Displaying items by tag: COT

Chicago Opera Theater (COT) presents the Chicago premiere of Der Silbersee: Ein Wintermärchen (The Silver Lake – A Winter’s Fairy Tale), a genre-defying theatrical work with music by Kurt Weill and text by Georg Kaiser that was banned by the Nazi regime just weeks after its 1933 premiere. Directed by COT General Director Lawrence Edelson and conducted by James Lowe in his COT debut, this revelatory new production will be performed March 4 at 7:30 PM, and March 7 & 8 at 3:00 PM at the Studebaker Theater, 410 S Michigan Ave. Tickets are $50-$150 and are available now at cot.org. The work is presented in German with English supertitles.

Der Silbersee marked Kurt Weill’s final theatrical work before he was forced to flee Germany as a Jewish composer, escaping the rising tide of fascism and eventually making his home in the United States. A groundbreaking, long-suppressed work by the composer of The Threepenny  Opera and Street Scene, Der Silbersee blurs the boundaries between opera, operetta, and musical theater. An act of artistic defiance at the moment of its creation, the work helped pave the way for modern music drama and remains a strikingly relevant reflection on humanity’s struggles and hopes. Der Silbersee tells the poignant story of Severin, a destitute man shot while stealing a pineapple, and Olim, the policeman who wounds him but later nurses him back to health as he seeks redemption. At its heart, this deeply human work asks a question that resonates with unsettling clarity today: How can we find reconciliation and hope in a fractured world? Weill’s extraordinary score—blending late-Romantic lyricism, sharp modernist edges, and the propulsive energy of popular song—moves seamlessly between satire, poignancy, and surrealism, underscoring the work’s emotional depth and political urgency.

COT General Director Lawrence Edelson on Der Silbersee: “When I first encountered Der Silbersee, I was struck not only by the circumstances in which it was written, but by how enduringly it speaks to our time. By cloaking a searing social critique in the language of a fairy tale, Kurt Weill and Georg Kaiser transformed political protest into poetic myth, using allegory to confront society in a moral winter. Written at a moment of profound political and ethical collapse, the work grapples with wealth inequality, the rise of fascism, and the violence of the state—forces that continue to forces that refuse to remain confined to history, resurfacing whenever societies lose their moral compass.. What makes the piece extraordinary, however, is that it refuses to surrender to despair. This theatrical masterpiece uncovers a profound hope—a belief that empathy and moral choice remain possible even when the world feels irreparably broken. Producing Der Silbersee today feels both like an act of remembrance and an act of resistance. I hope our new production allows contemporary audiences to encounter the work not as a historical artifact, but as a living moral inquiry—one that asks us, what kind of society we are choosing or allowing ourselves to become.”

The cast is led by tenor  Chaz’men Williams-Ali as Severin and bass-baritone Justin Hopkins as Olim. They are joined by soprano Ariana Strahl as Fennimore; tenor Dylan Morrongiello as Lottery Agent/Baron Laur; mezzo-soprano Leah Dexter as Frau von Luber; soprano Boya Wei and mezzo-soprano Sophia Maekawa as the Shopgirls; actor Korey Simeone as the Policeman/Doctor; and tenor Sam Grosby, baritones Evan Bravos and Leroy Davis, and bass-baritone Steele Fitzwater as the Four Youths. Jeffrey D. Kmiec is the Scenic Designer, Erik Reagan Teague is the costume designer, and Marcella Barbeau is the Lighting Designer.

In the weeks leading up to the opening, COT invites the public to deepen their engagement with Der Silbersee through two free, thought-provoking events that illuminate the opera’s historical context, artistic legacy, and striking contemporary relevance.

Free Public Event #1

1933: The Turning Point — Art, Oppression, and Resistance

Monday, February 9, 2026 | 6:30 PM
Harold Washington Library Center – Cindy Pritzker Auditorium

Chicago Opera Theater and the Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center partner for an illuminating evening that explores how 1933 marked a profound rupture in the history of both Europe and the arts. That year, Adolf Hitler’s appointment as Chancellor of Germany ushered in the Nazi dictatorship, unleashing a systematic campaign of antisemitism, censorship, and cultural control. Within months, civil liberties were suspended, Jewish artists were expelled from their professions, and a new ideology of “racially pure” art replaced the creative pluralism of the Weimar Republic. Amid this upheaval, composer Kurt Weill and playwright Georg Kaiser premiered Der Silbersee. The work was banned within weeks of its debut and its creators forced into exile. Yet its music and message endure as a testament to the power of art to bear witness and to resist tyranny. 1933: The Turning Point — Art, Oppression, and Resistance combines live musical excerpts from Der Silbersee with historical context and dialogue, shedding light on how this masterpiece reflects the political and moral crises of its time. Together, COT and the Illinois Holocaust Museum invite audiences to reflect on how the lessons of 1933—when democracy collapsed, truth was suppressed, and art was silenced—remain urgently relevant today.

Free Public Event #2

Close-Up with Der Silbersee

Thursday, February 19, 2026 | 7:00 PM
Newberry Library

The subtitle of Der Silbersee translates into English as “A Winter’s Fairy Tale.” This deliberate reference to Heinrich Heine’s Deutschland: Ein Wintermärchen signals that the opera was never intended as a children’s fantasy, but as a poetic reflection on a society in moral winter—an idea that feels strikingly resonant today. Fairy tales are not solely escapist diversions; they are powerful vessels for moral clarity. Through the language of wonder, they confront fear, cruelty, loss, and redemption, shaping archetypes we recognize instinctively. Although Der Silbersee was not conceived as a child’s tale, director Lawrence Edelson became increasingly fascinated by how fairy tales are first encountered—not as literature, but as formative stories absorbed in childhood, when our sense of right and wrong is still taking shape. This insight inspired Edelson and his design collaborators to imagine the opera as unfolding within a child’s bedroom—not to make the work childish, but to reveal how innocence can perceive moral truth with piercing clarity. Join us at The Newberry Library for an engaging behind-the-scenes conversation to explore how the evocative visual world of this new production is being brought to life. The evening will also feature live excerpts from this unjustly neglected masterpiece, performed by members of the cast—an inspiring preview of Chicago Opera Theater’s upcoming production.

Both events are free, but advance registration is highly recommended due to limited seating capacity.

Leadership support for Der Silbersee has been provided by the Kurt Weill Foundation for Music, Inc., New York, NY, the National Endowment for the Arts, and Production Co-Sponsors Ethel Gofen Penelope Steiner and Virigina Tobiason.

COT thanks Nancy Dehmlow and the Morse & Genius Operating Reserve Fund for their generous support of the 2025/26 Season.

About Chicago Opera Theater

Chicago Opera Theater’s mission is to enrich the lives of those who live, work and play in Chicago by bringing rarely produced and contemporary operas to life, supporting gifted emerging artists, and providing hands-on experiences with opera that entertain, empower creativity, and cultivate a lasting and meaningful connection to the arts. Guided by our core values, COT serves Chicago through unique, relevant, and innovative opera experiences that reflect the aspirations of our city — dynamic, inclusive, and forward-thinking — fostering inspiration, dialogue and belonging. Since its founding in 1973, COT has grown from a grassroots community-based company to a national leader in an increasingly vibrant, diverse, and forward-looking art form. COT has staged over 160 operas, including over 90 Chicago premieres and 50 operas by American composers. COT is led by General Director Lawrence Edelson who was appointed in 2023.

Chicago Opera Theater’s 2025/26 season continues with the concert world premiere of Trusted May 30, 2026 – the seventh opera commissioned and developed under the auspices of the Vanguard Initiative.

For more information on Chicago Opera Theater productions, visit chicagooperatheater.org/

Chicago Opera Theater presented the new opera, Moby Dick, by Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer, in a brave, intelligent, and strikingly beautiful performance last Thursday at the Harris Theater in Chicago. Usually, the old adage that “the whole is greater than the sum of the parts” seems well suited to most COT productions, but what can one say about a production in which all of the parts were truly excellent, yet the work itself did not quite live up to its disparate elements? Moby Dick is a well-crafted, entertaining and enjoyable opera, performed with a wealth of talent in an impeccable production, yet it never delivered the impact which could be expected from such an epic work of literature. Perhaps it is like Shakespeare’s “King Lear” in that respect, a work which is so epic, and which has a central character which is so complex that it defies transliteration. Even Verdi wouldn’t touch it. There are a few epic operas which have complex characters, Verdi’s Don Carlo and Samuel Barber’s Anthony and Cleopatra come immediately to mind, but there are many epic operas whose characters are not that complex, and there are many complex characters in operas which are not particularly epic in scope. It is really, really hard to do both.

Jake Heggie is an immensely popular, talented and accomplished composer. His canon of nearly 300 art songs has become a staple of the vocal repertoire, and his operas, such as Dead Man Walking, have achieved worldwide acclaim. However, with Moby Dick, while Heggie has mastered the musical language of opera, it seems as though he has not quite found his full operatic voice. Every scene is beautifully written, well suited to the human voice, gorgeously orchestrated and theatrically complete, much like an art song. However, they are more like individually luminescent pearls, rather than one magnificently encircling necklace. Heggie’s music is through-composed, yet the scenes feel as though the next one is of a different style, almost as though it was from a separate work, than the scene before. There is a jumble of styles which are reminiscent of Vaughan Willams, Britten, Stravinsky, Rutter and even the film score of “Lawrence of Arabia”, among a number of others. The result is that moments of tension are lost in transition between scenes, and the work as a whole never achieves the overall dramatic arch leading to the penultimate scene’s destruction of Ahab and his ship. This may be because it is never made clear what the opera is really about, or how any of the several relationships which are explored effect the others in driving the dramatic action to its tragic end. Is it about Starbuck’s struggle with morality and opposition to Godless authority? Is it about the friendship between Ishmael (here called Greenhorn) and Queequeg which bridges racial and religious chasms? Or is it really about Ahab’s self-absorbed and tragically maniacal obsession with exacting his revenge upon the great white whale? Whatever it is about, the audience should have walked out feeling as though they had just been kicked in the gut, not as if they had just seen a Broadway musical. It all seemed rather sanitized and prepackaged to please, rather than move or challenge the audience.

The tragic character in Moby Dick is without question Captain Ahab, with his unreasoning and implacable hatred of the “fish” which took his leg. Ahab’s manic-depressively single-minded focus upon finding the whale is the force which provides the dramatic tension in both the novel and the opera. Although he gave a splendidly well sung performance, Tenor Richard Cox seemed much too well adjusted and reasonable, portraying only a hint at the driving compulsion which takes Ahab and all the men of the Pequod to their watery graves. His aria, “I leave a white and turbid wake” eloquently explained his morbid fascination, but did not express its inherent dread.

Providing the foil to Ahab’s insane fixation, Aleksey Bogdanov as Starbuck was spectacular. Possessed of a booming, velvety smooth bass-baritone voice which easily soared through heavy orchestration, Bogdanov’s performance was powerful, committed, and nuanced. Bogdanov has the kind of voice usually associated with villains, such as Scarpia or Iago, yet his Starbuck was approachable and sympathetically touching.

As Greenhorn (Ishmael), the sweet-voiced tenor Andrew Bidlack was ideal. His thoughtful portrayal progressed from the naïve and unexperienced youth in search of knowledge of the world to the emotionally savaged sole survivor of the voyage with honest sincerity. Wallace’s Greenhorn was the mate every sailor wishes to have as his fellow oarsman.

Bass baritone Vince Wallace as Queequeg was exuberantly vigorous and entertaining, while never allowing the character to become a parody or stereotype. His straightforward humanity provided the structure for Queequeg and Greenhorn to bridge their cultural and religious divide and forge a deep friendship. However, Queequeg’s mysticism which foresees his death and the tragic confrontation with Moby Dick, is rather strangely portrayed as a heart attack, not as the ennui resulting in a spiritually broken heart. Perhaps the composer or director didn’t feel that having Queequeg simply waste away from a broken heart would be obvious enough to hold the audience’s interest.

A curtain speech announced that role of Stubb would be sung by cover Nick Ward. This is usually an ominous sign that the audience should be prepared for a somewhat under-rehearsed and tenuous performance. Not so, in the case of Mr. Ward. He sang impressively, and danced and cavorted around the stage with assurance and gusto, providing a great deal of comic relief with his sidekick Aaron Short as Flask. The physicality of the two was amusing and impressive.

The music for Pip requires the powerful adult voice of a pants role, and as the cabin boy, Summer Hassan sang with a luminous voice, soaring above the combined forces of the all-male chorus and orchestra. Equally impressive were the other male soloists and chorus. Each one was an outstanding singer and actor. They were supported by four male dancers who provided vigorous physicality to many scenes. Chicago Opera Theater does not have a full time professional chorus like the Lyric Opera of Chicago, so to be able to bring together an ensemble of such high quality speaks volumes concerning the commitment of the company to the highest performance standards. Kudos go to Chicago Opera Theater for its casting choices.

Those high standards are also demonstrated by the striking, and extremely functional set by Erhard Rom (whose remarkable whale’s eye at the end was a stroke of genius), the effective, yet atmospheric lighting by David Martin Jaques, and the clean and imaginative stage direction by Kristine McIntyre. McIntyre is a director who truly understands the unique needs of opera and opera singers, never pandering to the audience with unnecessary stage business or requiring the actors to go beyond the limits of good singing. Everything that happened on stage was both interesting and important. However a curious statement in the director’s note in the program may explain the seeming ambivalence of the opera. Ms. McIntyre states, “At its core, Moby Dick is a story about friendship.” While it is certainly true that the friendship is an important part of the story, and we want to find some form of redemption and growth of the human spirit in the story, it is not the driving force which impels the drama or precipitates the tragic end.

Moby Dick was masterfully conducted by Lidiya Yankovskaya. Under her baton the 60 piece orchestra played beautifully with a sumptuous sound. The one quibble is that with such dense orchestration at the beginning of the piece, the really loud playing might have been restrained so that the climax could have been more effective. By the end, the loud bits had become a bit tiresome. However, that is by no means entirely the conductor’s fault. The positive influence of Ms. Yankovskaya’s direction continues to impress in a business which is highly competitive for better orchestra players. Again the commitment to excellence from COT is to be commended.

Good news! The future of American opera is looking very bright, indeed! The beautiful and moving new opera, The Scarlet Ibis, was presented last Saturday and Thursday by Chicago Opera Theater as part of their Vanguard Initiative, a program to mentor emerging opera composers, commission and develop new operas, and connect audiences to exciting new works and creators.

The opera, with music composed by Stefan Weisman and libretto by David Cote, is based on the short story of the same name by James Hurst. If this touching, extraordinary production is indicative of what we can expect in the future from COT’s Vanguard Initiative, this is a great day for opera!

Lyrical and atmospheric, the music draws upon the best of 20th century American opera, not in a derivative way, but as you might say that Verdi’s style organically grew out of the Bel Canto tradition of Donizetti and Bellini, which depended upon compositional elements of Mozart and Gluck, which were spawned by Handel, Vivaldi, and Lully. The greatness of these composers was entirely dependent upon those who came before, and established a knowledge base of how to compose for the human voice. Much of the difficulty that many audiences have had with modern American opera, especially mid to late 20th Century opera, is that the compositional styles of those composers were created out of whole cloth, with no prior vocal tradition which allowed their music to be sing-able. The Scarlet Ibis, however, shows a burgeoning maturity in the compositional style and technique of modern opera. Although scored for a small ensemble, the open harmonies and folk-like strains of Weisman’s music are reminiscent of Copeland. Arpeggios and repeated patterns (don’t call it “minimalism”) hint at influence from composers such as Philip Glass and John Adams, although this work is mostly melodically sweet and flowing, without those driving rhythms associated with works by Adams or Glass. And when called for theatrically, the music becomes nearly Stravinskian, with more complex harmonies and lush texture. However, Mr. Weisman has found a voice of his own, guided by the demands of the drama, and the abilities and needs of the human voice. The vocal writing seemed tailor made for the remarkable cast, and lines that were eminently sing-able carried the listener along for an enthralling ride.

As in Copeland’s The Tender Land, the libretto is artfully crafted to capture the colloquial time and place of the story with succinct economy of language. Nevertheless the narrative is clear, with defining voices for each individual character. Every scene is simple, but imbued with a deep sense of poetry and humanity.

David Hanlon conducted with sensitivity and expertise, bringing out the loveliness and power of the score. Under his capable direction, the nine piece orchestra played superbly, without some of the pitch problems in the strings which have been disappointing in earlier productions. Hanlon was always there for the singers, fluently in control as if The Scarlet Ibis was an opera he’d known and loved for years.

Stage and Movement Director Elizabeth Margolius is the kind of opera director who seems to be more and more rare, these days. She is a director who completely trusts her singers and her material to be inherently interesting on their own, without the need to add a lot of meaningless stage business and movement because she is afraid that the audience will become bored. She understands that a singer does not have to be in constant motion, and that a good singer can remain perfectly still, that time can slow down and stretch, yet there will still be intense focus and attention from the audience. This is especially useful when the leading character can’t walk. Doodle’s “Lie” aria, in which he sat nearly perfectly still, was a stellar example. On the extremely simple, but versatile and attractive unit set, Ms. Margolius used the space with great imagination and skill. Nothing ever happened which didn’t make sense. Every movement, every sound, was expertly motivated and realistic.

Set in the home of the Armstrong family in the north-eastern Piedmont region of North Carolina, just after the Wright brothers had made human flight successful at nearby Kitty Hawk, the imagery of the possibilities of the flight of the human soul pervades The Scarlet Ibis. It is comprised of 13 brief titled scenes in one act, and runs just over an hour and a half, although it seemed to take only half that time. Each scene featured an event in the lives of the small rural family over the course of about six or seven years. The opera opens in a fairly straightforward manner. Six year old Brother, the family’s only child, is joyfully anticipating the birth of the family’s second child, who he hopes can be a companion with whom he can run, and jump, and fight, and play. The focus then shifts to his mother. In a scene unique in opera, in our experience, she is having a difficult childbirth. It is quickly apparent that if the baby survives, something will be terribly wrong. It is a boy, but he is a “caul” baby, a child who is born with part of the amniotic sack covering its head like a cowl. Many mystical qualities are attributed to caul babies and to cauls, themselves. Caul babies are reputed to have abilities such as second sight, great creativity, and unfettered imaginations. Cauls themselves, are prized by sailors to prevent drowning, by lawyers to help them win cases, and are thought by some Adriatic cultures to aid in the peaceful passing of the dying. Most disappointing to Brother, the baby also has a severe, but unspecified disability which leaves him incapable of walking and being the playmate that Brother wanted. In a fit of pique, Brother gives the baby the nickname, Doodle, because the only thing a doodlebug can do is push itself around backwards. However, Doodle is special in other ways, teaching himself to read by the age of four, with a flawless and prodigious memory, and an unparalleled imagination.

Jordan Rutter, as Doodle, was a revelation – a term we do not use lightly. He radiated pure innocence with an underlying poetic soul. His countertenor voice, soaring above all the others as the highest vocal part in the opera, is unusually pretty for the type. Mr. Rutter’s singing was moving and affecting throughout, especially in the ensembles and the duets with Brother. Equally remarkable, are Mr. Rutter’s acting skills. As an adult playing the role of a very young child to the age of about seven, he has a directness, simplicity, and economy of movement which are riveting in their expressivity.

Likewise, mezzo-Soprano Annie Rosen was thrilling in the “overalls” role of Brother, playing a boy who ages from about six to thirteen throughout the opera, with a total commitment to her character. She has a gorgeous, clear voice with an extraordinary color palette. She sang with talent, intelligence, and sensitivity, going from boyishly silly or mocking tones to a full, rich sound in moments of deep expressivity. Ms. Rosen is not a large woman, yet she exhibited an impressive physicality and strength as she lifted and carried the adult male actor playing Doodle around in the kind of stage action not usually expected from a female singer. Her future in opera should be brilliant. Both Ms. Rosen and Mr. Rutter made us completely forget that they are adults playing the roles of very young boys.

We have been continuously delighted and impressed with the talent of baritone Bill McMurray. His sturdy baritone is capable of a range of color that bordered on fearsome as Ibn-Hakia in Iolanta earlier this season, but was warm and paternal in this role. He portrayed the role of Father with pathos, dignity, and an uncanny honesty. Every time Father is faced with a crisis, either of sadness or joy, he goes to his shop to build something by hand for Doodle. He is a proud and loving man with little education and few resources, but he has knowledge and talent with wood, so he does the best he can with what little he has. He is not fluent or articulate with words, so he expresses himself through his craft. Each time Mr. McMurray went to his shop, it brought tears to our eyes, either from sadness or gladness. His “Coffin” aria was heart wrenching in the direct simplicity of a father’s pain. Later, when Doodle’s physical disability threatens to also stunt the growth of his mind by confining him to his home, Father expresses his frustration at not being able to afford a bicycle for his son by building him a red wagon in which to explore the world. In his “Red Wagon” aria, McMurray perfectly captures a simple working man’s determination to make his son’s life better than his own.

COT Young Artist alumni Quinn Middleman brought tenderness and a gentle presence to the role of Mother. Her fine, warm mezzo-soprano voice easily met the challenge of vocal demands which included musically notated high notes for sung screams and groans during the first scene’s difficult childbirth. Ms. Middleman musically gave us all of a woman’s pain, fear, agony, joy, and strength while in the throes of one of life’s essential moments. It is common for singers to die on stage, but we have never heard one give birth. However, when Mother discovers a newspaper article about a doctor in Chicago who might offer the possibility of a cure for her son’s disability, Ms. Middleman touchingly exchanged excitement and optimism for the pathos of the forlorn hope of an unattainable goal.

Contralto Sharmay Musacchio sang the role of Auntie. She seemed hesitant at times, as if she needed a little more time with the role to get it into her voice and find the truth in the character. Her performance, while not quite up to the high standard of her colleagues on stage, was more than adequate and did not detract. It’s just that the rest of the singers were so darn perfect in their roles.

It should be noted that music written for three female voices of the same general type and range could have been muddy and undistinguished. However, Mr. Weisman’s excellent vocal part writing, abetted by perfect vocal casting choices on the part of COT, was always marvelously clear and distinct, allowing each of the voices to shine with characterization.

The singers were joined by dancer Ginny Ngo, who portrayed the Bird, the title role, if you will, physicalizing the opera’s overarching and multifaceted theme of flight. Ms. Ngo appeared variously as a doppelgänger for Doodle, a rather spooky owl, as the actual scarlet ibis, and as Doodle’s soul free from the confines of his deformed earthly body. Whether representing the flight of imagination, the flight of the human spirit, or the flight of the human soul, Ms. Ngo’s movement was birdlike, but brimming with human emotion. In the disquieting penultimate scene, the ibis finally appears, storm blown far from where it should be and out of place in an inhospitable environment, like the not-normal little boy.

Scenic Designer Jack Magaw provided the creative and workable set. Charlie Cooper’s breathtaking lighting design was at once clean and atmospheric, while actually being illuminating. Even in scenes which were dark, emotions on the singers’ faces could still be seen clearly. The costumes designed by Brenda Winstead were appropriately plain, yet never uninteresting. An especially nice and amusing touch was Doodle’s goofy pilot’s helmet subtly reinforcing the flight symbolism. How gratifying to see all elements of a production come together in service to the whole of the work. We laughed, cried, hoped, celebrated and mourned with the Armstrong family.

Only one performance remains, Sunday, February 24 at 3:00 p.m. at The Studebaker Theater in the Fine Arts Building. If this review gets posted (without typos) and you are reading this before then, change whatever plans you may have and go see this marvelous production. Let’s hope it will be presented soon and often by other companies. It is a worthy addition to the American Opera repertoire.

Go to www.chicagooperatheater.org or call (312)704-8414.

Chicago Opera Theater opened their 2018-2019 season with the Chicago Premier of Peter Tchaikovsky’s ‘Iolanta’. Since this performance was also the Chicago debut of Lidiya Yankovskaya, COT’s new Stanley Music Director, it was an auspicious occasion for the company embarking on their 45th season. It also marked the first full season of Chicago Opera Theater’s Vanguard Initiative, committed to bringing newer and lesser known works to Chicago on the stage of the charming Studebaker Theater in the Fine Arts Building. In collaboration with Roosevelt University, COT has a respected young artist program, giving opportunities to promising singing actors. For Chicago audiences, it is a welcome complement to the much grander Lyric Opera of Chicago.

When one thinks of Tchaikovsky’s operas, and Russian opera in general, epic stories, casts of hundreds and massive choruses come to mind. Not so in Tchaikovsky’s final opera, ‘Iolanta’. As with last season’s offering, Donizetti’s final opera, Rita, (is this a theme?) ‘Iolanta’ is a more intimate work, and runs about an hour and a half. Nevertheless, it has the romantic sweep of Tchaikovsky’s style that tugs at the heart strings while rousing large as life passions, presaging the later works of Stravinsky and Rachmaninov.

A 2018 recipient of the Solti Foundation Career Assistance Award, Maestra Yankovskaya’s debut in the pit was promising and gratifying. She brought out all the pathos and grandness in the lush score, without ever overpowering the singers, quite an accomplishment in an intimate theater with such an exposed orchestra pit. This is most encouraging. If she can just get her strings to play in tune, under her leadership it will be an outstanding ensemble. We were fortunate for the heavenly harp played by Lillian Lau, a measure of a truly professional opera company.

The story of ‘Iolanta’ could be a simple fairy tale; Princess ‘Iolanta’ has been blind from birth. Her father, the loving and powerful King René, has kept this a secret from her, and instructed, upon pain of death, that the fact that she is blind never be revealed to her. Since childhood, ‘Iolanta’ has been betrothed to Robert, the Duke of Burgundy, but Robert has since fallen in love with another. Because the marriage of Robert and ‘Iolanta’ is pending, King René has engaged the services of an exotic doctor, Ibn Hakla, to try to cure his sightless daughter. Dr. Ibn Hakla, who employs the metaphysical and the psychological in his treatments, proclaims that ‘Iolanta’ will never be able to see unless she knows that she is blind. Honoring his betrothal, Robert comes to claim his bride, but his friend, Vaudemont, gets a glimpse of ‘Iolanta’ and is instantly enchanted. Vaudemont sneaks past a No Trespassing On Pain of Death sign to try to meet ‘Iolanta’. As they engage in a mild flirtation, Vaudemont professes his love. As a remembrance, he asks her to give him a red rose from the bouquet of red and white rose which ‘Iolanta’ carries. When ‘Iolanta’ is not able to pick out a red rose, Vaudemont discovers that ‘Iolanta’ cannot see and reveals it to her. Predictably, the two are discovered together, and Vaudemont is condemned to death. ‘Iolanta’’s love for Vaudemont makes her choose to allow Dr. Ibn Hakla to operate. The operation is successful, Vaudemont is pardoned, and all live happily ever after. Aside from the obvious, “you can’t solve a problem until you acknowledge it” the myriad possible interpretations make this opera a fascinating study in how we deal with all that comes along with being human.

The cast is stellar without exception. Katherine Weber, assuming the title role, is a singer to watch very closely. She is much more than just another cookie-cutter soprano, her large, distinctive voice is sweet and sturdy, with a wide spectrum of color, and burgeoning with tremendous promise. Her characterization was sympathetic and touching.

Mikhail Svetlov as King René is a spectacular true Russian bass. He tempered the role of René with understanding and presence. It is hard to imagine anyone singing the role any more beautifully than Svetlov. He had the regal bearing of a king and the tenderness of a father suffering for his daughter’s plight. His performance, alone, would make this production a must-see.

As Vaudemont, John Irvin has a slightly stiff stage presence, but he sang with vocal ease and treated us to some of the best high notes we’ve heard anywhere this season. In his aria, which was not part of the original score, he seemed a little uncomfortable, but once that was out of the way, he has a natural charm which made his performance entirely compelling and believable.

Operas with two major Baritone roles are quite unusual. Christopher Magiera, as a deliciously randy Robert, Duke of Burgundy, tossed off his devilishly difficult aria with aplomb. Magiera has the natural stage presence and effortless high notes demanded by the most difficult Bel Canto baritone roles. Bill McMurray, as Dr. Ibn Hakla, delivered a slightly more dramatic sound which suited the mystically transcendental requirements of that role. His aria was vocally spectacular, even if the staging was somewhat obtuse.

Important smaller roles were well sung and capably acted by Emma Ritter, Katherine Peterson, Annie Rosen, David Goversten and Aaron Short. It is gratifying to see that young singers of this quality are receiving professional mentoring in Chicago which is all-important to launching successful careers.

The sets designed by Alan E. Murakova were intriguing, and as lit by Lighting & Projection designer Driscoll Otto, occasionally quite stunning, but served little useful dramatic purpose. And they moved around all night. Not just between scenes, but during scenes too, being pushed around by the singers to no real purpose, achieving nothing. At times it seemed as though the opera was more about set pieces dancing around, than anything else. Oh please, it’s an opera, not a ballet for flats. In spite of that, when the set pieces were allowed to stay still and accept Mr. Otto’s visuals, they did ignite the imagination. However, that wonder was unfortunately squashed by the dull and dreary costumes, which looked like recycled costumes from last year’s The Consul. You can design a production cheaply that doesn’t look cheap. And rather than tease us with an interesting setting, then keep moving it around, why not just focus on good stage craft? Famed director Paul Curran let us be distracted from an otherwise honest and meaningful reading with all this unnecessary shuffling around of castered corner pieces. And although Curran did tell the story well, he did not help his young cast with the elementary stage movement. Too often, to use a nautical phrase, singers were caught in irons, with nowhere to go, or having to make an awkward La Scala cross from down-stage left to up-stage right while singing. A director of Curran’s reputation should know how to do better for his actors.

Despite the technical distractions, ‘Iolanta’ is delightful, beautifully sung and movingly performed by a supremely talented cast of young singers.
The Doctor’s orders: See ‘Iolanta’!

There are two additional performances – Thursday evening November 15 at 7:30 pm and Sunday afternoon November 18 at 3 pm. Don’t miss it! Go to chicagooperatheater.org.