Advertisement

arts entertainmentPerforming Arts

Coming-of-age story packs an emotional wallop with its premiere at opera festival

Terence Blanchard's "Fire Shut Up in My Bones," based on columnist Charles M. Blow's novel, joins a relatively rare Monteverdi 'Coronation of Poppea at the St. Louis festival.

ST. LOUIS — I love going to Opera Theatre of St. Louis each summer, as I've done for 29 years, because it's never business as usual. I have no idea what I'll see.

Even in standard rep, productions tend to be quite creative — sometimes brilliant, sometimes perverse, sometimes some mix thereof. While I generally prefer operas in original languages, I'm glad for the alternate experience of hearing everything here sung in English. And in 44 seasons the festival has presented no fewer than 28 world premieres. Instrumentalists are supplied by the St. Louis Symphony.

This year's festival, running through June 30, includes the world premiere of jazz great Terence Blanchard's Fire Shut Up in My Bones, based on New York Times columnist Charles M. Blow's coming-of-age memoir of the same name.

Advertisement

Read on for reviews of it and Claudio Monteverdi's 1643 opera, The Coronation of Poppea.

News Roundups

Catch up on the day's news you need to know.

Or with:

Dining outside Webster University's Loretto-Hilton Center for the Performing Arts in St....
Dining outside Webster University's Loretto-Hilton Center for the Performing Arts in St. Louis, before an Opera Theatre of St. Louis performance on June 13, 2019 (Scott Cantrell/Special Contributor)

There's also the charm of pre-performance dinners on beautifully landscaped grounds outside Webster University's Loretto-Hilton Center for the Performing Arts. Post-performance, you can hobnob with performers over drinks in a big green-and-white tent. Even the compact, fan-shaped, 924-seat theater fosters intimacy. It's opera in your face.

Advertisement
Davóne Tines as Charles Blow and Karen Slack as Billie in the world premiere of Terence...
Davóne Tines as Charles Blow and Karen Slack as Billie in the world premiere of Terence Blanchard and Kasi Lemmons' Fire Shut Up in My Bones, performed at the Opera Theatre of St. Louis(Eric Woolsey)

'Fire': A young man finds himself

Coming-of-age stories being among the most powerful of all, it's surprising that more operas haven't explored them. But Fire Shut Up in My Bones does just that, as "a boy of peculiar grace" in rough-and-tumble black Louisiana evolves into a battle-scarred survivor. The sometimes-earthy libretto by Kasi Lemmons packs one emotional scene after another into two and a half hours, with one intermission.

Advertisement

With the 7- and 20-year-old Charles repeatedly onstage together, Fire dramatizes an insistent and mostly frustrated craving for intimacy and affection. Charles' mother, Billie, is busy with four older sons and her bloody, smelly job in a chicken processing plant. His ne'er-do-well father, Spinner, is more interested in his honky-tonk performances and bedding other women.

Michael Redding as Uncle Paul (left), Jeremy Denis as the young Charles Blow, and Davóne...
Michael Redding as Uncle Paul (left), Jeremy Denis as the young Charles Blow, and Davóne Tines as the adult Charles Blow in the world premiere of Terence Blanchard and Kasi Lemmons' Fire Shut Up in My Bones, performed at the Opera Theatre of St. Louis.(Eric Woolsey)

Charles doesn't fit into the macho world around him, whether as something of a mama's boy or in a college fraternity, although he sometimes tries. The concept of intimacy is scarred by early sexual abuse from an older cousin.

Old-time religion fails to assuage shame over his yearnings and abuse. A dance scene, evocatively choreographed by Seán Curran, suggests fleeting encounters with partners of both sexes — Blow came out as bisexual in 2014 — and a promising fling with the young Greta hits a dead end.

Ultimately, Fire is about destiny — there's even a character portraying it — and the need sometimes to leave the past behind. In the end, in a surprisingly sentimental scene, both Charles and Billie do just that, and at least momentarily find in each other the love they've both craved.

Blanchard's score, conducted by William Long, is a cinematic mosaic sprinkling the orchestral writing with soft and edgier jazz and rowdy gospel singing. But much of the vocal writing suggests an instrumental composer still feeling his way in a very different art.

Given the story and characters, conventionally "beautiful" voices weren't always casting priorities. But bass-baritone Davóne Tines and soprano Karen Slack supply rich tones and ardent personifications as Charles and Billie. Soprano Julia Bullock is expressive and touching in triple duty as Destiny, Loneliness and Greta. Other notable performances come from Jeremy Denis as young Charles, Chaz'men Williams-Ali as Spinner and Michael Redding as Uncle Paul.

Opera Theatre of St. Louis artistic director James Robinson brings all the characters and situations vividly to life, managing the numerous uncomfortable scenes with great skill. Designer Allen Moyer's big roll-around frame and panel of rough-hewn boards, with occasional accessories, projections by Greg Emetaz and lighting by Christopher Akerlind, supply all the "sets" we need. Costumes are by James Schuette.

Advertisement

At the new opera's first performance, on June 15, the real-life Charles Blow was seated across the aisle from me. I couldn't help wondering what thoughts were going through his head. He subsequently wrote a Times column about the experience. For me, Fire certainly packed an emotional wallop — as it surely must for anyone who grew up feeling out of place and craving acceptance and approval.

At least on first exposure, I'm not sure Fire comes together as a convincing whole. The second act in particular sometimes seemed to add one scene after another without a compelling overview; the clapping-and-stomping episode seemed pointless. But I'd be interested in experiencing the opera again, especially with some different singers.

Brenton Ryan as Nerone and Emily Fons as Poppea in The Coronation of Poppea, performed at...
Brenton Ryan as Nerone and Emily Fons as Poppea in The Coronation of Poppea, performed at the Opera Theatre of St. Louis.(Camille Mahs)

'Poppea': Love and power in old Rome

Poppea, one of history's first operas, is the story of the Roman emperor Nero's sidelining his wife, Ottavia, in order to marry and crown his mistress, Poppea. There are, of course, subplots. In yielding to Nero, Poppea spurns her former lover, Ottone, who has been the hopeless love object of Drusilla. Personifications of Fortune, Virtue and Love make their cases, as does the philosopher Seneca.

Advertisement

The positive spin on Tim Albery's staging, imported from England's Opera North, is that it's, um, thought-provoking. Costumes (by Hannah Clark) and coifs (by Tom Watson) transpose the action, more or less plausibly, to circa 1960. Albery and collaborator Laurence Cummings add three gratuitous murders at the end.

But what's with Clark's set? Green tile walls, rusting metal doors and long, rolling steel tables evoke an industrial space, but a swimming-pool ladder suggests a repurposed pool. Accompanying instrumentalists — two violins, a gamba, two theorbos (bass lutes), baroque harp and two harpsichords — are divided at back corners of the stage. With no obvious gestures, harpsichordist Nicholas Kok somehow maintains assured coordination.

Baroque operas featured castrati, adult men castrated before puberty to preserve high voices, in main male roles. In their (merciful) absence, St. Louis assigns lyric tenor Brenton Ryan the role of Neron. (Although sung in Albery's English translation, the dramatis personae retain their original Italian spellings.) Ottone is portrayed by plummy-voiced countertenor Tom Scott-Cowell. Ryan and soprano Emily Fons, the Poppea, look like 1960s movie stars, and they sing and act vividly — and, at times, quite sensuously. Fons' rapid, fluttery vibrato, though, almost sounds like a trill on every note.

Sarah Mesko, Devon Guthrie and Patricia Schuman perform sturdily as, respectively, Ottavia, Drusilla and Poppea's nurse, Arnalta. David Pittsinger is a professorial Seneca, with a sonorous bass. The introductory divinities are amusingly portrayed — Sydney Baedke as a glamorous, seductive Fortuna, Jennifer Aylmer a schoolmarmish Virtu, Michaela Wolz a tomboyish Amore.

Advertisement

CORRECTED at 11:15 a.m. June 18 to update the number of world premieres to 28.

Details

Opera Theatre of St. Louis performances run through June 30 at the Loretto-Hilton Center, Webster University, St. Louis. $27 to $140. 1-314-961-0644, opera-stl.org.

Advertisement

Formerly staff classical music critic of The Dallas Morning News, Scott Cantrell continues to cover the beat as a freelance writer. Classical music coverage at The News is supported in part by a grant from the Rubin Institute for Music Criticism, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and the Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation. The News makes all editorial decisions.