My Obsession With Religious Opera? Credit The New York Times

ALPHA OMEGA ARTS
By TAHLIB

"The Indian Queen," at Teatro Real in Madrid, was also produced
by the National Opera in London and the Opera of Perm in Russia.

It was only a few years ago that I became interested in Opera, and the credit for that is the coverage in The New York Times. Case in point, the recent reviews by Raphael Minder and Anthony Tommasini on religious operas. Minder makes note of how the artistic director, Mr. Sellars chose Purcell’s religious music "to offset the fact that “the subject of Spain’s Conquista is usually treated only in a very materialistic way"; and when Tommasini describes the Noah's story of the Ark, he wrote: "When the storm turns terrifying, the orchestra bursts into gnashing chords, darting riffs and harmonic chaos. Then, calmly, the inhabitants of the ark start to sing the hymn “Eternal Father, Strong to Save,” and I felt as if I were there. Thanks to The New York Times, I became a regular at the MET, where I now feel the wonder of Opera as the perfect blend of art, music, theatre, and religion.

Spain’s Conquest of America as Opera
By Raphael Minder, THE NEW YORK TIMES

MADRID — Peter Sellars, the American theater director who has regularly transported classical opera to the modern world, is used to ruffling feathers with his unorthodox stagings. The opening night here of his latest production of “The Indian Queen,” based on the unfinished opera by the English baroque composer Henry Purcell and first performed in 1695, was no exception. While the night ended with an ovation, some spectators booed at points and several left half-way. Mr. Sellars said that the subject matter of “The Indian Queen,” which is about Spain’s American conquest and handling of indigenous people, was always going to make it difficult to win over the more conservative members of Madrid’s opera audience. “Our job as artists is not to seek the easy way but to challenge society and open up some wounds, so that they can be cleaned rather than allow them to fester,” Mr. Sellars said in an interview the day after the production opened at the Teatro Real, Madrid’s opera house. [link]

On the Ark, Two by Two, Creatures (and Performers) Great and Small
By Anthony Tommasini, THE NEW YORK TIMES

Noye’s Fludde Samuel Wong, lower left, conducting a cast assembled by Lighthouse International and Park Avenue Christian Church, at Park Avenue United Methodist Church.

NEW YORK---Benjamin Britten loved composing pieces for children, not just for children to enjoy but also to perform. There is no better example that “Noye’s Fludde” (“Noah’s Flood”), a 60-minute opera based on a 15th-century mystery play, written for amateurs, especially children, with professionals mixed in. This telling of the biblical story was first performed in 1958 at Orford Church in Suffolk, England. It was presented as part of Britten’s Aldeburgh Festival with artists from the English Opera Group along with a large local cast, including a children’s choir. It was an inspired idea for Lighthouse International, an multifaceted organization serving people with vision loss, to celebrate the 100th anniversary of its Filomen M. D’Agostino Greenberg Music School by joining with Arts at the Park, an affiliate of Park Avenue Christian Church, for an enchanting production of “Noye’s Fludde” on Friday night. [link]