a cameo, Maya Angelou — the deciding event on these shores seems to have been the premiere at the Metropolitan Opera in 1985.
“Porgy and Bess” had been produced seven times on Broadway by then and directed by Otto Preminger as a 1959 film starring Sidney Poitier and Dorothy Dandridge.
It doesn’t stay on the shelf for long. In September, Sony Masterworks released a new live recording of the opera.
Categorize “Porgy and Bess” however you like.
The Dayton Opera, which considers it a landmark American opera, is in the mood to do something spectacular and collaborative.
Set in the 1920s in a black district of Charleston, S.C., known as Catfish Row, the opera sings the story of a disabled man named Porgy who falls so in love with a prostitute named Bess that he would kill for her.
Her man, the dockworker Crown, flees to a nearby island after killing an opponent in a dice game. But he returns.
The hustler and drug dealer Sportin’ Life also presents an obstacle. He wants to take Bess to New York to give her a taste of the “high life.”
“Porgy and Bess” always has sparked debate about its portrayal of blacks. Langston Hughes said Heyward saw “with his white eyes, wonderful, poetic qualities in the inhabitants of Catfish Row that makes them come alive.”
For Harold Cruse, who was a social critic and black studies professor at the University of Michigan, the opera portrayed “the seamiest side of Negro life — presumably the image of black people that white audiences want to see.”
The libretto was based on the Heyward novel “Porgy,” which was inspired by a newspaper account in Charleston about a crippled black man who committed a crime of passion.
Even if you have never seen “Porgy and Bess,” or any opera, you may be familiar with the music.
Songs include “I Got Plenty O’ Nuttin’ ” “It Ain’t Necessarily So,” “Bess, You Is My Woman Now” and “Summertime,” which has been recorded more than 15,000 times by the likes of Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald and Janis Joplin.
Dayton Opera’s staging by Gary Briggle will feature Thomas Beard as Porgy and former Dayton Opera artist in residence Kearstin Piper Brown as Bess. The soprano made her U.S. debut in the role in March for the Virginia Opera’s 35th anniversary season production.
Philip Boykin as Crown, Roderick George as Sportin’ Life, Judith Skinner as Maria and Cameo Humes as Peter also will be featured, along with Dayton Opera returnees Adrienne Danrich (Serena), Eric McKeever (Jake) and Phyumzile Sojola Mingo.
William Henry Caldwell (Jim), Central State University director of vocal and choral music; Vincent Davis (Robbins), a music instructor at Wright State University, and Tifton Graves, a visiting professor of voice at Wilberforce University, also have roles.
Dayton area singers, musicians and dancers will enliven and support the production.
The Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by music director Neal Gittleman, will be in the pit.
Members of the Dayton Contemporary Dance Company will perform in dance scenes choreographed by company artistic director Debbie Blunden-Diggs.
The Dayton Opera Chorus, under chorus master Jeffrey Powell, will be swelled by about 40 student singers from Central State and Wilberforce universities.
CONTACT this reporter at (937) 225-2377 or tmorris@coxohio.com.
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