My Fair Lady

ROBERT MILLARD / LOS ANGELES OPERA

KIRAN WEST/HAMBURG BALLET

Quinn Kelsey (above) returns as Rigoletto, his signature role.

Rigoletto , with costumes designed by Constance Hoffman.

John Neumeier (above, right), who will direct, choreograph, and design Gluck’s

Season of Delight,

Orphée et Eurydice .

Russian tenor Dmitry Korchak debuts at Lyric as Orphée.

and for our audiences it’s sure to be a great discovery and an unforgettable, deeply affecting experience.” Any Orphée production requires artists of exceptional sensitivity and intelligence, both to produce it and to perform it. “We’re thrilled that the world-renowned American choreographer John Neumeier – in a very exciting collaboration between Lyric, The Joffrey Ballet, LA Opera, and Staatsoper Hamburg – will create the vital dance element of this opera, direct the production, and design the sets, costumes, and lighting. Harry Bicket, one of today’s finest interpreters of pre-1800 repertoire, will return to conduct. Russian tenor Dmitry Korchak, in his Lyric debut, will sing Orpheus with all the beauty of sound, stupendous technique, and deep expressiveness the role requires. Andriana Chuchman, one of the most successful recent alumni of Lyric’s Ryan Opera Center, will be with us again to sing Eurydice.” Next we’ll welcome back to Lyric’s

General director Anthony Freud reveals what Lyric audiences can look forward to

in 2017/18 By Roger Pines

I n just four months, another Lyric season will begin! The excitement is already building, with so many thrilling operas and special events ahead. Everything contributes to Lyric’s ultimate goal – to redefine what a great opera company is all about in the 21st century. That goal includes bringing a broad- based repertoire to the stage of the Civic Opera House, serving a wide range of tastes. “Even as we work to engage new audiences,” says general director Anthony Freud, “one thing that will never change is our commitment to advancing our art form by inspiring and entertaining our audiences with magnificent productions.”

The 2017/18 season opens with Orphée et Eurydice (Orpheus and Eurydice), Christoph Willibald Gluck’s retelling of the Greek myth in which the musician Orpheus braves the dangers of the Underworld to bring his dead wife back to earth. Lyric has produced this work before, but not in the 1774 Paris version (in French rather than Italian, with the hero sung by a tenor rather than a countertenor). Freud relishes “the marvelous virtuosity in Gluck’s music for Orpheus, as well as his captivating ballet music, added to satisfy the expectations of the 18th-century Parisians. There’s true musical and dramatic glory in this work,

12 | April - May, 2017