Search - Thomas Pasatieri, David Gilbert, Manhattan School of Music Opera Orchestra :: Pasatieri: The Seagull

Pasatieri's Enduring Opera

J Scott Morrison | Middlebury VT, USA | 05/19/2003

(4 out of 5 stars)

"When Thomas Pasatieri's opera, The Seagull, based on the Chekhov play, had its première at the Houston Grand Opera in 1974 it was given a lavish production, a splendid double cast (as was the custom at the HGO) that included such American operatic luminaries as Evelyn Lear, Frederica van Stade, Catherine Malfitano, John Reardon and Richard Stillwell, and lots of opera world hoopla. It had a number of other productions all over the place. Pasatieri, then only 28, became THE hot American opera composer and went on to write more than a dozen others in a brief period of time. Then he stopped - perhaps the meteor had burnt out or the commissions stopped - and departed for Hollywood where he has since written, orchestrated or arranged, music for such films as 'The Shawshank Redemption' (was it his brilliantly effective idea to use the excerpt from 'The Marriage of Figaro' in one of that film's crucial scenes?) and 'American Beauty.' His librettist, Kenward Elmslie, one of the best in the business (Rorem's 'Miss Julie', Jack Beeson's 'Sweet Bye and Bye', 'Lizzie Borden') had fashioned a fine libretto that preserved much of the conversation in the play. The première was a major success but as far as I know no commercial recording ever came from that production or from any that followed in the mostly regional opera companies around the country. In December 2002 the work was given its belated New York City première at the Manhattan School of Music, and it is that production that is recorded here. The singers and orchestra are all students but only occasionally would one know that. This is a fine performance, given a taut reading by conductor David Gilbert and dramatically apt performances by the singers. The music itself is mostly in parlando style, but frequently blooming into arias and ensembles that would not be out of place in the operas of Menotti or even Puccini. In the play within a play (an avant-garde poetic drama written by the young Constantine) the musical style becomes slightly more modern (echoing, at one point, the melismatic Stravinsky in 'The Rake's Progress'). There is nothing here to scare off the ordinary opera-goer, and indeed the piece has been a success wherever it has been mounted.From a strictly dramatic point of view, one does wonder why Pasatieri and Elmslie chose to build up the part of the neurotically depressed Masha far beyond her importance in Chekhov's play. One dramatic choice in the final scene of adding an aria by Madame Arkadina in which she prattles on about her great success on stage as Queen Jocasta, while offstage her son Constantine commits suicide, is truly effective.It is good to have this recording of an opera that has continued to live onstage. Pasatieri, who made some revisions and added some music for this production, has said that the experience has made him begin thinking about writing another opera after all these years. The sound level on my copy is quite low; I had to crank the volume control up quite a bit to get a listenable level. If you're interested in reliving your own experience of seeing this piece in the theater, or in otherwise exploring American opera in a conservative vein you could certainly do worse than give this one a listen. A libretto is included, but is hardly necessary because of the clear diction of the singers. Scott Morrison"