By Bill Zeeble, KERA reporter
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/kera/local-kera-503075.mp3
Houston, TX – Bill Zeeble, KERA 90.1 reporter: Critics universally LOVE Audra McDonald's voice, calling it radiant, glorious.
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The soprano has won four Tony's and numerous other awards for her work on Broadway. When the Houston Grand Opera approached her about making her opera debut in a one-woman program, they only had half a show to offer her the Poulenc opera. McDonald says the circumstances didn't intimidate her.
Audra McDonald, soprano: I'm very stupid about certain things. I was so into the piece I just wanted to do it. So I said yes. It was a piece I'd loved since school. Sign on the dotted line and then worry about the consequences. You're sort of beholden to the project. That way I don't run away from it.
Zeeble: Attracted to it; afraid of running from it. That's the kind of emotional yin and yang explored in this pair of pieces. Francis Poulenc's 40 minute solo work from 1958 features a desperate woman on the phone with her lover who's decided to leave her.
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Zeeble: Because Poulenc's opera is short, Houston approached composer Michael John LaChiusa, who decided to complement the doomed love affair by portraying the beginning of another one online. He says McDonald, whom he first met a dozen years ago, is perfect for the role
Michael John LaChiusa: When I first met her it really changed me a lot as a composer because when an artist does come along you have to reinvent a language for a great artist. Love is key here. It's love that she radiates so much when she approaches a new piece and even an older one.
Zeeble: In contrast to Poulenc's older work, LaChiusa's includes humor. The character's a young single professional awaiting the first phone call from a man she's only corresponded with by email.
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Zeeble: Driving the music, says LaChiusa, is always the character, first and foremost.
LaChiusa: What was she like, what did she listen to, what did she fantasize to, get angry to, that heart beat, a lot of the score has that pastiche quality to it which I like a lot. Like a pop song but a twisted pop song. In the banality of a lot of pop music, there's something resourceful and deep about it that touches you, like listening to an old American hymn, you find great beauty in the simplicity and seeming banality.
Zeeble: Audra McDonald says knowing the character is essential for her too. It keeps her focused, especially here, where she's alone onstage. Over the course of Send, her character imagines an entire relationship, from courting, the wedding and children, to her husband's affair, her scornful, violent reaction, and then, forgiveness. She drew on a high school theater trip to London with her two best friends to help her with the role
McDonald: We started to talk about what would it be like at each other's funerals. And we decided to act it out. So without any inhibitions, alcohol, nothing, it was just a rainy afternoon in England, we took turns lying down on the bed and acting out the rest of us coming to the funeral. And we were in tears, we moved ourselves beyond belief in what we would say to each other. And it really reminded me of, when I started working on Send, yes, , I could see a woman getting completely worked up , huh! Oh my God, I'm going to shoot my kids and you're having an affair with my best friend? And getting completely wrapped up in it
Zeeble: To give her occasional breaks, LaChiusa wrote the imagined man's part as well, which McDonald recorded in advance
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Zeeble: Musically & theatrically, Send, & Poulenc's The Human Voice succeed, according to Toronto Star critic William Littler.
William Littler, critic Toronto Star: A very appropriate meeting has come together of composer and voice. LaChiusa has written for McDonald before and he understands the expressive range of the voice. So he's written a piece tailor made for her.
Zeeble: But, Littler says it could've been more challenging
Littler:. It's easy on all involved. Maybe that's not the most complimentary thing to say. Critics like to go where we've not gone before. Audiences want to go where they have been before. I think we've come closer in recent years cause composers know there aren't the supports they used to have. You have to live and die in the market place.
Zeeble: Because it's a crowd pleaser, Littler says in time, Send might appear in popular music theater, the way Porgy and Bess or A Little Night Music, went from musical theater to the opera house.
The Houston grand Opera's double bill of Send and The Human Voice with Audra McDonald continues on Thursday the 16th, with 3 more performances after that. For KERA 90.1 I'm Bill Zeeble
bzeeble@kera.org