After listening to Laura Kaminsky and David Cote\u2019s \u201cmusic-is-healing\u201d chamber opera, Lucidity (2024), I dare you to hum one bar from the score. One bar is all I ask. You won\u2019t be able to, because this most modern music, though rhythmically throbbing with percussion, is disjointed, dissonant, skittery, choppy, and not at all pleasing to the ear.<\/p>\n
I could argue that this deliberate atonal technique \u2013 the bane of most contemporary work \u2013 is a fitting way to musically describe the onslaught of dementia. Memory slips away in bits and pieces, there\u2019s no coherence to it, and spurts of anger and disassociation are natural, if hated, consequences. The darkness comes with agonizing certitude. So spiky music might be apt for Lili (soprano Cynthia Clayton, striking and dramatic), the former concert singer\/composer who is afflicted by the slowing spread of Alzheimer\u2019s. But the other characters are swathed under this jarring music also.<\/p>\n
They suffer under their own haunting problems, but their music sounds just like Lili\u2019s. Everybody sings from the same hymnal. There\u2019s no difference in mood or style. Adopted son Dante (baritone Geoffrey Peterson, solid) has given up his languishing piano career to care for Mom; psychologist Dr. Klugman (mezzo Abby Powell, passionate), writing a book on the power of music to delay the onset of dementia, suffers from writer\u2019s block; young clarinetist Sunny (soprano Cristina Maria Castro, emotionally affecting), plays for Lili as an experiment in Klugman\u2019s research and is estranged from her devout parents for choosing music over motherhood. They are all conflicted, with music at the core of their troubles, but Kaminsky gives them the same ragged sound she gives Lili. What contrasts Lili\u2019s awful illness from the others?<\/p>\n
Lyricism\u2019s balm appears when Lili slowly remembers Schubert\u2019s classic song, \u201cThe Shepherd on the Rock,\u201d a former concert favorite in her repertoire. At first she fumbles with the lyrics, but the second try transforms her. You can see the clarity in Clayton\u2019s delivery, her pallor vanishes, her eyes clear. The radiant number overtakes her, as it does Lili. Schubert overtakes us, too. At last, beauty of line and form. The pleasure is fleeting. Bedlam soon returns.<\/p>\n
Cote\u2019s original libretto is direct but conventional. There\u2019s some fragrance inside his lyrics, but in this 90-minute work, there\u2019s no time to explore these people in depth, so the characters\u2019 dilemmas are easily resolved just like a Hallmark television movie of the week. When Klugman discovers that \u201cscience and music are one,\u201d her writer\u2019s block vanishes. Dante\u2019s love\/hate commitment to his mother softens when he\u2019s seated at the piano, once again accompanying her. Through her remembrance of the circus carousel\u2019s music from her youth, Sunny\u2019s passionate appeal to her parents solidifies her choice to be a musician (the opera\u2019s most dramatic aria and performed lovingly by Castro).<\/p>\n
Lili\u2019s happy ending is transitory, of course. She finishes her incomplete song to her son, \u201cI Have No Lullaby,\u201d and stands center stage. \u201cThere\u2019s so much to hear.\u201d She stretches out her arm, reaching for memories out of her grasp. \u201cListen.\u201d The clarinet\u2019s lone note fades to nothingness, as do the lights. A most effective ending.<\/p>\n
The orchestra\u2019s quintet is first-rate, led by maestro Gregory McDaniel, who evokes all the brutal screeching that Kaminsky throws into the score. Maiko Sasaki\u2019s clarinet soars with lush phrasing; Dominika Dancewicz\u2019s violin flutters in arpeggios and achingly melts with plush velvet tone; Jeanette Stenson\u2019s cello adds plummy timbre; Eric Andries\u2019 sparkling piano sounds as if Gershwin were at the keys; and Andrew Keller\u2019s stylish percussion work covers marimba, xylophone, gong, blocks, drums with easy brilliance. The score softens under their playing.<\/p>\n
Although it\u2019s receiving many current productions, I doubt if Lucidity will ever become a staple in the rep. The music is disjointed and full of angst, more angry than clarifying, hard and edgy. In her work for the theater, Kaminsky prefers intimate, personal stories that speak to contemporary social issues. Alzheimer\u2019s is certainly on the front burner these days, but no matter the subject, no matter how timely, is melody anathema to modern ears?<\/p>\n
Lucidity continues at 2 p.m. Sunday, March 8. Opera in the Heights, 1703 Heights Boulevard. For more information, call 713-861-5303 or visit operaintheheights.org. $35-$85.<\/p>\n
\n\tRelated<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After listening to Laura Kaminsky and David Cote\u2019s \u201cmusic-is-healing\u201d chamber opera, Lucidity (2024), I dare you to hum…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":194684,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[226,56,58,57,16076,77175,2510,77176],"class_list":{"0":"post-194683","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-houston","8":"tag-homepage","9":"tag-houston","10":"tag-houston-headlines","11":"tag-houston-news","12":"tag-houston-opera","13":"tag-lucidity","14":"tag-opera","15":"tag-opera-in-the-heights"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=194683"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194683\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/194684"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=194683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=194683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=194683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}