In honor of Seattle Opera’s newest production of Ruggero Leoncavallo’s masterpiece and to celebrate Pagliacci Pizza’s 45th Anniversary, the Seattle-based pizza maker has created a signature pizza box featuring Sasquatch as the clown.
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| © Pagliacci Pizza |
Pagliacci climaxes in a show-within-a-show: a performance (which goes completely haywire) of traditional Italian comedy, commedia dell’arte. This ancient theatrical form is perhaps best understood as live-action Looney Tunes. Commedia shows didn’t have much by way of plot. They didn’t use scripts. Instead, stock characters and situations provide a framework for improvised jokes, buffoonery, and rampant silliness. The name commedia dell’arte best translates as “artisanal comedy,” i.e. a bespoke performance, like the kind of cheese sold at a farmer’s market. Yes, they followed a recipe, but it comes out differently each time, that’s half the fun.
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| Canio (Diego Torre) and Nedda (Gabriella Reyes) from the 2023 Lyric Opera of Kansas City production of Pagliacci. © Ken Howard |
Monica Conesa, the American Cuban soprano, and Diego Torre, the Mexican Australian tenor are making their Seattle Opera debuts as Nedda and Canio. Discover how they started, their artistic influences, and favorite pastimes.
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| Duke Kim (Count Almaviva) and Megan Moore (Rosina) in The Barber of Seville. © Sunny Martini |
“The Seattle Opera has done it again, in their wonderful and fun new production of The Barber of Seville (one of Rossini’s greatest comic works). Co-produced by Opera Queensland, Seattle Opera, and New Zealand Opera, all I really need to say about it is “WOW!” –British Theatre Guide
This co-production between Opera Queensland (Australia), Seattle Opera and New Zealand Opera began life in 2016 as a 200th birthday celebration of The Barber of Seville. It followed a similarly joyful collaboration between our companies on a 2014 production of Rossini’s Cinderella. Here in 2024, I’m delighted to say that since their Brisbane debuts, both productions have been well-travelled and warmly embraced by audiences in around the world and across Australasia. It is a delight to revisit our salute to Rossini’s comic genius at a time when the world is thirsty for what Barber offers in abundance: humanity, love, laughter and the possibility of a happy ending, all set to Rossini’s exhilarating music.
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| Seattle Opera's new Artistic Ambassador, Kenneth Kellogg, as Malcolm X in X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X in 2024. © Sunny Martini. |
Seattle Opera:
You were just named Seattle Opera’s Artistic Ambassador for the 2024/25 season. How are you envisioning this role as you prepare to step into it?
Kenneth Kellogg:
The first thing this new role makes me think of is my elementary school teacher. As a young person, I could always see how much she loved music—it was infectious. It impacted me as a kid, which led me on a path first to enjoying music, and then to music taking over my life.
I think of my role as Artistic Ambassador as an extension of that. Music has been a blessing to my life in so many ways: it’s what I think of day and night, it helps me provide for my family, it’s taken me to worlds that I never thought possible. I just hope I can exude the same infectious spirit for music and art that my teacher did for me.
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| © Philip Newton |
Created and directed by Tazewell Thompson
Vocal arrangements by Dianne Adams McDowell
Orchestrated by Michael Ellis Ingram
Nineteenth century. A theater in Nashville, Tennessee. Thirteen members of The Fisk Jubilee Singers are gathering behind the curtain in vocal warmups, preparing to perform their concert of Spirituals. Post show, the singers retreat to the old military barracks set aside by northern abolitionists to house former slaves, now students and teachers of The Fisk Colored School. Eventually changed to Fisk University.
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| © Micah Shumake |
Music by Anthony Davis
Libretto by Thulani Davis
Story by Christopher Davis
Scene 1: 1931, Lansing, Michigan
At the home of Reverend Earl
Little and his wife Louise, a meeting is taking place of the local chapter of Marcus Garvey's Universal Improvement Association, and Rev. Little is late. Louise has been tense all day and members of the meeting are concerned about active white supremacist groups terrorizing local people.
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| USA. Illinois. Chicago. Malcolm X during his visit to enterprises owned by Black Muslims. 1962. © Eve Arnold/Magnum Photos |
This spring, Seattle Opera is presenting the West Coast premiere of X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X. To encourage students to celebrate and engage with this work and Malcolm X’s legacy, we have created this competition for high school juniors and seniors in Washington State. All students, including home-school and charter students, are invited to submit their essays, poems, and visual artwork responding to the following prompt:
What aspect of Malcolm X’s legacy has had the greatest impact on our society today?
The first-place winner in each category will be awarded $500. The first-place winners and first runners up for each category will be invited to present their submissions before one of Seattle Opera’s performances of X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X at McCaw Hall, and their submissions will be showcased in McCaw Hall during the entire run of the opera, February 24—March 9, 2024.
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