Back row: James Gochenouer, Scott Fikse, Sarah Lambert Connolly, Keane Ishii, Dylan Bunten, Kawaiola Murray; Middle Row: Darel Stark, Karol Nowicki, Andrea Maciel, Georgine Stark, Naomi Castro, Katherine Crosier, Benjamin Leonid, Taylor Ishida, Megan Bledsoe Ward; Front Row: Ann Hansen, Maile Reeves

Everybody looked happy!

In the end, everything was a success at Early Music Hawaii’s concert, “The Rise of Italian Opera and Oratorio,” last Saturday night. Despite putting all the music and musicians together in only one rehearsal on Friday, and with one of the recorder players being taken to Emergency Friday morning and unable to play the concert, we did it! There were no obvious train wrecks (thank goodness!) and the flaws were few and far between. We had a large crowd so I’m hoping we did all right at the box office.

Here’s what Ian Capps, the President of Early Music Hawaii, wrote to the singers and instrumentalists:
Aloha All,

What a fabulous concert—you did it again!  The audience was captivated throughout, myself very much included. All the soloists were outstanding, especially in the two big works, [L’Incoronazione de] Poppea and [La Caccia del] Toro. Thanks to Naomi for joining us again, and for bringing Dylan, the most convincing Toro imaginable. Thanks to Sarah, Georgine and Keane for making their roles stand out.

The choral ensembles were all very good. I was particularly impressed by the Lamento, a challenging work which I have sung several times. The exaggerated tuning and balance were perfect, and the extremely emotive mood changes beautifully calibrated. You sounded like the single voice of Ariadne.

The instrumental accompaniment and the two stand-alone sonatas were really terrific, providing much needed contrasts from all the vocal work. Thanks to long time friends Darel and Maile for their virtuosity, and new friends James and Megan. Ann provided a fine solo job where two recorders had been planned. And Kathy not only played two instruments with her usual skill but also gave up a lot of her earlier time (and home!) to accompany rehearsals.

Above all, Scott’s direction, inspiration and immense hard work made the program into a triumph. We promised the audience “Drama” in all our promotions, and under Scott’s leadership gave them exactly that. Thank you, Scott, for all you do for EMH!

Many thanks to all of you for a wonderful evening,

Ian

I also received this note: Many thanks for the beautiful music last night. What an interesting, well-conceived  program! I especially liked the short opera selections. I had never heard Monteverdi live. Both the vocals and instrumentals were wonderful to hear. (J.S.)

What a relief that everything turned out so well! To tell you the truth, I was feeling rather nervous, especially in the “Sonata per due Violini” by Biagio Marini (c.1587-1663) which I played with Darel Stark, Maile Reeves, and James Gochenouer. We had only the one rehearsal and there were many changing tempos and fast rhythms—I felt I was hanging on by my fingernails!

Georgine Stark sang the blockbuster recitative and aria on “Nel agone – Su la tela” by Alessandro Stradella. She had three whole pages of nothing but sixteenth notes, including a high C, and her virtuosic technique was clearly evident. In the meantime, I was reading chord symbols like crazy and going lickety-split! Georgine got many deserved raves for her incredible singing.

And oh, those pages and pages of reading open score and figured bass (a musical shorthand)! I confess I made a couple of boo-boos, but hopefully they were not too noticeable.

If you’d like to see the program, you can click here.

I cannot tell you how relieved I am that the concert is over and I can now work on the music for my Cleveland trip!