It’s the start of week 3 on the ground in Lyon. At this point Seppuku has become an option.
For those of you not up on your Japanese suicide rituals, Seppuku is the formal method of self-disemboweling that was practiced by the Samurai. It’s frequently and mistakenly called Harakiri (or even more mistakenly Harikari, a term brought back by the GIs of WWII). One undergoes Seppuku to regain one’s honor. From all accounts it’s quite painful.
For the record – everyone at the Opera de Lyon has been wonderful. Serge and Robert, the head of O.L. and the artistic administrator, are fine gentlemen, and their staff has been most helpful. The directors have been easy to work with, and I have at my disposal a wonderful musical staff which includes Alan (chorus master), Dominick (my young British assistant whom I am trying to get to ditch his blazer for just one rehearsal), and our pianists Graham and Jamal (Jamal, BTW, is one of the most ridiculously over-talented people I’ve ever met, and listening to his constant jazzy re-imaginings of the score has become a daily highlight).
But opera is a very long grind. We’ve been at it for almost two weeks in Paris – I arrived the second week – and two weeks in Lyon, and the premiere is still almost three weeks away. The staging has gone slowly. There are 24 named vocal roles, plus little parts like the “other woman” in act III (for the record I’m happily married). All in all I am supposed to keep track of 34 various roles, which is as many as appear in the entire Ring cycle even if you count each and every Valkyrie individually. There is the added factor of certain rambling scenes. Admittedly, Act I scene II just involves the mourning over Robbins, the great Serena aria “My Man’s Gone Now,” the first Detective sequence, and “Promised Land.” But then there are scenes like Act II Scene II which opens with the Fisherman sequence, and quickly rambles through “I Got Plenty,” lawyer Frazier, Archdale, the Sportin’ Life/Bess sequence, the “Bess you is” duet, the off to picnic “Oh I can’t sit down,” etc. etc. etc. There was a moment last week when one of the chorus baritones came up and said “I need coaching on the part of Nelson” and both Dominick and I looked at each other desperately trying to remember who Nelson was and where he appears.
Add to this the usual mixture of artistic egos, scenery deciding that it’s not going to function, us deciding that certain scenery wasn’t going to work, video, dance, and a schedule of daily double three hour rehearsals, and I admit I can’t wait to get back to the normal lunacy of running my orchestra in Edmonton.
But this week things start to chance. Tuesday morning is the first orchestra rehearsal, followed by one Wednesday morning as well. Of course that means that these two days will be back-to-back triple rehearsal days. At least Thursday is a (very rare) day off.
Lets see now – to do the ritual of Seppuku correctly one plunges the knife into the right side of the belly and cuts left…….. I think. I wonder if there’s a special variant for opera?