| John Estacio is now under the gun. At an invitation-only workshop at The Banff Centre, the much-in-demand composer said that now he had completed the marathon of setting John Murrell’s grand opera libretto Frobisher to music, he must complete the next marathon of orchestrating all the music in the next two months. However, that can happen only after the re-writes and additions that will emerge from the final week of work in Banff with singers, the conductor and music directors, stage director, costume and set designer and the co-creators.
The evolution of the opera is exciting to witness. Murrell and Estacio have dreamed as expansively as the Arctic in creating this opera. It is about pursuing one’s dreams to reality and the cost of doing so. Privateer, adventurer, explorer Martin Frobisher believed that a tropical paradise existed near the North Pole but the story he told Queen Elizabeth I was a different one. To gain her support and that of her advisors, he claimed that he could find the Northwest Passage to the Orient and gold along the way. Murrell has invented a story in which Anna and Michael, partners in life and successful filmmakers, are preparing to chronicle the story of Frobisher and his efforts to realize his dream. Michael is more passionate about the project, while Anna is more practical about the obstacles. When Michael disappears in the Arctic, Anna eventually pursues his dream after being haunted and prodded by the ghosts of both Frobisher and Michael.
Not unexpectedly, the story and the music are multi-layered, intellectual and imaginative. Yet both are clear and accessible, transporting us to the worlds they have created.
Each workshop gave us different scenes and music. The sixth workshop sparked our imaginations to envision Queen Elizabeth I’s court, resplendent with courtiers and Frobisher’s passionate pleas for his northern expedition. This was juxtaposed with Anna pitching her film idea at a "film festival somewhere in the Rockies" to a deep-pocketed producer and his entourage. All on stage at the same time, proclaiming their passions. It’s enough to give one shivers of excitement. The orchestration, the blending of voices and the singers’ expressiveness combined to send the imagination soaring.
In the collaborative world of opera, Murrell relies on the interpretations and talents of others to develop his dreams. In Frobisher, his libretto is very cinematic. Things that could happen seamlessly in a dissolve or double screen must become a scene change transporting the audience from past to present. Alternately, two time periods side-by-side on stage with about 80 to 100 people – each with their own story.
Part of Estacio’s task is to compose music to cover scene changes and the noise attendant with moving props, sets and people in place and at the same time in a coherent way.
Estacio is not the only one now under pressure. Stage director Kelly Robinson and set and costume designer Sue LePage are immersed in making these dreams real – or at least finding solutions to stage them. Robinson was director on Filumena and he thrives on the challenges of new works. He guides all the characters, even the chorus and minor players, to know what brings them to this place at this time. Robinson will meet in Toronto with the leads to help bring them up to speed, prior to rehearsals in Calgary. LePage, who has worked on many new works in theatre and on Filumena, knows what she is facing. By designing both sets and costumes, she feels she can make more elegant and economical choices to bring the team’s dreams to the stage.
After even more consultation and designing, the sets will be built at the Banff Centre in November, costumes will be cut and sewn, wigs and make-up will be diagrammed and singers will arrive at Calgary Opera Centre for rehearsals with the stage and music directors. The chorus and supers will rehearse. Calgary Opera will move it all into the Jubilee Auditorium in late January for the première of the second co-production between Calgary Opera and the Banff Centre, and the second co-creation between Estacio and Murrell. |
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