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Ill-fated romance set to timeless music.
That is the story of Giuseppe Verdi’s “La Traviata”.
Presented by Livermore Valley Opera, the fall production is set to take the stage at the Bankhead Theater beginning later this month. It marks the opening of the Tri-Valley opera company’s 34th season.
Set in 19th-century Paris, “La Traviata” features a courtesan named Violetta Valéry who runs away with Alfredo Germont, a young bourgeois.
But intervention by Alfredo’s father, Giorgio Germont, prompts Violetta to turn away from her lover. By the time Alfredo comes to his senses, there is scarcely enough time for apologies, as Violetta succumbs to tuberculosis.
The production has “great tunes and wonderful drama”, LV Opera artistic director Erie Mills said.
Sung in Italian with English supertitles, no one needs to feel intimidated to attend an opera, said Candace Evans, “La Traviata” stage director and choreographer.
“It’s not like going to a rugby match and not knowing the rules. Opera is just life,” Evans said.
“Wear your jeans and tennies or wear your sequin evening gown. It doesn’t matter,” Evans added. “You’re there for a human experience, told through unbelievably beautiful music.”
Whether audience members have seen the opera before, they are likely to recognize the tunes, Evans said.
“The music — it just gets inside you,” Evans said. “It is so lyric, and so melodic and so transportive.”
In addition to the music, the narrative is very relatable, Evans said.
“We all have a love story or 10 in our lives, of someone and something at a time, and if it worked or didn’t work,” Evans added.
One can also connect through the perspective of health and illness, according to Evans.
Those who saw the recent pandemic lived a parallel scenario to people’s experience of tuberculosis in the 19th century, wherein there was a deadly illness of unknown cause and remedy, Evans explained.
As a classic production, audiences often know Violetta is doomed from the start, according to soprano Avery Boettcher ,who is cast as Violetta.
“But still, people come to see her try to make the best of it. It’s like every time you watch the movie ‘Titanic’ you’re like, ‘I hope it doesn’t hit the iceberg this time.’ And it always does,” Boettcher said.
For over a decade Boettcher has been wanting to play Violetta.
“It is a dream come true in real-time,” Boettcher said of her debut performance as Violetta. “It’s a beautiful and moving story.”
Composed of three acts, “La Traviata” requires distinct singing for the part of Violetta, Boettcher said.
“It’s like a triathlon”, Boettcher said. “You have to train your body to do three different types of singing and train yourself to do all of them at once, so that by the time you get to the end, you still have enough strength and skill to be able to maneuver the difficulty that is embedded in the music.”
While rehearsals last only a few weeks, Boettcher said she has been working on her role rigorously for about three or four years.
Joining Boettcher on stage is tenor Brad Bickhardt, who is making his third appearance as Alfredo — a role he first played five years ago.
“Having five years to revisit this role and additional time for this, I feel as if the role has grown and matured as I have physically and vocally matured as well,” Bickhardt said.
In Evans’ role, she says she works to bring the story to life at the level of the individual performer as well as the overall piece.
The performers are telling the story with their words, but there is also an undercurrent of storytelling, Evans said.
In opera, people don’t always tell the truth with their lines, she explained. “I remind singers that your body tells the truth before your mouth speaks,” Evans said.
Tricky to performances on stage, the actors and actresses know their lines before they move. This means the performers must work backwards to elicit movement.
With this in mind, Evans said she finds ways for performers to incorporate gestures, sitting and standing, turns and props.
“(As) the audience, we are tuned to watch people’s bodies to get the truth, even over the words,” Evans explained.
“My duty is to open the story. If I’ve done a good job of that, even if you didn’t read the titles, you’d have a pretty darn good idea of what was going on, just because of what is physically happening on the stage,” Evans said.
The upcoming production of “La Traviata” also features baritone Krassen Karagiozov as Giorgio, Tiffany Gao as Flora Bervoix, Chad Somers as Gastone de Letorières, Kirk Eichelberger as Dottore Grenvil, Leandra Ramm as Annina, Gilead Wurman as Baron Douphol and Kevin Brown as Marchese d’Obigny.
Alexander Katsman serves as music director and Bruce Olstad as chorusmaster.
Performances of “La Traviata” are scheduled at the Bankhead Theater this weekend (Sept. 27-28) and next (Oct. 4-5). For more information and tickets, visit LVOpera.com or livermorearts.org.
