OPERAWISE: OPERA BUFFA

In this series of podcasts, Seattle Opera Dramaturg Jonathan Dean gives listeners a taste of nine different types of traditional opera. Opera buffa, the beloved old Italian tradition of opera comedy, is what you get by adding music to the even older Italian tradition of improvised (artisanal) comedy, commedia dell’arte. The fools and buffoons of commedia—the sassy wenches, befuddled old professors, suicidal young lovers, dirty old misers, hungry Harlequins, arrogant soldiers, zany servants, and all the rest—found new ways of entertaining us once they began singing gloriously. And with the opera orchestra functioning as a laugh track and adding jokes of its own, opera buffa continues to disarm us and charm us while putting a big grin on our faces. The Barber of Seville and The Elixir of Love are great examples of the genre.

Praise for Cinderella

Miriam Costa-Jackson (Clorinda), Peter Kalman (Don Magnifico), and Maya Gour (Tisbe). Philip Newton photo

"Two exciting casts, a solid score, and staging as speedy as a runaway train: Seattle Opera audiences had a rollicking good time this past weekend with Rossini’s Cinderella."
—The Seattle Times

"The audience at Seattle Opera's Cinderella knew from the first note of the overture that this evening was going to be fun."

—Seattle Gay News 

"A performance to relish in a production that produced continuous laughs."
—Opera Wire

"It's a charming take on a classic tale. Seattle Opera's production of Cinderella brings toe-tapping tunes, bright ensembles, and colorful characters together for an enchanting evening. [The] ultimate rags-to-riches show."

—KING5 TV, Evening Magazine

"It’s the concept and imagination of stage director Lindy Hume which makes this production so delicious, ably abetted by production designer Dan Potra, lighting with some wonderful effects by Matthew Marshall and the choreography of associate stage director Dan Pelzig. Not least are the apt supertitles of Jonathan Dean which caught each nuance of the libretto, which might otherwise have been missed, and frequently gained laughs for themselves."

—Bachtrack  

"Wow. Cinderella was phenomenal. Great show, @SeattleOpera. Beautiful performance and good for plenty of laughs too!"
—@thybeardedbard via Twitter, opening night 

Cinderella: Director's notes

Wallis Giunta as Cinderella in the production directed by Lindy Hume. Photo courtesy of Giunta

By Lindy Hume, Stage Director of Seattle Opera's Upcoming Cinderella 

It’s nearly two hundred years after Rossini, a precociously brilliant 25-year-old celebrity, wrote Cinderella (La Cenerentola) in three weeks. He wrote it over Christmas, and it opened on January 20, 1817. Two centuries later, notwithstanding the speed with which it was written, and the worldwide fame of The Barber of Seville, for me Cinderella, or Goodness Triumphant (the full original title) is his most wonderful creation.

Rossini’s Cinderella not only has a unique place in the history of opera in Australia—my homeland—the story of Cinderella has embedded itself in the Australian psyche, as it has all over the world. The upcoming production you’ll see at Seattle Opera seeks to respect two centuries of this opera’s performance history, while referencing popular contemporary entertainment styles such as the rom-com, the sitcom, and music theater—vernacular styles that speak to today’s audiences.

DANDINI, WHO ARE YOU?

Wallis Giunta (Cinderella) and Jonathan Michie (Dandini). La Cenerentola, Oper Leipzig © Kirsten Nijhof

By Jonathan Dean 

La Cenerentola is Cinderella...almost. 

Rossini’s opera differs from most of the world’s many Cinderella stories because of a few key features: there is no magic, the traditional evil stepmother and fairy godmother are replaced with male counterparts, and the prince identifies Cinderella thanks to a bracelet, not a slipper. And then, of course, there’s Dandini, the prince’s clever and mischievous servant. He isn’t part of the standard Cinderella-story cast list. What is he doing in this opera? He provides a much-needed reality check; while in real life there are people as virtuous as Cenerentola, or as awful as Magnifico, mostly there are people like Dandini.

Cinderella lights up the stage with vocal fireworks

Wallis Giunta as Cinderella. Photo courtesy of Opera Leipzig 

When stage director Lindy Hume last worked at Seattle Opera, her powerful Rigoletto sparked important #MeToo conversations with a story intended to be devoid of hope. Next up, she’s bringing something completely different to McCaw Hall—a sparkling fairy tale that families will fall in love with. 

“When Rossini composed his Cinderella (La Cenerentola), the alternative title was Goodness Triumphant,” Hume said. “Cinderella ends in a blaze of optimism, which is sorely needed in these times. This show is joyful, quirky, and led by a feisty heroine whose defining character is her goodness.”

Hume’s upcoming production stars audience favorite Ginger Costa-Jackson (Carmen in Seattle Opera’s 2019 Carmen) alternating with Canadian mezzo-soprano Wallis Giunta (company debut) as the title character. Inspired by the whimsical worlds of Charles Dickens and Tim Burton, Hume sets the familiar classic in and around an emporium filled with multi-level sets, unexpected twists, and Victorian-era costumes, including two jewel-encrusted ball gowns for the heroine. But this fairytale isn’t Disney

Rossini’s original Cinderella

Gertrude Righetti Giorgi (1793-1896) was a contralto and the first to sing the heroine in Rossini’s Cinderella (La Cenerentona). According to Alto: The Voice of Bel Canto by Dan H. Marek, her voice was “full, powerful, and of rare extension, rising from F below the staff to B-flat above it.” Righetti Giorgi had a short career, retiring in 1822 because of ill health, but she created the leading roles in two of the immortal masterpieces of the Italian lyric stage: Rosina in The Barber of Seville and the title role in Cinderella, which premiered on January 25, 1817.

Righetti Giorgi was a spirited advocate for Rossini, and in turn, Rossini appreciated her ideas and strength of character. Righetti Giorgi in fact convinced Rossini to convert an aria that had been written for Count Almaviva in The Barber of Seville into Cinderella’s famous celebration of forgiveness, “Non più mesta” (“No Longer Sad”).

Lindy Hume, Stage Director of Seattle Opera's upcoming Cinderella describes Rossini as a composer who was known to portray dimensional, interesting women:  

Cinderella: Disney vs. Rossini

Left: Disney's Cinderella. Right: "Cinderella," San Diego Opera, 2016 © J. Katarzyna Woronowicz Johnson.

Rossini's opera Cinderella (which comes to Seattle Opera this fall), might be a little different than the one you're used to. The narrative familiar to many Americans comes from the 1950 Disney cartoon, which took its inspiration: fairy godmother, transformed pumpkin, glass slipper, midnight spell and all, from Charles Perrault’s 1967 Cendrillon (Rossini was also inspired by Perrault, however, conscious of his theater producer's budget, the composer avoided expensive magic and transformation scenes).⁣

Listen now to our Cinderella podcast

Photo courtesy of Oper Leipzig

Curious to learn more about Rossini's masterpiece, Cinderella (La Cenerentola)? Here's an excerpt of a recent Seattle Opera podcast hosted by Dramaturg Jonathan Dean:

"When introducing Rossini's opera Cinderella (La Cenerentola) it's almost easier to tell you what it's not than what it is. It's not the Cinderella you know from Walt Disney, with a fairy godmother, a pumpkin that turns into a magic carriage, a glass slipper, and an impossibly idealized female lead. This story is much more about human behavior.

Although musically, Rossini's Cinderella and The Barber of Seville are similar, the humor in Cinderella isn't nearly as anarchic or as juvenile as in The Barber of Seville. Unlike that opera, in this one, the hero and heroine actually get to sing a love duet. There's an adorable meet-cute scene for Cinderella and her prince—he's disguised as a servant because he wants to find a woman who loves him for who himself and not for his money. It's love at first sight, Italian style where it's both super sexy and sweetly innocent. Imagine two young Italians discovering each other ... Rossini casts the prince, Don Ramiro, as a high tenor and Cinderella, a mezzo (technically at the first performance, a contralto), their voices almost overlap.

Staff Chat with Head of Wardrobe RON ERICKSON

When Ron Erickson isn’t teaching costume design for theater, opera, and dance at Cornish College of the Arts, he is backstage at McCaw Hall as Seattle Opera’s Head of Wardrobe. Always ready with a needle and thread or a calming word, he can handle any backstage costume malfunction or quick change with ease.

What are the responsibilities of the head of wardrobe?
My job is to make sure everybody has all the costume pieces that they need and that everybody gets dressed in the amount of time allotted. I check out the costumes once the shop has finished the work on them and move them to the opera house. I have to account for every item before every performance, from socks to hats and everything in between. I also hire dressers to dress the performers, and I maintain the costumes once we’re at the hall by doing laundry and repairs.

What kind of repairs?
A classic one was during The Marriage of Figaro. I got a page, “Please meet Cherubino in the wings with a needle and thread.” You don’t know what you’re walking into, but there was Cherubino and the back of her pants were completely split. She needed to go back onstage in about three minutes. We were holding flashlights so we could see backstage, and we stitched the back of her trousers shut so she could go back out for the rest of the scene. Other times it might be that somebody forgot a costume piece—a handkerchief, a hat, a watch—and we have to run with it because they usually notice it just before they’re going on. I love that part of my job, too. I like thinking quickly on my feet and coming up with a solution.

If you do the laundering, how in the world do you deal with stage blood?
Blood is the bane of my existence. For Bluebeard’s Castle, for example, we would boil the dress in a huge cauldron of chemicals, and it would come out pristine. I had this big spoon that I would stir it with; it was a head-of-wardrobe witch moment.

Are you involved in the quick changes? Can you walk me through that?
We start with a walk-through here in the costume shop: where do you put the jewelry, how fast can we pull the shirt off, and how to make the closures on the costume work to our advantage. Then we’ll do a quick-change rehearsal with the singers and dressers at the house. We choreograph it first without time. Then we’ll do it in real time and someone will be there counting down the seconds and we’ll see, did we do it? Do we need to do it again? The most problematic was The Magic Flute, where 8 blue-faced prisoners changed into gold priests in 90 seconds.

Do you get to know the singers?
To some degree, yes; it’s so exciting to have people come back. Some have even said, “You guys take such good care of us; we really appreciate it.” This job is not just about the costumes; sometimes it’s about making that person feel good because you know he has to go out there and perform.

What are Seattle Opera’s dressing rooms like?
They’re quite lovely. A nice suite, they’re large and private, and you’ve got that whole bank of mirrors with lights around them; it’s what you would hope a dressing room looks like. Costumes are in the dressing room with them, and there is also an outer greeting room, where the dressers and a husband/wife can sit and wait. Sometimes we’re the gatekeepers. We’ll ask, “Do you want this person to come in?” The performer will use a password to let us know what to do. The one person we can’t stop is Speight.

Do you ever get to see the show?
I can watch from the wings. I think it’s the best seat in the house. I wish the audience could see what I see, how it really works. It’s one of the things I love about the job.

-Jessica Murphy
Photo by Robert Wade
This Staff Chat first appeared in Seattle Opera’s program for La Cenerentola in January 2013.

Meet our Singers: VALERIAN RUMINSKI, Don Magnifico

Tonight is our penultimate performance of La Cenerentola, and we’re sad to see the hilarious characters of this Rossini opera leave us. One of those characters is the pompous Don Magnifico, cruel stepfather to Cinderella, who is sung by both Patrick Carfizzi and Valerian Ruminski. We’ve already chatted with Patrick—and you can see him perform in tomorrow night’s closing performance—but now we get to know Valerian, who sings tonight. We talked to this bass about his work on stage, as well as behind the curtain: he runs his opera company in his hometown of Buffalo, NY. Read on for more, and visit http://www.seattleopera.org/Cinderella to grab tickets for our final performances!

Welcome back! It’s been a while since we’ve last seen you, hasn’t it?
Yes, about six years. I was here in 2006 for Così fan tutte, which was a Jonathan Miller production. That made it very special because Jonathan Miller is one of the all-around great directors and people on the planet. And being in a show with him directing is more like a Broadway theater acting experience, which is always a plus because it’s not your standard “park-and-bark” type of opera singing. Not all directors do that, of course, but Miller is a step above as far as taking us out of the opera element.

And you do some directing yourself, don’t you?
Only three years of Amahl and the Night Visitors. But I’ve produced eight productions for my company, Nickel City Opera, in Buffalo, NY.

Valerian Ruminski as Don Magnifico in Seattle Opera's current production of La Cenerentola.
Photo by Elise Bakketun

Yes, tell us more about your company! When did you begin Nickel City Opera?
Our first production was in 2009. I incorporated years before that, but I was only raising money to raise money, and not getting a production off the ground. But our relationship with the theater changed when they changed management. It’s a non-union, 1100-seat theater, and they wanted to some local company productions happening there, and they asked me if I’d like to start. So we did The Barber of Seville there in 2009, so we’re coming up on our fifth year in a row of doing one large opera every June. We’re doing Don Pasquale next June, and contemplating a fourth year of Amahl, which we do every Thanksgiving weekend.

We also did Il tabarro on a destroyer—U.S.S. The Sullivans—in the harbor, with full audience, costumes, lighting. It was at dusk and we had an orchestra on the stern of the boat and staged it all on the back of the boat, with supertitles on a boat behind it. We had about 400 or 500 people in the audience there, next to the Naval Park building. This was part of Buffalo’s effort to revitalize the waterfront, and I tried to get funding for it but I couldn’t, so I relied on box office. We took a hit on the box office, but we got a good review in the newspaper and a lot of kudos for trying.

(Above, the love scene from Nickel City Opera's Il tabarro)

What inspired you to begin an opera company?
Well, we haven’t had a company in Buffalo since 1997, and I wanted to give back to my town. There are a lot of reasons why, but I felt there was a call for it. And there were a lot of bad operas happening, a lot of bad productions with people scrambling around, and I knew I could put on stuff that was high caliber if I could find the resources. And I’ve slowly put together the pieces of the puzzle. We’ll see how long I can continue doing it, because I’m working on my own career as well.

Karin Mushegain (Cinderella) and Valerian Ruminski (Don Magnifico) in La Cenerentola.
Photo by Elise Bakketun

How much time does it take out of your schedule?
Well, I’ve been able to start putting it into a box a little more, because now I know what to expect every year. Things don’t change that much from year to year, I have found. And I find that the more professional people you employ, the smoother it goes. Plus, I hire people who have done the shows before, so I don’t need three or four weeks of staging. I have one week of staging in the hall, one week in the theater, and that’s it—two weeks. And it makes it fresh, because people are still a little on edge. [Laughs]

Let’s switch over to your career on stage. As a bass, you often have to play the role of the old man; how do you get into the right state of mind for those characters, when you don’t seem to be that old yourself?
Well, I’m getting there! I have more arthritis in my hands. Oh, but it’s not that difficult. I’ve been trying to act like an older guy ever since I was in my twenties, because I was getting hired to sing Verdi roles where I was supposed to play a character twenty years older. Now I’m at an age where I don’t have to act very much because I’m already in the middle age group, so I can sing these roles and I’m not trying to put anything on. This character of Don Magnifico is older than I am, so I’m playing him a little stodgier, a little more arthritic, I guess you’d say. [Laughs] But it’s not much of a jump to play old men.

Valerian Ruminski as Don Magnifico in La Cenerentola.
Photo by Elise Bakketun

What other buffo roles have you done?
I just did Don Pasquale at Hawaii Opera Theatre this past February, which was a real marathon. And then I did a concert of The Elixir of Love, as Dulcamara. Don Magnifico is my third large buffo role. I’m looking to do more of that. It’s good to make a living doing these roles, but I’m more of a bravura bass than a buffo. The basso cantantes, we’re sort of the chameleons of the bass category. A buffo can’t be a cantante; if you’re a natural buffo, you can’t sing bravura music, you can’t be a leading bass. You have to be a buffo. But if you’re a cantante, you can fake being a buffo. You can make the voice thicker and more bulbous.

Brett Polegato (Dandini) and Valerian Ruminski (Don Magnifico) in La Cenerentola.
Photo by Elise Bakketun

Do you have a favorite role in La Cenerentola?
Well, it’s my first time, so I’m discovering that. I don’t think I have one yet. But musically I enjoy the drinking scene with the chorusmen. It’s fun to sing and it’s sort of a blustery moment for Don Magnifico. He’s full-blown, and as close to his dream as he’s going to get. It’s stupid—he’s been made captain of the wine cellar, who cares?—but he thinks it’s the greatest thing in the world so he’s lording it over everybody. This is his big moment. From here on, he’s diminished because he finds out his daughters are not going to be married.

Search for Cinderella: Day 4 Wrap-Up

Ooh, today's final hunt had a couple tricky clues thrown in--so extra big congratulations to grand-prize winner Jaci D., who won a pair of tickets to each of our remaining 2012/13 operas! She figured it out in a mere 19 minutes, and Ed R. came in 25 minutes later for our runner-up prize of "Viva Verdi!" tickets. And we had so many people playing this round, we gave out one bonus runner-up prize, to Joanna L.! Thanks to everyone for playing; we hope you had as much fun as we did. And, as in days past, we break down the clues that got them to the finish line...

January 18 Clues

At 10 a.m. on Facebook, we uploaded a very special photo album (and we also tweeted the link for on Twitter). That album was our very first clue:

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It had several pictures (with accompanying captions) that needed to be unscrambled. If you had figured out the correct order, you would've read the instruction to "find full photo seattle opera dotorg slash suorangelica." More elegantly stated, that meant you should've gone to seattleopera.org/suorangelica to find the full-size version of this particular image. Had you navigated to our photo player on that webpage, you would have come across this image, which, unlike our FB version, includes Rosalind Plowright's head:

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The caption for this image read "blog search: 2012/13 season," which should have led you to this very Seattle Opera Blog, where a search would have yielded these results:

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The first link is to our original announcement of the 2012/13 season, and that's where you should have gone.

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Spread throughout that post was a series of zeroes and ones, which could only mean one thing: binary code! And for those folks not fluent in binary code, there are many online translators available for free. Using one of those would have given you this translation:

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Translated, 01111001 01101111 01110101 01110100 01110101 01100010 01100101 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01110010 01100100 00100000 01101111 01110000 01100101 01110010 01100001 00100000 01110100 01110010 01100001 01101001 01101100 01100101 01110010 is a very long way of saying: "youtube third opera trailer." And from reading that previous blog post, you would have known our third opera of the season is La Cenerentola (also known as Cinderella). And, by the way, we still have five more performances of this fantastic opera left...

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So, had you gone to YouTube and viewed the Cinderella trailer, you would have noticed, just after the 1:40 mark, a speech bubble appearing over Don Ramiro's head. "Who will sing me this Sunday?"

The answer is tenor Edgardo Rocha, and this is where it could have gotten tricky. We didn't tell you WHERE, exactly, to go next with this information--although we hinted at it in the video caption, where we wrote, "For tickets and more information, including cast lists, visit: http://www.seattleopera.org/cinderella." Or, you might have discovered that Edgardo Rocha was the answer by navigating to our cast page in the first place. In which case, you might have clicked on his bio...

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His bio seemed to be fairly normal--except for this very odd line: "Seattle Opera Debut Turandot, Turandot ('67)"

What's so weird about that? Well, Edgardo is a very young man, who would never have been able to make his debut in 1967. Plus, Turandot? Edgardo is very much not a woman or a soprano, so that should've rang some bells. Also, this production of Cinderella happens to be his company (and U.S.) debut. The "'67" in that line of text was hyperlinked and clicking on it would have taken you right back to our Facebook page.

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From there, you should have navigated to 1967 on our Timeline, where we have some photos posted of our very first Turandot production. Clicking through those would have taken you to this particular photo, with that year's actual Turandot, Licia Vallon, and a special caption.

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That caption read: "Of course, the young Edgardo Rocha couldn’t have actually made his debut in 1967 or as the very soprano Turandot—but it got you here! TURANDOT opened the 2012/13 season; which opera followed it, and what did our audiences think?"

It just so happens we keep a tab on our production pages for "Audience Reviews," where we encourage opera-goers to leave their thoughts. You might have already known that, in which case it was easy to find the page for Fidelio. Or you might have Googled something like "Seattle Opera Fidelio audience reviews," in which case you would have also been pointed in that direction.

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Once there, you would have seen the following comment: "First Turandot, then Fidelio, now Cinderella, with Bohème and Voix Humaine/Suor Angelica upcoming. Catch the remainder of the 2012/13 season—if you’re fast enough: SeattleOpera2013@gmail.com."

And that was that! Thanks to EVERYONE who played, and make sure to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter to be the first to hear about future opportunities and giveaways.

P.S. If you want to read how the first three hunts were solved, visit: Day 1, Day 2, Day 3.

Search for Cinderella: Day 3 Wrap-Up

This morning was our penultimate digital hunt, and it should've been called the "Search for Mimì" rather than "Search for Cinderella," because our prize was a pair of tickets to next month's production of La bohème, along with dinner for two at Ten Mercer and a night's stay at The Maxwell Hotel. As we've done with the two other hunts, we'll break this one down and show you how the winner got to the end of today's trail of clues. Congratulations to Dale Abersold for winning our grand prize and to Greg Barnes for claiming the runner-up prize of two tickets to the Young Artists Program's "Viva Verdi!" concert on April 6!

January 16 Clues

At 10 a.m. on Facebook and Twitter, we announced today's prize and shared a link to our La bohème production page. On that page was our very first clue:

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The final blurb of text on the page read "Tweet Tweet" and provided a timestamp, which was a clue toward our Twitter feed.

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Sure enough, there was an update we'd tweeted yesterday (15 JAN 13) at 2:27 PM. That link was to bass Arthur Woodley's Q&A on this here blog. This particular page was chosen, by the way, because Woodley stays in Seattle following Cinderella and will also perform in La bohème!

Once on his blog, you may have noticed a suspiciously large gap in the text. If you had highlighted that area, you would have been able to read the hidden message.

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That message read "seattleopera.org/ PLUS ArthurWoodley’sMostRecentSeattleOperaProductionPriorToThisSeason." That was supposed to guide you to a URL, and some research would've told you that prior to 2012/13, Arthur Woodley sang in 2010's Lucia di Lammermoor. So, going to seattleopera.org/luciadilammermoor redirected you to Stage Director Tomer Zvulun's bio on our website.

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As the clue read, Zvulun worked with Woodley in Lucia di Lammermoor, and both will return for La bohème. But that production of Lucia has one other link to Bohème, and the word "link" was, appropriately enough, hyperlinked to take you to the cast page for Lucia.

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Had you compared that list of artists to the one for Bohème, you would have noted that there's only one commonality, besides Zvulun and Woodley. And that's Lighting Designer Robert Wierzel.

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Clicking on Wierzel's name takes you to his bio, which had a bonus image embedded. That was a screen cap of our 2007 Bohème trailer on YouTube.

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Everything would have seemed normal on this page--unless you had clicked "Show more." Then you would have been presented with a series of dots and dashes. That's Morse Code, and you didn't need to be fluent to translate it; a visit to any search engine would yield tons of Morse Code-to-English translators.

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The translation? "SEATTLE OPERA'S CARMEN ON FACEBOOK." While this could've been taken as a nudge toward some Carmen-related content on our Facebook page, it was actually a lead to our popular graphic "If Carmen and her friends were on Facebook...". And at the bottom of the page was a brand new comment...

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Hmm. Figaro's wedding photos? That could only refer to The Marriage of Figaro, which we last produced in 2009. And since we mentioned Facebook...

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A scouring of our Facebook page (either by scrolling through our timeline to 2009, or by scrolling through our list of photo albums) would have led you to this photo album from that Marriage of Figaro production. And one of its five photos had a special caption...

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That particular photo shows Elizabeth Caballero, who was Susanna in 2009, and returns as Mimì in Bohème. And the caption pointed our victors toward today's special e-mail address, AllAboutMimi2013@gmail.com, which they e-mailed to claim their prizes!

That wraps up today's hunt, but there's still one more to go. Make sure to come back this Friday for one final grand prize, as well as a runner-up prize of "Viva Verdi!" tickets.

Search for Cinderella: Day 2 Wrap-Up

We hope you joined us this morning for our second hunt in our Search for Cinderella! We posted a recap of last Friday's trail of clues here, and once again we'll break down the path our winner had to take to claim today's prize of a four-pack of tickets to this Sunday's Family Day matinee performance of Cinderella. Today was more challenging than Friday's kick-off hunt, which lasted only about 5 minutes before the prize was claimed. Today, it took about 50 minutes--10 times as long! Congratulations to Chloe V. who made it to the finish line first. Here's how she did it...

January 14 Clues

At 10 a.m. on Facebook and Twitter, we announced today's prize and shared this image:

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That's a screen-cap of this very blog, with the words "YOUTH CHORUS" typed into the search box, to the right. If you traveled to the Seattle Opera Blog and searched for that phrase, you'd come across these options:

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If you'd clicked on the first choice and watched the Youth Chorus video from Carmen, you'd have noticed this speech bubble pop up at the :45-mark...

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Next, you would have needed to head to Facebook--specifically, the Seattle Opera Facebook page. If you had scrolled through our many photo albums, you would have found one titled "Magic Flute Family Day."

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Within that album are several photos of Parlin Shields as the Magic Flute emu, but one of those photos had a special caption:

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This clue was a little difficult, but it hinted that you should try searching Google for "Heron and the Salmon Girl," which is the name our first Our Earth opera. You would have been given a few different options, but only one had "Heron and the Salmon Girl" prominently featured in its title (the second link in the photo below).

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That link would send you to the Heron and the Salmon Girl production page on our website, which has a special subhead and message just for those playing the Search for Cinderella:

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That message was written backwards, but if you flipped it around read "The mezzo's clip on the Seattle Opera SoundCloud" and was hyperlinked to take you to the Seattle Times' photo gallery of our recent Cinderella open house at McCaw Hall. Then you would have needed to spot the mezzo-soprano amongst the images:

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The final photo was of Karin Mushegain, who sings Cinderella in our Sunday/Friday performances. The earlier two-part clue indicated you needed to find Karin's clip on the Seattle Opera SoundCloud page, where we upload lots of great clips from our performances. Had you navigated to that page, you would have noticed that the second clip is of Karin--but it wasn't a musical excerpt.

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That audio clip was actually a special message from Karin to you, congratulating you for (nearly) making it to the end of the hunt. She also gave you the super-secret address to e-mail--DancingRats2013@gmail.com--in order to claim your free tickets!

Phew, that was a tough one, but we hope the winners enjoy their prizes, and that everyone who participated had fun on the trail. If you didn't win this time, come back on Wednesday and Friday at 10 a.m. when we do our final two rounds of the Search for Cinderella! Those next prizes will remain top secret 'til each hunt begins, but trust us--they're pretty awesome!

Meet Our Singers: KARIN MUSHEGAIN, Cenerentola

Karin Mushegain (left, photo by Elise Bakketun) sang Cinderella’s famous opera-concluding aria in audition for Speight Jenkins, Seattle Opera’s General Director, in December 2012 in New York. It went well; but she never expected she’d be flying to Seattle a week later to make her Seattle Opera debut in her favorite role. An unexpected cancellation, just a day or two before rehearsals were to begin, had left Seattle Opera without a mezzo soprano for three of the January performances of this Rossini comedy. Luckily for all concerned, Ms. Mushegain was able to re-arrange her schedule, join Seattle Opera for the production, and share her gifts and talents with our audience. She makes her debut this afternoon. I spoke with her a few weeks ago about coloratura technique, her summer in France, and how Cinderella might be avenged on an unsupportive childhood music teacher.

Welcome to Seattle Opera! First things first, would you pronounce your name for us?
Yes, it’s kah-REEN moo-SHAY-ghee-un.

It’s an Armenian name?
Yes, it’s Armenian, and my last name is pronounced as if it were “-ian,” but it’s spelled differently because when my great-grandfather and his three brothers emigrated here, they each got a different spelling and each kept it.

Wow.
‘Cause they didn’t know how to tell them how to spell it. So they kept it. But I’ve had people call opera companies, all offended, and say, “You spelled her name wrong!” But no, that’s how I spell it.

Okay, so tell us a little about your background, where you’re from, and how you got started in opera?
I was born in raised in Pasadena, California, and like a lot of singers always sang when I was little. I got kicked out of piano lessons as a little kid because I wanted to sing the songs, instead of play them. I started taking voice lessons very young, when I was 11, because my music teacher at school had made fun of my voice, in front of the whole class, and I had stopped singing. So my mom put me in voice lessons, so I would start singing again!

What happened to the music teacher?
She still works there, I think. My family used to send her letters...you know, every time I was in a new opera, they’d send the program there!

Cenerentola (Karin Mushegain) gets a ride to the prince's ball
Elise Bakketun, photo

Send it along to the higher-ups, get her fired.
No, nobody wanted bad karma, they just wanted to make her feel bad. Armenian family, you know, we like to make people feel guilty. [laughs] So yes, later I went to Northwestern University, and studied both vocal performance and musical theater there. I moved to New York on September 1, 2001, and ten days later everything changed, and Broadway closed down, so then I went back to school, to UCLA, and started refocusing on opera.

At Northwestern you had been more focused on musical theater...
Both, but their musical theater program is so phenomenal, studying acting and dancing every single day. But I finished the opera program at UCLA, and then went to Pittsburgh to be a Young Artist.

Karin Mushegain at La Cenerentola rehearsal
Alan Alabastro, photo

Now, you made your European debut this last summer.
Yes, in France in this lovely little company called Lyrique-en-mer, on a tiny little island, Belle-Isle, in the Bay of Biscay. The nearest part of France is Brittany. All farms, all rural, and it was nice because no one spoke English. You really had to immerse yourself in French and French culture, which was fun.

Did you speak French very well before you got there?
I speak French poorly. I did Rosetta Stone before I went there, to prepare myself, and it’s amazing, it really helps. I’m very thankful I did it.

What were you singing?
The role I’m doing here, Angelina [aka Cenerentola] in La Cenerentola.

Now, it looks like you’ve been singing a fair amount of Tisbes, too.
I have, I sang the wicked mezzo sister with Glimmerglass and with Florida Grand. Altogether I’ve done 23 or 24 performances of this opera.

Did you learn Cenerentola’s arias while you were singing Tisbe?
It definitely helped, it helped hearing it all the time. And at Glimmerglass I was covering Cenerentola, so I really learned it then. The cover cast had a performance onstage, with orchestra and costumes and sets and everything.

Which character is more fun to do?
Good question. Tisbe is more fun to play, but Cenerentola is more fun to sing. And she’s more interesting, she has a bigger journey. Tisbe doesn’t really change over the course of the opera...she’s pretty stagnant.

But it seems like such a fun role to do, because she’s such a twit!
She’s so fun, and I also love having a partner onstage, that’s a blast. It’s like they’re twins, you always have your buddy there.

But not as much fun to sing, since you don’t have quite so much of the amazing coloratura that Cenerentola gets to do.
This is my dream role, in life, this is what my voice does, what I enjoy doing, this music is delicate and precious but it’s also strong...

The Prince (Edgardo Rocha) discovers the mysterious beauty's bracelet on the arm of the lovely serving-girl Cenerentola (Karin Mushegain)
Elise Bakketun, photo

Was it hard to get it into your voice, the first time?
I really think you’re either born to sing coloratura, or you’re born to sing legato, and you have to learn to do the other. And my voice naturally does coloratura. But yes, the thing that’s tricky about this is there are so many runs, and they’re all just a little different. You have to have a road map. I do all my runs by number: 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4 [demonstrates singing a coloratura run]. My whole score is all numbers, written out, and I’m thinking those numbers as I’m singing it. You may hear, “Vengo, vengo, ve-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-ngo” but I’m thinking “1-2-3-4, 1-2-3-4, 1...” in my head.

What an interesting technique! Now did your teacher...
Yes, my voice teacher, Juliana Gondek, taught me that. “You obviously know how to sing coloratura,” she said, “but it’s messy at times, and this is how you clean it up.” And you can’t mess it up when you’re thinking the numbers. That’s how my brain works: I like to organize it and have a map.

That’s brilliant, I want to see the Excel spreadsheet with the database of all the high notes you’re going to sing in this opera! [laughs] Now, you mention how Cenerentola grows over the course of this opera...
It’s easy to get used to a bad situation. When you’re a servant, doing chores all day, or being picked on, and then there’s this moment when she gets woken up—she gets invited to the ball, but then it gets taken away from her. But this is something new, something that hasn’t happened to her before. She reaches her peak of frustration, and we get to see that. In the pre-story in my head, she hasn’t yet reached that peak. To me she has accepted her existence, but here she reaches the boiling-point, she is lost in despair, and that’s when Alidoro comes in, and she gets this sense of hope again. You see her deal with that, and then in the Act 1 finale she appears at the pinnacle of her strength: she’s in disguise, she can be whoever she wants—

She’s so good at it, she’s the belle at the ball par excellence, as if she were born to it...
She has been. That’s why I love Joan’s direction, he wants her very calm and in control at every moment.

It's love at first sight for Ramiro (Edgardo Rocha) and Cenerentola (Karin Mushegain)
Elise Bakketun, photo

Even when she first meets Ramiro, and gets all flustered?
Well, he allows that, but he’s constantly reminding me that I need to be calmer and more collected. Which is interesting—I’ve played her a bit more frantic, because I think that’s how I am, internally, and so it’s been a nice way to rediscover her, as a calmer, tranquil person.

And even in that love-at-first-sight duet, which shakes up her well-ordered world, it’s still very controlled, very elegant, very Rossini-classical. And then in the second act, you get even stronger, even more control, when you give him the bracelet and say: “Okay, your turn now.”
Yes, and with her family. I love how she teases them when they come back from the ball: “Oh, why did you have such a bad night?” I love it when she’s ballsy and gusty. But she never loses herself. At the end, when she forgives her family and tells the prince, “If you love me, this is the time not to stoop to their level, but to let goodness triumph.” She’s herself the whole time, but she increases in strength over the course of the opera.

And it’s Alidoro who makes all that possible for her.
I think so. She’s never had anyone 100% on her side before. This is someone who has shown up for her, just for her.

What’s your favorite moment in this opera?
Ensemble-wise, my favorite part is the quartet-quintet at the end of the first scene. I just think there’s a little of everything there. There’s the excitement of Ramiro being there, and looking at him, there’s the frustration of her father, not letting her go to the party, the vulnerability when she’s thinking “Am I just always going to be the cinder-girl?”

[Hums plaintive tune to “Ah, sempre fra le cenere, sempre dovrà restar?” 0:46 in the above excerpt]
I mean, does that not get to you? Is that not the prettiest line in the whole opera?

Cenerentola (Karin Mushegain) begs her stepfather Don Magnifico (Valerian Ruminski) to take her to the ball
Elise Bakketun, photo

It’s a bit like “Una furtiva lagrima,” the pretty tenor aria in Elixir of Love. Something dark in the midst of this very, very happy, bright, major-key piece.
Yeah, and it’s one of those wonderful frozen bel canto moments, where nothing else is happening—and those musical phrases wrap up exactly what she’s feeling every day.

Well, we look forward to hearing you sing it toi this afternoon!

Meet Our Singers: DANIELA PINI, Cenerentola

Italian mezzo soprano Daniela Pini is singing in America for the first time tonight. She makes her debut with one of her favorite roles: the title character of Rossini’s charming fairy tale, La Cenerentola. I chatted with her a week or two back (amid endless Seattle drizzle) about her background, her favorite places to sing in Italy, and a remarkable Cenerentola she produced—featuring 100 children from the village where she lives.

Welcome, Daniela! We’re honored to be hosting your U.S. debut...now, is this also the first time you’ve been to this country?
Yes, this is my first time in the States, I’m very excited!

Daniela Pini on opening night (click to listen)

I feel I should apologize for Seattle’s weather. It’s not always this rainy and cold, in the US!
No problem, it’s just like at home—it’s the same in Italy right now.

Daniela Pini as Cenerentola
Elise Bakketun, photo

Now, where is home?
I live close to Bologna.

When we corresponded this fall, you mentioned that you’d been reading up on Seattle...
Yes, because I don’t know much about the United States or Seattle, I was reading about it. And I love walking around and getting to know a city that way. Although I haven’t had much time to explore, because we are always in rehearsal! I did get to a friend’s house on a day off, for cooking Italian food and American food, that was very nice.

That’s pretty much what most of us Seattleites do this time of year; hang out indoors and cook. You know, Seattle is the most beautiful place in the U.S.—in July and August.
I read something about that. And someone else told me it was ‘Rain City.’

A different kind of precipitation falls upon Daniela Pini when she becomes the princess at the conclusion of La Cenerentola
Elise Bakketun, photo

Now, getting back to Italy, where were you born?
In Lugo, the same place where Rossini’s parents were born, close to Pesaro. It’s in the middle of Italy, the north middle. It’s very nice, a very quiet place; I live in a small village.

How long have you been singing?
Always. I remember singing in bed every day when I was 4. But I started more officially when I was 6.

In church?
Yes, and later I went to Bologna, for university, which is where I started to sing opera.

Alidoro (Arthur Woodley) introduces a mysterious beauty (Daniela Pini) at the prince's ball at the end of Act One of La Cenerentola
Elise Bakketun, photo

We heard about an unusual Cenerentola production you put together for your daughter’s school.
Yes, my daughter is 9, and I went to her school several times, two years ago, to speak about opera, and I introduced the children to Cenerentola.

Did you sing to them?
Yes. And the children and teachers were very excited, so they asked me to do something more. So with friends and colleagues we tried to organize Cenerentola for a small Italian theater in Lugo di Romagna. We did the opera, with a little bit cut, with costumes, and ten instruments, and a hundred children singing along with us.

Which parts did they sing?
“Una volta c’era un re,” the sad folk song Cenerentola sings at the beginning of the opera...

They had learned to sing it ahead of time, in their classes?
Yes, I prepared a CD and the teachers taught them the music. And the bouncy chorus in the first scene, “O figlie amabile di Don Magnifico,” and—with Alidoro—“Qui nel mio codice delle zitelle,” when he interrupts the quartet and makes it a quintet. And some parts of the final Rondò.

It sounds amazing.
It was, it was wonderful. We had “pelle d’oca...” [gestures] How do you say?

Goose pimples. That’s terrific, I wish I could have been there.
The children gave us a very big energy. And I think it’s very important to do that, because the children are the future public.

And doing this opera in Italy, the language isn’t much of a barrier...the libretto.
All the world knows Cinderella, the story, it’s very easy for children. It’s not Trovatore, you know!

Cenerentola (Daniela Pini) flirts with Ramiro-as-Valet (René Barbera) while Magnifico (Patrick Carfizzi) toadies up to Dandini-as-Prince (Brett Polegato) in the La Cenerentola Act 1 Quintet
Alan Alabastro, photo

What’s your favorite moment in this opera?
I love this entire opera. I love that sweet melody, “Una volta c’era un re.”

I think it’s one of the only minor-key pieces in the entire opera.
And I love the finale, of course...my big aria!

Do you remember how old were you the first time you ever sang the Rondò?
I was young, it was my first Cenerentola, in 2000. Because I remember being very scared, ahead of time.

This opera is a comedy, but your character doesn’t get a lot of laughs.
No, Cenerentola herself is not very funny.

Cenerentola (Daniela Pini) learns she isn't invited to the prince's ball
Alan Alabastro, photo

Do you play characters in other operas who are more comic?
Yes, I have more buffa roles, like in Italiana in Algeri or in Barbiere. But I think that mezzo sopranos never do such funny roles—maybe more ‘spiritoso.’

Spirited, plucky. Do you get to play a lot of boys?
Yes, all the time.

I guess Cherubino is a pretty silly character. He gets a lot of laughs.
Oh, yes, he’s lots of fun.

One last question: do you have a favorite place to sing in Italy?
Hard question...we have a lot of very good theaters in Italy! Old theaters, with good acoustics. I love the theater in Torino, but I think La Scala...

Do you like singing in the older, historic theaters? Or do you sing in many brand-new, high-tech, ultra modern places?
Yes, we have many such; Teatro Carlo Felice in Genova is a new building, and Torino, too. At La Fenice, the opera house in Venice, the building is new, although the theater has been around a long time.