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October 21, 2005
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The Merry Wives of Windsor, Nicolai’s Opera about Complimentary Media Tickets: 440-775-8328
OBERLIN, OHIO — Oberlin Opera Theater presents as its spring production The Merry Wives of Windsor (Die Lustigen Weiber von Windsor), Otto Nicolai’s comic opera about deception, revenge, and love. The curtain rises on Wednesday, March 15, at 8 p.m. in Oberlin College’s Hall Auditorium, located at 67 North Main St. on Route 58, between the Oberlin Inn and the Allen Art Museum. The three-act opera will be sung in German with English supertitles. There will be two intermissions. Stage direction for The Merry Wives of Windsor is by Sally Stunkel, visiting assistant professor of opera theater. Musical direction is by Bridget-Michaele Reischl, music director of the Oberlin Orchestras and visiting associate professor of conducting. Performances of The Merry Wives of Windsor are at 8 p.m. Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday, March 15, 17, and 18, with a 2 p.m. matinee on Sunday, March 19. Tickets are $5 for all students; $8 for those with an Oberlin College I.D. (faculty, staff, alumni, and parents), area educators, and senior citizens; and $12 for the general public. All seats are reserved. Tickets are $3 more when purchased at the door. Call Oberlin’s Central Ticket Service, located in the lobby of Hall Auditorium, at 440-775-8169. Box office hours are noon to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday. Hall Auditorium is wheelchair accessible, free parking is available throughout the campus, and hearing enhancement is available upon request. The Merry Wives of Windsor is sponsored by the Oberlin Conservatory of Music’s Opera Theater Program through generous support from the Louis C. Sudler Fund and produced in cooperation with the Oberlin College Theater and Dance Program.
Synopsis and Director’s Notes “Imagine if Shakespeare had written an Elizabethan version of a TV sitcom,” says Stunkel. “In this scenario, men are driven by their inflated egotistical view of themselves and it’s up to the women to bring balance back into their world. Add to that Otto Nicolai’s sparkling and delightful music (much of which is unknowingly known to the average audience member), and you have Die Lustiger Weiber von Windsor.”
Performers and Production Team The Oberlin production team of professional staff and students includes: Assistant Music Director Alan Montgomery, assistant music director of opera theater; Assistant Director and Stage Manager Victoria Vaughan, assistant director of opera theater; Scenic Designer Damen Mroczek, lecturer in theater; Managing Director/Technical Director Michael Louis Grube, associate professor of theater; Costume Designer Chris Flaharty, associate professor of theater; Lighting and Sound Designer Jen Groseth, lecturer in theater, Chorus Master Hugh Floyd, director of choral ensembles; and Vocal Coach/Accompanist Daniel Michalak. Allison Choat ’06 is the assistant stage manager. Otto Nicolai (Composer, 1810-1849) Otto Nicolai’s style was formed by diverse influences. His early studies in Berlin gave him a sound technical knowledge and a self-critical approach to composition which he never lost. As an heir of the classical tradition of Mozart and Beethoven and the newer German romantic tradition of Spohr and Weber, Nicolai was acutely conscious of the composer’s responsibility to his art. This element of his creativity, however, was significantly modified by his experience in Italy, where he was attracted both by the purity and beauty of 16th-century church music and by the vivacity of modern Italian opera. After years living in Italy and composing to little avail, the German composer was invited to conduct Il Templario at the Hofoper in Vienna in 1841, and its success with the public led to Nicolai’s engagement as principal Kapellmeister. He remained in Vienna for the next six years, making a significant impact on the city’s musical life. In March 1842, he began a concert series with the Hofoper orchestra that eventually developed into the Philharmonic Concerts, and later he took over the direction of the moribund concerts spirituals, considerably raising his standard of performance. By 1845, Nicolai had found an opera subject that suited him in Shakespeare’s The Merry Wives of Windsor, and he began work on setting Hermann Mosentahl’s libretto. When Die Lustigen Weiber von Windsor was refused at the Hoftheater, however, Nicolai was determined to leave Vienna. He accepted a post as Kapellmeister at the cathedral and the Hofoper in Berlin and began his duties in 1848. The following year, he conducted the highly successful première of Die Lustigen Weiber von Windsor. Two months later, after directing a concert with the cathedral choir, he suffered a fatal stroke. Although he did not live to build on his achievement, his last opera continues to hold the stage. (Source: Grove Music Online). Bridget-Michaele Reischl (Conductor) Since becoming the first American to win Italy’s Antonio Pedrotti International Conducting Competition in 1995, Bridget-Michaele Reischl has been an active guest conductor throughout the United States and internationally. Some of her recent engagements include those with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, the Brooklyn Philharmonic, the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, and the Dayton Philharmonic as well as numerous orchestras throughout Italy and Greece. Besides being music director of the Oberlin Orchestras and a member of Oberlin’s conducting faculty (she recently conducted the Oberlin Orchestra during a whirlwind tour of China), Reischl is music director of the Green Bay Symphony Orchestra in Green Bay, Wisconsin, a position she has held since 2001. From 1992 to 2004, she was music director of the Lawrence Symphony Orchestra and associate professor of conducting at the Lawrence University Conservatory of Music in Appleton, Wisconsin. She is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music. As a student of Robert Spano ’83, she continued her studies as a conducting fellow at both the Aspen and the Tanglewood music festivals, where she worked with Seiji Ozawa, Murray Sidlin, and David Zinman ’58. She is recorded on the Velut Luna, CRI, and Sea Breeze Record Company labels. Sally Stunkel (Director) Sally Stunkel has directed for Sacramento Opera, Tulsa Opera, Opera Theater of St. Louis, Skylight Opera, the Aspen Music Festival, Kentucky Opera, and Four Corners Opera, and has more than 80 productions to her credit as a director. As a former opera singer, she has sung with the Colorado Springs Opera, Skylight Opera, and Baltimore Opera. With more than 15 years in dance training, she has also choreographed various operas. She is a graduate of the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music (where she received the National Opera Association’s [NOA] award for best opera for her productions of The Consul and Postcard from Morocco). She has headed the opera programs at the former St. Louis Conservatory of Music, the University of Tennessee, the University of the Pacific in California, and the University of Iowa, where she won first place for her Marriage of Figaro from the NOA. She has taught and directed with the apprentice programs at the Des Moines Opera, Chattauqua Opera, the Banff Center in Alberta, Canada, and the Aspen Music Festival. She will be premiering her new English language version of Mozart’s The Magic Flute at the University of Kentucky this year. The Oberlin Conservatory of Music, founded in 1865 and situated within the intellectual vitality of Oberlin College since 1867, is the oldest continuously operating conservatory in the United States. Renowned internationally as a professional music school of the highest caliber and pronounced a “national treasure” by the Washington Post, its alumni have gone on to achieve illustrious careers in all aspects of the serious music world. Numerous Oberlin alumni have attained stature as solo performers, composers, and conductors, among them Jennifer Koh, Steven Isserlis, Denyce Graves, Franco Farina, Lisa Saffer, George Walker, Christopher Rouse, David Zinman, and Robert Spano. All of the members of the contemporary music ensembles eighth blackbird and the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE) are Oberlin graduates, and members of the Miró, Pacifica, Juilliard, and Fry Street quartets, among others, include Oberlin alumni, who can also be found in major orchestras and opera companies throughout the world.
The Oberlin Conservatory of Music Opera Theater
THE MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR Bridget-Michaele Reischl, conductor Wednesday, March 15 at 8 p.m.
Friday, March 17 at 8 p.m. Saturday, March 18 at 8 p.m. Sunday, March 19 at 2 p.m. Reserved seating tickets: Central Ticket Service Hall Auditorium
Hall Auditorium, 67 N. Main St. on
Route 58, between the Oberlin Inn and the Allen Art Museum. Free parking. FREE OPERA SCENES PROGRAMS Monday, May 15
# # # Media Contact: Marci Janas440-775-8328marci.janas@oberlin.eduwww.oberlin.edu/~eventswww.oberlin.edu/operathe
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