The Canadian Operatic Arts Academy (COAA) hits a high note this year with an expanded program and culminates with a free concert Saturday, May 22.
The best young, budding opera singers, pianists and directors will take the stage in the Paul Davenport Theatre to perform sample scenes from some of the top operas of all time.
COAA is presenting 25 scenes by renowned opera composers for two free performances at 1-4 p.m. and 7-10 p.m. on May 22. The Paul Davenport Theatre is located in Talbot College at The University of Western Ontario.
Held at the Don Wright Faculty of Music, COAA is an elite international program that provides singers, pianists and directors with the skills for prolific and rewarding career in the operatic profession.
Internationally acclaimed faculty from La Scala in Milan, New York, Montreal and across North America have been preparing the young singers for this performance. Since May 3, the experts provided participants with insight into the multifaceted world of opera – its preparation, performance, and business.
Topics include role preparation, performance practice, collaboration, dramatic exercises and study, audition training, promotion, management, and vocal and physical health.
“We really wanted to create a small laboratory of opera,” says COAA general and artistic director Sophie Roland, noting students see the process of how an opera is created. “This is really an academy that is focused on the process, not on the finale.
“The calibre of the singers is particularly high this year,” she notes.
One of the students is a countertenor, a man who sings with a vocal range above a tenor, like a female-sounding voice.
The performances are black-box style, which will allow for some staging freedoms that are not as easily achieved in traditional opera productions.
The intensive program means faculty and students put in 13 to 15 hour days of practice. The increased number of opera experts who joined the faculty this year shows the dedication to the program, in spite of the large time commitment, she says.
“There is something more you get from working with the young singers that are so motivated,,” says Simone Luti, musical director, who is an orchestral conductor and pianist with experience in European operas. “You get to work with singers who are flexible.”
With the singers at the beginning of their opera careers, they are easily molded and eager to learn, he says.
Click here for more information about the May 22 program.
As well, COAA is partnering with Orchestra London in an edgy opera production of Giulio Cesare.
Set in modern-day Middle East, the staging will incorporate multiple television screens with images of war. Faculty of the academy including Luti, along with students, will also participate in the opera.
Conducted by Orchestra London Canada director Timothy Vernon (who is also on faculty with COAA), the production runs June 3-6 at the Grand Theatre in London, Ont. with American countertenor Drew Minter in the title role.
Modern countertenors, no longer castrati, have been gaining in popularity and reclaiming the “trouser roles” taken over by woman after the castrati era ended.
The production also includes Roland as Cornelia, Caesar’s wife, and Canadian singer Lucia Cesaroni as Cleopatra.
Videos of the opera’s production progress as it goes from rehearsal to performance with the directors and cast are posted at www.operalondon.ca.