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Written by Harry Cherkinian
Mar 13, 2011
Daniela Mack
Daniel Belcher
The moment they announced the 2011 Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording nearly a month ago, Daniel Belcher suddenly realized he’d be up there all by himself on stage. Alone. To accept a Grammy Award. He looked around the celebrity-studded auditorium. No one else was moving toward the podium.
His wife, Metropolitan Opera director Kathleen Belcher, asked if he’d prepared anything to say “just in case.” He hadn’t. And now the spotlight was on the 40-year-old baritone from Liberty, Mo.
“I don’t even remember what I said,” Belcher recalls. “It was completely surreal.”
The award was for the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin’s recording of composer Kaija Saariaho’s “Amour de loin.” The recording took four years from start to finish. Belcher calls it “a labor of love.”
Fresh off his Grammy win, Belcher takes the stage in the leading role of Taddeo with the Florentine Opera’s upcoming production of “The Italian Girl in Algiers.” Belcher is a familiar face in Milwaukee, having performed with FO in “The Barber of Seville.” He also worked with “Algiers” director Bill Theisen in a production of “HMS Pinafore” with Lyric Opera of Kansas City. That production also featured another of the “Algiers” cast members, Kevin Glavin, who also was in FO’s “Seville.” Apparently, there’s only one degree of separation in the opera world.
“The good thing is coming back into a room full of friends,” Belcher says. “It’s like picking up where we left off.” The friends include the “Algiers” set, which Belcher has performed on twice before.
“The Italian Girl in Algiers” is nearly 200 years old, yet remains a challenge for performers, given Gioaachino Rossini’s combining of the “opera seria” (dramatic) and “opera buffa” (comic) styles. Set in a palace in Algiers, the physically demanding work involves star-crossed lovers, mixed identities and court intrigues.
“Any Rossini opera is like running a marathon,” Belcher says. “You have to really train your voice and get your flexibility back, vocally and physically.” “Algiers” was challenging for its time due to the chords of feminism it strikes. Isabella, “the Italian girl,” is not one to sit demurely and pine for her lost love. Instead, she goes out to find him and rescue him and, in the process, she promises freedom for the Algerian slaves.
“This is a woman who’s very ahead of her time,” says Daniela Mack, who sings the role of Isabella (in the March 18 and 20 performances). “This is a woman in love with Lindoro and (she) goes to save him. Her feminism is very strong, while there are also moments of vulnerability.”
Mack recently sang the same role at the Opera National de Bordeaux. Born in Buenos Aires, she came to the United States at age eight. The soprano finds a commonality with Isabella and with the music of Rossini.
“I’m a bit more demure but I do have Latin blood in me,” Mack says. “So I know the fiery side to her (Isabella) as well. She does know how to get what she needs and wants.”
Mack agrees that Rossini demands much of the performer. “It is a very physical show,” she emphasizes. “The way the vocal lines are written, the composer demands that the voice do things that are hard to do.”
“But Rossini is very close to my heart,” she adds. He’s one of the first composers whose work she performed during her training.
Despite the demands “Algiers” is a comedy, and Mack says she’s looking forward to having fun with it onstage. She says it’s an entertaining work, not just for opera lovers but for everyone.
“It’s very accessible, not very long and just a hoot!” she promises.
The Florentine Opera performs “The Italian Girl in Algiers” March 18 - 20 in Uihlein Hall at the Marcus Center for the Performing Arts, 929 N. Water St. Call 414-291-5700, ext. 224, or go to www.florentineopera.org.
