VOL. 90 JULY 2010 NO. 3

THE OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF PROFESSIONAL MUSICIANS, LOCAL 47, LOS ANGELES, CA, AFM, AFL-CIO, CLC

LA Opera's daring 'Ring Cycle'

sparking praise, controversy,

swirls through Los Angeles

and a surge of 'Ring' festivities along the way.

SPECIAL 'RING'pull-out center insert

inside this issue >

OVERTURE — SPECIAL PULL -O U T SECT IONJULY 2010 'RING' 1

JU L Y 2010 'RING' 3'RING' 2 OV E R T U R E SP E C I A L PU L L-OUT SE C T I O N

'Ring Cycle' Swirls Through Los Angeles

The Los Angeles Opera Orchestra has a core roster of 61 players (noted below with an asterisk), augmented for each production according to the demands of the music. Regular orchestra members who did not perform the "Ring Cycle" are indicated in parentheses.

LA Opera 'Der Ring des Nibelungen' Orchestra & PersonnelFirst Violin

Stuart Canin*, ConcertmasterAna Landauer *, Associate ConcertmasterJinny Leem * , Assistant Concertmaster

Margaret Wooten*

Olivia Tsui *

Tamsen Beseke *

James Stark*

Marina ManukianArmen Anassian*

Helen NightengaleSusan RishikRadu PiepteaRafael Rishik

(Lisa Sutton, Associate Concertmaster)(David Stenske)

Second ViolinJayme Miller *, Principal

Steve Scharf *, Associate PrincipalFlorence Titmus *

Leslie Katz*

Michele Richards*

Second Violin (cont'd)

Cynthia Moussas*

Loránd Lokuszta*

Tina Chang Qu*

Grace Oh

Sarkis Gyurgchyan

Neil Samples

Searmi ParkXiaowei Shi

Violas

Kazi Pitelk *, Principal

Andrew Picken*, Associate Principal

Karie Prescott*

Shawn Mann*

Dmitri Bovaird*

Marlow Fisher

Alma Fernandez

Josephine Liu Moerschel

(Matthew Funes)

CelliJohn Walz*, Principal

Rowena Hammill* , Associate PrincipalDane Little*

Kim Scholes *

Margaret Moores *

Nadine Hall*

Trevor HandyRoger Lebow

Xiadoan ZhengLynn Harrell

BassesDavid Young *, Principal

Ann Atkinson*, Associate PrincipalFrances Liu-Wu*

Donald Ferrone*

Timothy Eckert*

David ParmeterJames Bergman

Flute / PiccoloGary Woodward *, Principal

Angela Wiegand *

Cathy ChoSarah Weisz* piccolo

Oboes / English HornLeslie Reed*, Principal

Leslie ResnickSarah Beck

Grace HongStuart Horn* English horn

ClarinetsMichael Grego*, Principal

Mary Gale*

Joshua RanzLawrence Hughes

Stephen Piazza* bass clarinet

BassoonsJohn Steinmetz * , Principal

Judith Farmer *, Principal (Walküre)William May *

William Wood

HornsSteven Becknell*, Principal

Stephanie StetsonKristy Morell, Associate Principal

Justin HagemanMartin Rhees, Assistant Principal

Horn / Wagner TubaJames Atkinson* , Associate Principal

Nathan CampbellDaniel Kelley*

Jenny Kim *

TrumpetsTim Morrison*, Principal (Siegfried,

Götter)

David Washburn*, Principal (Rhein -gold, Walküre)

Andrew Ulyate*

Timothy Owner bass trumpet

Trombones

William Booth*, PrincipalAlvin Veeh *

Terry Cravens* bass tromboneGeorge Thatcher contra bass

TubaJames Self*, Principal

Harp

JoAnn Turovsky*, Principal

Allison Allport

Timpani

Gregory Goodall*, Principal

PercussionTheresa Dimond *, Principal

Timm Boatman*

Mark Zimoski

BANDA

Anvils

Theresa Dimond*

Timm Boatman*

John Wakefield

Scott Higgins

Jason Goodman

Mitchell Peters

ConductorJames Conlon

Orchestra Personnel ManagerBrady Steel

Music Administrator / LibrarianRobert Willoughby Jones

Assistant LibrarianFelino Jason Vasquez

Director / DesignerAchim Freyer

Co-Costume DesignerAmanda Freyer

Co-Lighting DesignerBrian Gale

Associate Conductor / Chorus Master

Grant Gershon

Jayme Miller

Rafael Rishik

Helen Nightengale

Ana LandauerLesl ie Katz

Steve Scharf

Jinny Leem

Margaret WootenOlivia Tsui

Tamsen Beseke

Tina Chang QuKarie Prescott

John Walz

Kim Scholes

Dmitri Bovaird

Marlow Fisher Grace Hong Stuart Horn

John Steinmetz Gary Woodward

Timothy Eckert

David Parmeter

Angela Weigand

Gregory Goodall

Terry Cravens

James Self

William May

Theresa Dimond

G r a c e O h

Steve Becknell

Radu Pieptea

Kazi PitelkAndrew Picken

James Stark

Armen Anassian

Susan Rishik

David Young

James Atkinson

Rowena Hammill

Dane Little

Please note: Not every member of the LA Opera Orchestra had a photo available to include in this spread. Please see complete personnel list below. Photos of Conlon, Canin, Landauer, Anassian, Nightengale, S. Rishik, Miller, Katz, Moussas, Richards, Hall and Marukian by Steve Scharf. All other photos from LA Opera or other orchestra artist bio pages.

The Musicians Behind 'The Ring'The Musicians Behind 'The Ring'Music Director James Conlon leads the LA Opera Orchestra to new heights in Wagner's epic four-opera cycleMusic Director James Conlon leads the LA Opera Orchestra to new heights in Wagner's epic four-opera cycle

James Conlon

Special thanks to Brady Steel, Steve Scharf, Gary Murphy, Mark Lyons, Kimberly Henshaw and to all of the LA Opera Orchestra musicians for their time and generosity in making this "Ring Cycle" feature possible.

by Linda Rapka, Overture Managing Editor

Stuart Canin

David Washburn

Los Angeles felt a lot like Bayreuth these past few months asthe entire city joined in an unprecedented 10-week celebration ofLA Opera's monumental production, "The Ring of theNibelungs" ( "Der Ring des Nibelungen").

The first "Ring Cycle" ever presented in Southern Californiamet with an eclectic citywide festival of widely attended museumshows, lecture series, stage productions, and special events like"Gangsta Wagner" presented by daKAH Hip Hop Orchestramaestro Double G (this is L.A., after all).

The LA Opera announced its plans to present its first-everRing Cycle in 2000. In the interim, the originally planned collab-oration between German director Peter Mussbach and GeorgeLukas' Industrial Light & Magic company for "The Ring" fell tothe wayside, and the LA Opera nearly went bankrupt — not tomention the nation suffering shattering terrorist attacks, enteringinto two foreign wars, and succumbing to a global economicmeltdown. How's that for Wagnerian tragedy?

With visionary German stage director/set designer AchimFreyer and some financial help from the County, LA Opera's"Ring" went on. Beginning in mid-April, 2009, each of the fouroperas ("Das Rheingold," "'Die Walküre," "Siegfried" and Götterdäm -merung") was performed as a single production, culminating inJune 2010 with presentations of three full cycles. Based looselyon characters from Norse sagas, the Ring Cycle is the most chal-lenging of all opera endeavors in every capacity: financially, phys-ically and mentally. Having taken Wagner over 20 years to com-plete, the monumental work clocks in at over 15 hours and ismeant to be presented in one long sequential run within the timeframe of a week. Considering the notoriously short attentionspan of Angelenos, and coming with a not-so-slight $32 millionprice tag, this was by no means a sure thing for the LA Opera.

"It's a massive undertaking in every way, taxing in everydimension," said John Steinmetz, principal bassoonist. "It's tiringto do, it demands incredible concentration, and all the resourcesyou have to marshal to make it work — the technical stagingrequirements, the coordination — everything about it is blown upto a huger scale."

When the orchestra first learned the company was going totake on the Ring Cycle, the news was met with excitement, and alittle trepidation.

"It brought a little bit of fear for me," said Steve Becknell, prin-cipal horn player. "This is probably the biggest thing for Frenchhorn to do, so it's a little daunting to look at."

"It's intense," said Greg Goodall, principal timpanist. "Enor-mously intense. The pieces are long, and I really wasn't veryfamiliar with them. Wagner is not a part of our musical educa-tion in the same way 'Beethoven 5', '7' and '9' are."

Cellist Nadine Hall had a similar reaction. "It was really excit-ing, but also I was a little apprehensive," she said. "I have friendsin the Seattle Symphony and heard that it's pretty brutal physical-ly and very grueling to play. And that's of course proving to be thecase. But it's a remarkable experience."

Doing the full cycle of four operas, one right after the other,presents unique challenges.

"The hardest thing is to do one big opera, five hours of music,and then two days later do an entirely different one," Becknellsaid. "You've got different transpositions, so you've really got tobe focused."

"One of the tricks to this is that almost no two measures are inthe same tempo," Goodall said. "This is the case in other operas,and that's fine — but these are so long, and there's so much of it.And you compound that when you're doing the full cycle; by thetime you come back to the first one again it's been quite some peri-od of time, so to remember all of that again is quite an exercise."

"It's so overwhelming the first couple times through," Hall

said. "You're so busy trying to get through your own part, youcan't really focus on everything else that's going on. But the morefamiliar you get, the less you have to focus on your own part andyou can really hear what's going on, which makes for a very richexperience."

Though challenging, Goodall also describes the experience asincredibly rewarding. "The music is absolutely magnificent," hesaid. "The performance is intense. And it has been an amazinglymusical experience."

Achim Freyer's hyper-stylized staging of this "Ring," with itssurreal and sometimes grotesque costuming, gigantic props andhypnotic lighting, has sparked animated love-it or hate-it reac-tions and debates throughout Los Angeles, and around the world.

"It's a different kind of staging," Becknell said. "Some peoplelike it, other people find it distracting, so there's a bit of a dichoto -my. I think it's great that we did this, it makes it unique. And it isunique; it's the first time in Southern California, and we've putour imprint on it."

"The company had two choices: do a traditional staging, or doa modern staging," Goodall said. "Traditional staging is some-thing the (New York) Met has done for years, that you can getreadily on DVD. That's been done. I think to bring a new stagingcertainly brings some controversy, but it also brings thought. Thepurpose is to allow people the opportunity to think about whatthis all means, how it all fits together, and how it is relevant to ourown lives. For forward-thinking Los Angeles, I don't think itcould have been done any other way."

"I thought it was a really unusual approach," Steinmetz said."We're out there doing a production that's got uniqueness thatmakes for something the audience is going to be talking about."

And talk, people have been doing. A lot. This "Ring" hassparked more controversy than any other LA Opera production.It's also sparked more conversation — quite a feat for a city fullof events constantly vying for attention.

"The LA Opera has made people aware that there is a 'Ring'and not just Hollywood films," said concertmaster Stuart Canin."This music was written around the 1850s, 1860s, 1870s, and it'sstill here with us and still great."

As Wagnerians will readily tell you, the music is as big a partof "The Ring" as the stage production, if not more so. MusicDirector James Conlon succeeded in making the music just asstriking as the much-talked about staging.

"He knows this work so well, it's almost mind boggling," Beck-nell said. "It's really inspiring. During rehearsals he'll tell us, 'This iswhat's happening here.' He's really put his imprint on the music."

"You always learn something from him," Hall said. "There'san incredible knowledge behind what his musical decisions are.His passion for this music is so clear, and he really communicatesthat. He goes for the big musical picture."

For any opera company, taking on "The Ring" is a huge state-ment of purpose. It shows not only it has the financial means, butmore importantly exhibits the company's artistic vision and itscapability to work as a single cohesive unit.

"The company is very serious about presenting the highest qual-ity opera possible," Goodall said. "A project such as this is so mas-sive it requires substantial work from every area of the company.From the management to wigs and makeup, stage mangers and theorchestra, everybody is involved on a very intense level. That bringsthe company together in a unified way. To the city, it shines a lighton all it is that we're doing. From an artistic standpoint, it's terrificfor the company, and for the citizens of Los Angeles."

"It's a right of passage," Canin said. "Any opera company thatputs on 'The Ring' has already established itself as a major com-pany. And the city of Los Angeles should know what they havein store for them in the future."

Alma Fernandez

Nadine Hall, Marina Marukian Trevor Handy

Cindy Moussas, Michele Richards

"I'm leaving Los Angeles Opera, but I am not giving up theviolin," said Concertmaster Stuart Canin. "I want to make thatclear."

Stuart will be leaving the LA Opera to live full-time at hishome in San Francisco, where he splits residences between LosAngeles when working with the opera company. "I've beendoing this for nine years, and I found out looking at my booksthe other day that I've spent more time in Los Angeles than Ihave in San Francisco!" he said. "At some point in your life, youhave to say enough is enough."

When Stuart heard the LA Opera was planning the massiveundertaking of Wagner's Ring Cycle, "I was tickled to death,frankly. What a way to go out!" he laughed, adding, "I was justhoping they wouldn't put me in the ring of fire."

After finishing up a performance of "Das Rheingold" June 8,a bon voyage party was held in Stuart's honor in the beautifulFounder's Room of the Dorothy Chandler. After rounds oftouching speeches and gift-giving, Music Director James Conlonand Carol Colburn Høgel presented Stuart with a most presti-gious honor: a concert chair now holds his name. "That is one ofthe nicest things I have ever had in my life," Stuart said. "It's never done for a player. I am trulyhonored that the Opera thought enough to do that."

As if the evening weren't special enough already, it was also Stuart and his wife's 58th weddinganniversary. Obviously still very much in love, they look forward to spending more time togetherin their San Francisco home.

Spry and jovial at 84 with his violin always at the ready, Stuart isn't quite sure what he plans todo next, but knows that whatever it is, it will involve playing music. "As long as my playing is stillgoing, I will continue to play," he said. "When you get to be in your middle eighties it's a differentsituation, so I have no idea what I'll do. But that may be the beauty of it. I'm not thinking of it. I'mdoing my work here at the Opera. We'll see what happens." — Linda Rapka

'RING' 4 OVERTURE — SPECIAL PULL -O U T SECT ION JULY 2010

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German stage director and set designer AchimFreyer's elaborate production of the four-part cycle of"The Ring" by the Los Angeles Opera featured a rakedstage, flying props, screen projections and specialeffects to create a surreal and hallucinogenic theaterexperience.

Singers stood on level platforms to ease singing whileperforming on the stage outfitted with a central rotating

turntable, which represented both a clock and globe andflipped open like a clamshell. Waving silk simulated thewater of the Rhine, captivating LED lights lined thestage, and front, rear and overhead projectors castimages onto translucent scrim screens at the front andrear of the stage. An ominous giant illuminated eyeball,representing Wotan's lost eye, changed location forevery opera, moving across the stage during "Siegfried"

and splitting in two during "Götterdämmerung," repre-senting the destruction of the Gods.

The many Gods, giants, dwarfs, maidens and mor -tals took many forms in "The Ring," often requiringcostumes with complex riggings that employed multi-ple actors; it took five performers just to manipulateWotan's coat. The orchestra was located below stagelevel.

Achim Freyer's Unique Vision

Concertmaster Stuart Canin LeavingLos Angeles in Body, Not Spirit

TALK ABOUT CLOSE QUARTERS — Down in the pit beneaththe stage of the Dorothy Chandler, LA Opera musicianspack together like sardines for up to five hours a night toperform Wagner's "Ring Cycle."

In a feat one must seeto believe, GregGoodall manages tosqueeze his massivetimpani amongst the23 violins, eight vio-las, seven celli, sixbasses, four flutes,four oboes, four clar -inets, three bassoons,five horns, four Wagner tubas, four trumpets, four trom-bones, tuba, two harps and three percussionists.

'Das Rheingold ' (The Rhine Gold) 'Die Walküre' (The Valkyrie)

'Siegfried ' 'Götterdämmerung' (The Twilight of the Gods)

Nibelung dwarf Alberich, teased unmercifully by the Rhinemaidens, denounces love, seizes the gold,and forces his brother Mime to fashion from it a ring, key to all worldly power. Meanwhile Wotan,ruler of the Gods, has giants Fafner and Fasolt build a castle, Walhall. As payment, Wotan offersthem Freia, sister of his wife Fricka. To appease Fricka's unhappiness at this, Wotan sends Logedown to earth to find something else to give the giants. Ultimately Alberich is brought beforeWotan, who takes the gold for the giants. He steals the ring for himself, but is forced to hand it toFafner. Alberich lays upon it a curse: until returned to him, whomever possesses the ring shall die.

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Siegmund seeks refuge with Sieglinde, wife of brute Hunding. Despite being long-lost twin brotherand sister, they fall in love, and Siegmund must fight Hunding. Wotan, father of the mortal twins,pledges his sword Nothung to help his son win the battle, but goddess of marriage Fricka demandsthe death of Siegmund, who is guilty of adultery and incest. Distraught, Wotan relents and ordersValkyrie daughter Brünnhilde to ensure Siegmund's death. But deeply moved by their love,Brünnhilde disobeys. Though she fails to save Siegmund, she hides Sieglinde, who is carrying babySiegfried. To punish Brünnhilde, Wotan casts her into a ring of fire, penetrable only by a mortal hero.

Mime forges a sword for his foster son Siegfried, whom he hates but hopes will kill Fafner so hehimself can obtain the all-powerful ring. Siegfried demands to know his real parentage, and Mimediscloses that he found his mother Sieglinde in the woods and that she died giving birth to him. Anold Wanderer (Wotan in disguise) poses three riddles to Mime, who gives up in terror when askedthe final question of who will repair Nothung. He soon realizes this can only be done by Siegfried,who happens upon Brünnhilde and awakens her. Meanwhile, Wanderer summons Erda, goddessof the Earth, to learn the Gods' fate; they are doomed.

Three Norns predict the end of the Gods. Siegfried gives his bride Brünnhilde the ring he took fromFafner. Plotting to obtain the ring, Lord of the Gibichungs Gunther is convinced by half-brotherHagen to marry Brünnhilde: by means of a magic potion, Siegfried forgets his bride and winsBrünnhilde for Gunther in return for his sister Gutrune's hand. Betrayed, Brünnhilde reveals to HagenSiegfried's sole vulnerable spot. Hagen murders Siegfried and Gunther for the ring. Brünnhilde con-demns the gods for their guilt in Siegfried's death and takes the ring to the Rhinemaidens, who dragHagen to his death and regain their gold. Flames engulf Valhalla, and the world is redeemed by love.

Photo by Linda Rapka

Music Director James Conlonand Carol Colburn Høgel pres -ent Concertmaster StuartCanin, who is leaving LAOpera after 'The Ring,' with aconcert chair named in hishonor.

Photos by Linda Rapka