The Dallas Opera 2021-2022 - The Barber of Seville/The Pearl Fishers

gets louder and more frantic, leaving the audience completely breathless! Leading the cast is today’s pre-eminent Figaro, American baritone Lucas Meachem, whose magnificent voice and captivating charisma have been hailed in this role at the major opera houses in San Francisco, Houston, and Los Angeles, as well as at London’s Royal Opera House and the Vienna State Opera, among many other other houses. TDO’s Rosina is the glamorous, sumptuous-voiced Irish-Canadian mezzo Wallis Giunta, winner of the 2018 International Opera Award in the “Young Singer” category. She’ll appear opposite the Almaviva of the young Australian tenor Alasdair Kent, who’s earned unanimous praise as a born Rossini singer since his European debut at Pesaro’s prestigious Rossini Opera Festival. One of South America’s most gifted performers, Colombian baritone Valeriano Lanchas, is Dr. Bartolo, and prominent American bass Adam Lau is Don Basilio. Another important Colombian artist, Lina Gonzalez-Granados—an alumna of TDO’s Hart Institute for Women Conductors—will be on the podium, in a delectable production by American director Tara Faircloth. There’s nothing more fun in an opera house than The Barber of Seville . Enjoy! • A writer, lecturer, teacher, and coach, Roger Pines has contributed articles to every major opera-related publication in America, as well as to seven prestigious recording labels. Since 2006 he has appeared annually as a panelist on the Met broadcasts’ “Opera Quiz.” 10 part to incensed operagoers who couldn’t forgive the brilliant young composer for daring to take on the same story that had already been set by the revered Paisiello. Such was the magic of Rossini, however, that the next performance scored an absolute triumph, and it’s been such for Rossini’s Barber ever since. Barber confirmed Rossini’s stature as the composer who was singlehandedly achieving a total revamping of Italian comic opera, which had grown stale and predictable. First of all, the melodies were fresh and utterly exhilarating, but Rossini also had a natural sense of what worked in the theater, and above all, that fabulous sense of humor. Whether his plots involved mistaken identities, misadventures in romance, or all-out silliness in farcical situations, he knew exactly how to make comedy come to life. The story of The Barber of Seville originated as a French comedy of the same name, written in 1775 by Pierre- Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais (he later gave the world The Marriage of Figaro ). It presents Count Almaviva, who’s intent on winning the beautiful Rosina. The problem? She’s the ward of the much older Dr. Bartolo, who aims to marry her himself. Almaviva enlists the assistance of Figaro, the barber. Their schemes get the Count into Bartolo’s house, where he makes his presence known to Rosina. (He disguises himself not once but twice—first as a drunken soldier, then as a music teacher). No end of complications ensue before the lovers are finally united. The highlights come thick and fast: Almaviva’s stratospheric showpieces (including a final aria so challenging that for more than 150 years it went unperformed); Rosina’s “Una voce poco fa,” in which uses elaborate Rossini coloratura to reveal how adorable she really is; the music master Don Basilio’s imposing aria in which Rossini asks the bass to expand his voice from a whisper to a roar as he reveals the ins and outs of slander (“la calunnia”); Bartolo’s furious aria sung to Rosina, filled with patter that flies like the wind; and, of course, Figaro’s entrance aria, “Largo al factotum” (“Make way for the jack-of-all-trades”), which introduces us to the cleverest, most ebullient, most fun-loving barber there ever was. Rossini also gives us spectacular ensembles, especially at the end of the first act: thanks to the uproar instigated by Figaro and Almaviva, everyone onstage is totally perplexed. They pause to declare, “My poor brain, stunned and bewildered, can’t think, is confused, and is reduced to madness.” Rossini gives those words one of his most famous crescendos : each time the phrase gets repeated, the music THE DALLAS OPERA | 2021/2022 SEASON Barber confirmed Rossini’s stature as the composer who was singlehandedly achieving a total revamping of Italian comic opera, which had grown stale and predictable.