Glimmerglass: Upstate New York’s operatic wonder

It was lights out for Romeo at Glimmerglass. Well, it’s always lights out for both of Shakespeare’s suicidal lovers. Eventually. But in the closing moments of Gounod’s Romeo et Juliette last Sunday on the shores of Lake Otsego, in a valley cleaving the greening Catskill-Adirondack mountains, whilst still singing at full throttle, and just as he was poised behind his still not yet revived Juliette on a stone slab, about to utter his last lament after swigging his fatal potion, it literally was, “lights out” for Romeo.

First the crucifix overseeing the tragic ritual of the double or quits lovers went dark. Then, the downlight illuminating Maestro Joe Colaneri in the pit wavered and failed. Korean tenor Duke Kim (Romeo) soldiered on heroically in the bleak afternoon until the orchestra was brought to a halt by Colaneri. Silentio in tenebris.

The power failure was total. Robert Ainsley, Glimmerglass Opera Festival’s Artistic Director and General Director, popped up with a torch and made reassuring remarks like Corporal Jones in a Dad’s Army WWII blackout. “Don’t panic. Stiff upper lip. Happens all the time here. Generators will kick in. Five minutes. Those pesky power providers won’t get us down.”

The audience, calmed by a sprinkling of power-cut veterans in the crowd, was stoical. Sure enough, after five minutes Maestro Colaneri was shakily, then steadily re-illuminated, whirring noises came from the stage machinery. Romeo was revealed. He hadn’t moved a muscle.

Kim could not resist milking the moment. He grinned and then mischievously waved at the audience, bringing the house down. It was a miracle that when the orchestra struck up anew the emotion of impending tragedy was immediately reinstated.

Glimmerglass is a wonder of the operatic world. Sitting in splendid isolation on Lake Otsego, upstate New York, it is in true back-of-beyond territory. The imposing Alice Busch Theater built in 1987 is a wooden structure mimicking the style of local barns, but on such a scale that it might have landed from outer space. David Grusch, the celebrated UFO whistle-blower, must be a fan.

For a summer festival venue, the 918-seat theatre boasts a huge backstage area well capable of accommodating four annual productions. The stage depth and width are extraordinary, so productions are mounted on a scale that can easily translate into more traditional city opera houses. Good for on-selling productions.

To reach Lake Otsego requires a four-hour car journey from Manhattan, across the George Washington Bridge, north along the Palisades, those imposing bluffs on the west of the Hudson, then – my preference – diving off Interstate 87 to take rural state roads into the Catskill mountains via evocatively named rural settlements, Monticello, Mount Vision, and on past Cooperstown, famous home of the Baseball Hall of Fame. Ugh!

There is something purifying in making an extravagant effort to reach any destination, let alone an opera festival. Glimmerglass ensures the journey – a necessary rite of passage – is worthwhile.

Over three days I was able to take in Handel’s Rinaldo, Bernstein’s Candide, Puccini’s La bohème, that blacked-out Romeo and Juliet and a stunning, almost spur-of-the-moment concert, Cantico, starring folk singer Natalie Merchant with countertenor and Glimmerglass artist in residence, Anthony Roth Costanzo.

Top man since 2022, Ainsley, aptly describes what is on offer as “Glimmerglut”. But not only is it the range of musical fare on offer that makes Glimmerglass unique. It is the musical quality of the performances and the campus atmosphere, fostered by the presence of a host of highly motivated students, for whom inclusion in Glimmerglass is an affirmative tick in that all-important CV box.

Informative and entertaining pre-performance lectures, usually given by the conductor, are on offer. Ainsley, Colaneri, and the rest of the Glimmerglass team mingle freely with the milling audience in the outdoor bar. Unlike Glyndebourne, there is no focus on a 90-minute picnic interval. Glimmerglass is all about opera.

After his delayed demise, I bumped into Romeo afterwards. The crowds had gone. He was having a get-together with his family. I was passing time before the evening performance. Kim was carrying a well-earned bouquet. He had, after all, shot the lights out. One of the most compelling tenors on the circuit today. Watch him! The Kims were fumbling over a selfie, so I summoned up my memories of my old friend, Terry O’Neill, and offered to help with their iPhone. I hope my feeble attempt at star photography worked.

After the impromptu photo shoot, Kim was ebullient about his Glimmerglass appearance. He has forward engagements with Irish National Opera, Washington National, Pittsburgh and Des Moines. He enthused about the collegiate atmosphere and struck me as a tenor on a mission. I predict his break into the European circuit will not be long delayed.

Kim radiates a dignity tempered by lightness of touch which will attract audiences. I could not help noticing that when he parted from his family, who were simply oozing pride at his triumph, they all exchanged the customary Korean formal bows. Success has not gone to this charming young tenor’s head. I hope the photo wasn’t botched.

Colaneri has the clout to command a wide range of conducting talent to schlep upstate. Nader Abbassi conducted La bohème. His career is rooted in the Middle East and now Paris, as artistic director of L’orchestre de la paix. Colaneri took on Candide and Romeo et Juliette. I don’t much rate the Gounod opera, but the music is beautiful, typically luscious and Colaneri brought it to life. His Candide, really a rapid-fire operetta, exploded with excitement in true Bernstein fashion.

Emily Senturia, an American conductor “on the rise” took on Rinaldo at the gallop this Handel fire-cracking mystical comedy demands. Anthony Roth Costanzo in the title role was as compelling as worldwide audiences who recall his Akhenaten have come to expect. I will review Rinaldo next week. It was the highlight of a wonderful weekend.

It takes a brave festival team to allow the audience to inspect the inner workings of their well-oiled pet machine. On Saturday we were invited to watch the impossibly rapid two-and-a-half-hour set change between the matinee performance of Candide and that evening’s La bohème. I expected to stay for twenty minutes and find it mildly interesting. I was riveted for the full two and a half hours and witnessed as beautifully choreographed a performance as George Balanchine used to deliver at the New York City Ballet company he founded in 1968. But without the hissy fits.

A swarm of about thirty bee-workers, all clad in different coloured hard hats indicating electrician, carpenter, grunt-movers, were supervised by a laconic boss in a white Stetson. Every move was predetermined. Each hard hat had a designated task. The floor buzzed with handheld power screwdrivers. Boards marked with unique numbers were taken up, stacked, and strapped on a dolly in strict order then wheeled backstage. Military precision on display.

A seemingly impregnable battlement was skilfully folded like a kiddie’s toy. Every instruction had to be acknowledged by the whole team, each ritualistically shouting “Thank you!” in acknowledgement. Kept them on their toes. When the new floor was being installed the floor-boss walked the planks shouting “Good!” as each was bedded in. Stetson man watched with a gimlet eye.

Suddenly, stripped of their decorations, walls from Candide disappeared into the flies as a hard hat pulled on ropes balanced by metal weights, while La bohème’s Café Momus gracefully descended. I was witnessing a religious ritual, a sort of Tridentine scene changing with no room for slack or revisionist liturgy. Reasonable, then, to assume the well-drilled stagehands were grizzled experts. Astonished to be told the average age was 22. Newbies all, learning their craft like everyone at Glimmerglass.

In all, 380 staff are called to the colours for the festival. The event is a great engine of economic significance to that part of a state still suffering from the age of de-industrialisation. Derelict factories scar the small towns. This was Robert Ainsley’s first Glimmerglass. He came – appointed in September 2022 – from Washington National Opera (WNO) where he ran a young artists’ programme, in the nation’s capital, to Glimmerglass in the nation’s boondocks. Taking over from the highly respected Francesca Zambello, who clocked up eleven years in the post is a massive challenge. He and Zambello know each other well. She has been artistic director of WNO since 2012.

I’m sure that in the choice of Ainsley his experience in the education of a diverse group of young artists to serve current opera audiences and attract fresh faces counted heavily. The sell-out Calisto was foot-stomping evidence that he is off to a flying start, picking up Costanzo’s off-the-wall suggestion and running with it enthusiastically. Natalie Merchant and Anthony Roth Costanzo blazed into her highly rhythmical anthem Come On, Aphrodite. I happened to be sitting next to American Aphrodite, a six-foot-two platinum blond of not unpleasing demeanour, who swayingly kept time with the beat. “Have you been to Glimmerglass before?” “Nope, but this is great. What’s the rest of it like?” “Not quite like this, but I’m sure you’d enjoy it”.

Well, maybe not exactly Ainsley’s next-generation audience, but getting there. Sadly, Aphrodite had arrived with a six-foot-four Ares. As with the power supply, not everything goes to plan at the magical opera house on the lake.

Write to us with your comments to be considered for publication at letters@reaction.life