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Monday, November 1, 2004
Cap City Opera and Georgia Philharmonic
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
CLASSICAL REVIEWS
— Georgia Philharmonic, Saturday at the Roswell Cultural Arts Center in Roswell
— Capitol City Opera in Menotti’s “The Medium,” Sunday at Earthlink Live in Midtown.
“Music, like sex, is too important to be left to the professionals,” wrote Robert Shaw who, bawdy or serious, gave heart and soul to Atlanta’s classical music scene. The late conductor loved “amateurism.” He meant it in the old Olympic sense of unjaded non-professionals who pursue excellence out of love for the endeavor.
“Amateur is not a dirty word,” wrote Shaw. Amator, from the Latin, is a lover.
Two of metro Atlanta’s most satisfying community ensembles —- for-love-of-art players —- performed over the weekend, exceeding expectations for what no-frills, shoestring-budget troupes can accomplish.
The Georgia Philharmonic is an all-volunteer orchestra with a fascinating history. Its musicians hold day jobs, love classical music and play cello, clarinet or trombone as a hobby. Founded 30 years ago as the Sandy Springs Chamber Orchestra, and later renamed Orchestra Atlanta, they rebelled three years ago when a new administration diluted the mission by forcing them to perform money-making pops concerts. The players, with conductor Philip Rice, mutinied en masse and reformed as a self-governing organization. They took a new name but retained their proud status. Rice and visiting soloists get paid, the amateur players do not. Robert Shaw would have loved them.
In concert Saturday evening at the Roswell Cultural Arts Center, the Georgia Philharmonic was splendid for Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto, with guest soloist Martin Chalifour, a former Atlanta Symphony Orchestra concertmaster (under Shaw) and now Los Angeles Philharmonic concertmaster.
Perhaps to aid the orchestra, Chalifour’s gutsy playing was always clear and sensible, and he never exaggerated rhythms for showy effect. Rice, who is the most skilled and energizing among Atlanta’s suburban-orchestra maestros, kept the orchestra properly quiet in accompanying passages. With rapt attention and only a few wrong notes, they allowed the music to sing and shout and sound really exciting.
Rice also programmed a rarity, Massenet’s Orchestral Suite No. 1, from 1865, a mini-symphony of sweetly lyrical tunes from the French opera composer. The philharmonic played with verve and understatement —- just right for this music —- and found magic in the breezily chromatic Nocturne.
Where the philharmonic is a fine community orchestra, I’m frankly flabbergasted at the level of audience satisfaction delivered by the Capitol City Opera. With Halloween on the calendar, the hand-to-mouth troupe gave two performances of Gian Carlo Menotti’s spook-fest opera “The Medium” —- at 8 p.m. and midnight —- in the operatically sympathetic space of EarthLink Live, a venue of just 750 seats and with decent acoustics.
I attended the late-late show. Near me sat post-party revelers dressed in a butterfly costume and a Venetian Carnival mask. As community opera, Capitol City allows talented local singing students, voice teachers and choristers from the Atlanta Symphony and Atlanta Opera to stretch themselves with leading roles.
As Madame Flora, the séance scammer who goes nuts, hears voices and is driven to murder, Thressa Gardner was entirely believable. Her low soprano was poised and strong, her manner matronly. She made her descent into psychosis seem inevitable.
As the medium’s abused daughter, Monica, Courtney Loner’s high soprano was bright and girlish, although her diction was a bit garbled. Flora’s three self-deluded suckers were enjoyable to listen to and watch: Elizabeth Cooper, Jameson Linville and Kharis Belgrave don’t have voices you’d hear on a professional opera stage, but they seemed like regular folks. Joshua Reiff played Toby, the mute man-child, with convincing pathos.
It all came together under Michael Nutter’s straight-ahead stage direction and Eric Smithey’s conducting of the 13-player orchestra. For love of opera, they pushed themselves to a highly enjoyable performance.
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