Do you love good opera as much as I do? Premiering for the Empress of Hapsburg’s birthday in 1733, the opera buffa (comedic opera) “La Serva Padrona” (“The Servant Turned Mistress”) by Pergolesi will be the fourth offering in this year’s Camerata Gordon Campbell.
Originally written as an intermezzo, the theme of “La Serva Padrona” is timeless and something most anyone can relate to. A young woman, working as a maid for a wealthy elderly bachelor, has designs on marrying him and inheriting his estate. She works in cahoots with Vespone, a mute fellow servant, to make her goal a reality.
Greg and I recently interviewed the Director of the Sinfónica Sinaloa de las Artes, Maestro Gordon Campbell, and his wife, Guianeya Román, in our home. Below is their Behind-the-Chamber peek into La Serva Padrona:
The concert will take place at the Angela Peralta Theater this Sunday, February 1st, at noon. Karla Muñoz, soprano, will sing the role of Serpina, the maid. Carlos Serrano, baritone, will sing as Uberto, the master of the house. Actor Larik Huerta will play the mute servant, Vespone. The stage director for this performance is Rodolfo Arriaga.
A few of the inner balconies in St. Mark’s Basilica, Venice, Italy
Do you know the origin of stereo music? Although “stereo” most commonly refers to a method of music reproduction, and the word “stereophonic” was coined by the Western Electric company in 1927, the origins of stereophonic sounds go way back to the Renaissance.
The first stereophonic music was performed in the 1500s in St. Mark’s Basilica, when groups of musicians would sing and play from the multiple balconies inside the basilica.
stereophonic derives from the Greek “στερεός” (stereos), “firm, solid” + “φωνή” (phōnē), “sound, tone, voice”
We here in Mazatlán will be privileged to experience such live stereophonic sound inside our own Angela Peralta Theater, as part of the Camerata Gordon Campbell.
Renaissance Stereophonic will take place at noon this next Sunday, January 25, 2015. Below you can hear Maestro Gordon Campbell and his wife and collaborator, Guianeya Román, giving us a Behind-the-Chamber glimpse into this weekend’s event.
Tickets to this event are being sold at the unbelievable price of 200 pesos, at the TAP box office or online. Can you imagine how great our Angela Peralta will sound, filled with music from the balconies, in a surround-sound effect?
You have probably already fallen in love with this season of the Camerata Gordon Campbell. Both Daniela Liberman on piano and Mozart and his Women were terrific. This Sunday, January 18, will be the first Camerata event this year in Casa Haas. The noon performance of “The Virtuoso Trumpet” is already sold out, but there are still tickets available for the 6 pm event.
Héctor Tomás Jiménez, a Mije Indian who grew up learning to play in Oaxaca on a horn donated by US Americans, is one of Mexico’s premier concert trumpeters. The serendipity, that Maestro Gordon Campbell, Director of the Orquesta Sinfónica Sinaloa de las Artes, encouraged a woman to gather instruments for a Oaxaqueñan band that needed them, and, years later, that a musician who learned on one of those donated instruments is playing under Gordon’s baton, is beautiful.
Below is a Behind the Chamber clip about this Sunday’s concert, from an interview Greg and I recently conducted with Maestro Gordon Campbell and his wife and collaborator, Guianeya Román.
Buy your tickets at the Angela Peralta box office or online.
Sounds sexy, right? Intriguing? This performance, the second in the Camerata Gordon Campbell series this year, sounds absolutely fabulous to me. It will take place on Sunday, January 11, at noon in the Angela Peralta Theater.
We all love art—listening to music or looking at paintings. What is even better to me, however, is when curators use music or visual art to tell us a story, to give us a glimpse into the lives of the artists—to take us with them into their lives. I love an exhibition that showcases the work of two friends who were painters, for example, comparing and contrasting their viewpoints, experiences, personalities and techniques. It’s so much more enriching than simply looking at the paintings and enjoying them. Such an approach accesses more of our senses simultaneously.
“Mozart and His Women” takes such an approach. It is musical tour de force, performed by the Chamber Orchestra, and it will be accompanied by readings from private letters between Mozart and his family and friends. So, we will hear the concerto that Mozart composed for his brother, Frederick, on the latter’s birthday, while we listen to the letter that Wolfgang wrote to him on that very occasion. Sound awesome?
The video below shows Gordon Campbell, Director of the Orquesta Sinfónica Sinaloa de las Artes and of the Camerata Gordon Campbell, and Guianeya Román, his collaborator and wife, as they talk about the genesis of this performance. Be sure to listen for what Mozart called one of his best friends—he may have been Mazatleco after all!
Joining the Chamber for this concert will be the wonderful Angelica Aragón. I know her as an actress in movies and telenovelas, the daughter of my beloved Ferrusquilla. So my first question to Gordon and his wife was, “Does she sing?” No, in “Mozart and His Women,” Angelica will be performing the roles of Mozart’s mother, sister and wife, as she reads from the letters. We may even see a cameo by Gordon himself, in a white powdered wig.
Be sure to get your season tickets for only 150 pesos each, or your ticket to this event only at the unbelievable price of 200 pesos. Tickets at the TAP box office or online (though, personally, I can never get the online payment to work). We are so very truly blessed here in Mazatlán!
I am doing this series on the Camerata, not because we want to start reporting here on this blog, but because we so often find out about events after the fact. Sure, we see the announcements ahead of time, but often we don’t really know what the various performances are about. And we are blessed with a plethora of terrific options here in Mazatlán! It is my hope that this “Behind the Chamber” series can help you to discern what the performances will involve—they are so exciting this year! Many thanks to the Maestro and his wife for spending time with us to give us some background details and build our excitement.
¡VidaMaz! 