DRACULA FOR CHILDREN
Civilization's crumbling! Bat abductors, zombie wives, and a hero who ives of the blood, often menstrual, of injocent maidens, and one who can die only with a stake in his heart after he has been weakened by the presence of crucifixes.
Such is the story of Dracula, now set in operatic form performed by the Boston's Chiuldren's Opera in a church basement in Belmont. What has the world come to!
What goes around comes around! Years ago, I was asked by the then 3-i/2 year old daughter of a very good friend of mine to tell her a story, "a scary story." Not being a natural story teller, I decided to give her a watered down version of NOSFERATU. I thought I cleaned it up pretty musyh, but, when her mother called me, two days later, to tell me that her daughter had been traumatized by the story, couldnt sleep, etc., When she came to visit, she couldn't enter the living room b ecause of the poster of the Werner Herzog remake of NOSFERATU. The story became part of "Uncle David" lore.
Then, over six years later, I get a call from young Ana, a precocious little girl with remarkable poise and beauty, who also has a keen sense of irony, as well as a promising singing voice.
She called to tell me that she was playing one of the three Brides of Dracula in the Boston Children's Opera production. Of course I had to go, and relish the eerie effects, the racoon eyes, and the trance like movement of the brides.
Quite frankly, I found the entire thing to be an ambitious enterprise. The man who composes the opera, Newfoundler David Budgell, does six such projects during the year, with almost 400 children. Each opera has six casts of at least 16 roles. That's over l00 children he has to rehearse. And he has to put on a show for families, where the adult relatives can be expentantly supportive, but the siblings and peer friends do sit through a two-hour performance in support. The sheer volumn is astounding, and what might get sacrificed in individual voice training gets compensated for in the building of self=confidence.
After the performance, I joked with the director, who, perhaps unwittingly had done a score that was part Gilbert and Sullivan (England is a great place for someone like Count Dracula to come and learn to be civilized)_ and part SWEENY TODD. After all, how often does one hear an aria on blood transfusions. And, it could have been camped up.
Alas, and necessarily, it was done straight, but without premeditated irony, it was interesting to watch a cast of pre and early pubescent girls performing a work that has implicit rite of passage themes.
But, on a far more innocent level, I was pleased to have been invited by young Ana, who did confess to occasionally scaring herself in rehearsal, but who now can come into my living room and confront the poster of NOSFERATU.
Such is the story of Dracula, now set in operatic form performed by the Boston's Chiuldren's Opera in a church basement in Belmont. What has the world come to!
What goes around comes around! Years ago, I was asked by the then 3-i/2 year old daughter of a very good friend of mine to tell her a story, "a scary story." Not being a natural story teller, I decided to give her a watered down version of NOSFERATU. I thought I cleaned it up pretty musyh, but, when her mother called me, two days later, to tell me that her daughter had been traumatized by the story, couldnt sleep, etc., When she came to visit, she couldn't enter the living room b ecause of the poster of the Werner Herzog remake of NOSFERATU. The story became part of "Uncle David" lore.
Then, over six years later, I get a call from young Ana, a precocious little girl with remarkable poise and beauty, who also has a keen sense of irony, as well as a promising singing voice.
She called to tell me that she was playing one of the three Brides of Dracula in the Boston Children's Opera production. Of course I had to go, and relish the eerie effects, the racoon eyes, and the trance like movement of the brides.
Quite frankly, I found the entire thing to be an ambitious enterprise. The man who composes the opera, Newfoundler David Budgell, does six such projects during the year, with almost 400 children. Each opera has six casts of at least 16 roles. That's over l00 children he has to rehearse. And he has to put on a show for families, where the adult relatives can be expentantly supportive, but the siblings and peer friends do sit through a two-hour performance in support. The sheer volumn is astounding, and what might get sacrificed in individual voice training gets compensated for in the building of self=confidence.
After the performance, I joked with the director, who, perhaps unwittingly had done a score that was part Gilbert and Sullivan (England is a great place for someone like Count Dracula to come and learn to be civilized)_ and part SWEENY TODD. After all, how often does one hear an aria on blood transfusions. And, it could have been camped up.
Alas, and necessarily, it was done straight, but without premeditated irony, it was interesting to watch a cast of pre and early pubescent girls performing a work that has implicit rite of passage themes.
But, on a far more innocent level, I was pleased to have been invited by young Ana, who did confess to occasionally scaring herself in rehearsal, but who now can come into my living room and confront the poster of NOSFERATU.
1 Comments:
Great story...my son performed with Boston Children's Opera for a number of productions and it was
a wonderful influence on him.
David Budgell and Jenni Harrison are great assets to our community.
Thanks!
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