RODELINDA
October 20, 24, 26, 28 at 7pm
October 22, 29 at 3pm
at Hudson Hall, 327 Warren Street, Hudson, NY
Performances in Italian with English supertitles
Running Time: Approx. 2 hours and 15 minutesOpera by G.F. Handel, premiered at the King’s Theater in London, 1725
Direction and Production R.B. Schlather
With early music band Ruckus
Hudson, NY —Hudson Hall at the historic Hudson Opera House presents RODELINDA as the first in an ambitious multi-year series of operas by G.F. Handel with the daring, internationally acclaimed director (and Hudson resident) R.B. Schlather. Six performances take place October 20, 24, 26, 28 at 7pm and October 22 and 29 at 3pm, and the opening night performance will be followed by a post performance reception with the artists.
The production features a stellar cast and a re-orchestration performed by early music band Ruckus. Envisioned as an ongoing collaboration to create opera for a new generation, this inaugural production builds on the extraordinary success of Schlather’s sold-out run of Virgil Thompson and Gertrude Stein’s The Mother of Us All at Hudson Hall in 2017, named one of the Best Musical Performances of the Year by The New York Times.
“Handel is a perfect fit for Hudson Hall’s historic 1855 theater. He’s an opera composer whose works become more potent and more thrilling on an intimate scale where the focus becomes the talent and virtuosity of the individual musicians,” says R.B. Schlather. “Rodelinda is a crime thriller about a woman protecting her home and her child after the disappearance of her husband. It explores ideas about love, power, loyalty, tyranny, grief, and ultimately, redemption, with characters audiences can deeply connect with. Rodelinda is ideal for people who are curious about opera and want an introduction to it, as well as for people who love opera, especially baroque repertoire.”
An immediate success when first performed, Rodelinda was the third opera Handel wrote in twelve months. It followed the triumph of Giulio Cesare and Tamerlano but then fell into obscurity. With the revival of interest in Baroque music since the mid-20th century, Rodelinda is finding its way back into the repertory. When it had its American premiere in 1933 in Northampton, Massachusetts (just east of Hudson), The New York Times called the opera “Handel at his operatic best.”
Schlather has long been obsessed with the work of Handel. In 2014, he gained significant media attention as the impresario of a series of radical installations of Handel’s so-called “Ariosto Trilogy.” Presented as crowd-funded, open process installations at the WhiteBox art gallery on the Lower East Side of NYC, Schlather explored the boundaries of performance and access. The operas were praised in The New York Times by art critic Holland Cotter as a fascinating “species of performance art,” and classical music editor Zachary Woolfe called the series “a gift given to the New York cultural scene” and “a valuable project that deserves enthusiastic support.”
Schlather’s vision and determination to bring Handel to the Hudson Valley has found the ideal partner in Hudson Hall in Hudson, New York, his hometown since 2014. Schlather’s deepening collaboration with Hudson Hall signals an exciting new direction for the artform and reflects a pandemic-accelerated shift of creative artists and theater goers to Upstate New York and the surrounding areas.
“Thanks to a new generation of talented artists like R.B. Schlather, opera is getting a major refresh,” says Hudson Hall Executive Director Tambra Dillon. “The creativity and originality these artists bring to their work is, in part, born out of necessity. While they have fewer resources than their elder peers, innovators like R. B. bring a fresh and dynamic approach. He’s like an earthquake when it comes to shaking opera out of its late-life crisis.”
With Rodelinda, Schlather brings together a dynamic group of rising and established stars and creative collaborators, many of whom hail from or currently reside in the region. Playing Rodelinda, the soprano Keely Futterer was praised by The Wall Street Journal as the “stand out singer” in Tenor Overboard in the 2022 Glimmerglass Festival; mezzo-soprano Sun-Ly Pierce debuts as Bertarido, following her string of debuts with Houston Grand Opera, Opera Philadelphia, and the Fisher Center at Bard College; GRAMMY Award-winning tenor Karim Sulayman plays Grimoaldo; Hudson-based mezzo-soprano Teresa Buchholz (The Mother of Us All) is Eduige; Massachusetts-based early music specialist Douglas Williams (bass-baritone) is Garibaldo; and countertenor Brennan Hall is Unulfo.
Performing live, the shapeshifting baroque band Ruckus brings the score to life with its visceral and playful approach to early music. The young period instrument ensemble debuted in Handel’s Aci, Galatea e Polifemo in a 2017 production directed by Christopher Alden featuring Anthony Roth Costanzo, Ambur Braid, and Davóne Tines at National Sawdust. The band’s playing has earned widespread acclaim: “Achingly delicate one moment, incisive and punchy the next” (The New York Times). Ruckus’s core is a continuo group, the baroque equivalent of a jazz rhythm section: guitars, keyboards, cello, bassoon, and bass, who are joined by violin, flute, and oboe soloists for a 13-member conductorless ensemble.
Kaatsbaan Cultural Park in nearby Tivoli, NY joins as a cultural partner, and is where the cast will be in residence for the month of October.
CAST:
Keely Futterer, Rodelinda
Sun-Ly Pierce, Bertarido
Karim Sulayman, Grimoaldo
Teresa Buchholz, Eduige
Douglas Williams, Garibaldo
Brennan Hall, Unulfo
SYNOPSIS:
A woman’s husband is missing, maybe dead. Her life as she knew it has disappeared. Villains invade her home, seeking to profit from her loss. To their surprise, she heroically overcomes her grief, defends her child and her home. After her husband’s dramatic reappearance, the evildoers are expelled, and marital order is restored. They begin again.
EARLY MUSIC BAND RUCKUS
Doug Balliett, bass
Elliot Figg, harpsichord
Ravenna Lipchik, violin
Fiona Last, oboe / flute / recorder
Manami Mizumoto, violin / viola
Kyle Miller, viola
Joseph Monticello, flute
Paul Holmes Morton, guitar / theorbo
Rebecca Nelson, violin
Gaia Saetermoe-Howard, oboe / recorder
Michael Unterman, cello
Clay Zeller-Townson, bassoon*
CREATIVE TEAM
Company Manager: Daniel Stermer
Assistant Director: Emily Cuk*
Costumes built by Gaby LaRoche*
Wardrobe Supervisor: Quinn Czejkowski
Set by Consigli Construction
Lighting Associate: Vittoria Orlando
Supertitles: Steven Jude Tietjen
Musical Preparation: David Sytkowski*
TICKETS:
Section 1: Reserved Seating (starting at $85)
Section 2: General Admission, Mid-Center Section/Side Aisle, Front Mezzanine (starting at $50)
Section 3: General Admission, Rear and Side Seating, far sides may be partially obstructed (starting at $25)
The opening night performance will be followed by a post performance reception with the artists. To attend the reception, please purchase a “Section 1+ Opening Night Reception” ticket ($300, contribution portion – $160)
Hudson Hall is grateful for the generous support from the following for making this production possible:The Schlather family, in memory of Robert B. Schlather.The Reinhart Foundation, Fenimore Asset Management, Cynthia R. Richards, Wheelock Whitney III and Sandro Cagnin, and the Joan Shafran & Rob Haimes Foundation.Kaatsbaan Cultural Park for partnering with Hudson Hall to provide an artist residency.Consigli Construction for set construction.
