Golden Gate Opera - Marin County Opera

"They've certainly improved over the years," said a friend during intermission at last Friday's Golden Gate Opera performance at Marin Veterans Auditorium. "I was on the board of directors of the Marin Opera Company, and I don't think that group ever sounded as good as this."

The word is out that Golden Gate Opera has stepped up in the world, and the word is pretty much true. From performances at area schools of Engelbert Humperdinck's Hansel und Gretel, the organization ramped up its ambition and budget to present Giacomo Puccini's Madama Butterfly in April 2004. Now, a bit more than two years later, the group has returned to the Puccini fountain to produce two-thirds of Il trittico, namely a double bill of Suor Angelica and Gianni Schicchi (the third one-act opera of this trilogy is the worthy but least-known and -produced Il tabarro).

From its first productions in 1918-1919, in New York and Rome respectively, the trilogy's comedy, Gianni, became the most celebrated, and that was certainly the case here as well. Puccini in a comic vein is a delight, and the work functions for this composer as Falstaff did for his older compatriot Verdi, as an eleventh-hour, lighthearted masterpiece.

Puccini's comedy shines
The story, after lines from Canto XXX in Dante's Inferno, deals with a crafty medieval Barber of Seville-like commoner of titular fame who outwits a family of scheming aristocrats whose eldest member has just died leaving his inheritance to charity. Schicchi pulls a Monty Pythonesque "not dead yet" by impersonating the deceased and dictating an updated will to a gullible notary, thereby restoring monies to the relatives but assigning the largest portion of the inheritance to himself. There's a love story to boot, between the only honorable aristocratic relative and Schicchi's daughter, and they all live happily ever after.

Golden Gate's production allowed this opera to shine, with only a few issues of production and delivery to get in the way of a completely polished rendition. In some ways, this is analogous to the earlier years of the Marin Symphony, when audiences were smaller and performances a little less certain. If the latter is any model, Golden Gate is on the road to further successes.

An able cast
In drama, it has often been said that comedy is harder than tragedy; but in opera, the reverse may be true. The hat trick of levity can divert the ear from purely musical matters; and indeed, "good singing" is sometimes beside the point in instances when characters are depicted as crude, rustic, or sick. In any case, Paul Cheak inhabited the title role entirely convincingly, able to deliver handsome and comically crabbed singing with equal aplomb. Charlotte Nytzen, as his daughter Lauretta, was charged with the most beautiful music of the evening ("O mio babbino caro") and lived up to its potential. Her lover, Rinuccio (Zachary Sheeley), proved her able foil in duet and solo capacities.

The rest of the capable cast did their part to keep the proceedings popping. Animatedly directed by Edna Garabedian, these included Heather McFadden (Zita, the Old Woman), Abraham Aviles-Scott (Gherardo), John Minagro (Simone, the departed's cousin), Julia Ulehla (La Ciesca), DeAnne Reeder, and Taber Dullea. The trio of basses — Axel Van Chee, Jeff Jones, Glade Truitt — made their winning contribution as the officials taken in by the ruse. The latter should have known better, as he played a double role that included that of the dead Buoso Donati earlier in the proceedings.

Throughout, music director Geoffrey Gallegos and his fine orchestra supported with the requisite sweep and perkiness, and Paula Langhoff Barton's fanciful set gave the players a nice springboard for the goings-on.

Fine performance of a less-deserving work
Suor Angelica was less successful, partly because it is simply a less successful opera. An operatic "chick flick" in a nunnery (the gentle predecessor of Francis Poulenc's Dialogues of the Carmelites), this story of social shame is harder to buy into in the early 21st century. And the opening music is as beautiful but dramatically static as that of some church services, with a bit of unbalanced choral singing to boot (billed as exclusively soprano/mezzo-soprano — heavens, no altos here!).

All this changes in the fiery and passionate scene between Olga Chernishva (last heard to similarly excellent effect in the aforementioned Butterfly) and Lisa Houston, as Sister Angelica and The Princess, her ice-cold aunt. Suffice it to say that the heroine is an abused woman whose downward spiral is totally undeserved. That Puccini could be attracted to this sad, slim story is remarkable; that he could produce such convincing music, more remarkable still.

It remains a second-rate piece, but the members of the Golden Gate Opera, including a supporting cast too numerous to mention, gave it their all.

(Mark Alburger is an award-winning ASCAP composer of concert music published by New Music, editor-publisher of 21st-Century Music Journal, oboist, pianist, vocalist, and music critic.)

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