SFist Interviews Frederica Von Stade
Two operatic legends will take the stage at Herbst theater on Thursday and Saturday, to honor French mezzo-soprano and composer, Pauline Viardot. We hadn't heard of Viardot, and yet, it turns out that everyone who was anyone in Paris at the end of the 19th century (a list which includes Franz Liszt, Frederic Chopin, Alfred de Musset, Hector Berlioz, Camille Saint-Saens, Charles Gounod, Giacomo Meyerbeer...) was head over heels for her. Most were only infatuated with her, but Ivan Turgenev ended up moving with her and her husband, adding a Russian twist to the ménage à trois.
Pauline sang, she was an opera star, but she also composed and had her salon in Paris. And Thursday's show will try to re-capture the atmosphere of the salon, with songs by Viardot or inspired by her. The host of the evening is Marilyn Horne, a mezzo-soprano legend in her own right. She rarely sing nowadays, having nothing to prove anymore, but she's a Viardot fan, and she'll introduce the tunes. Frederica von Stade, maybe Alameda's most famous resident, will be doing the singing. Flicka does not need to be introduced: she starred at the SF Opera (last seen here), the Met or La Scala, she recorded over 70 CDs, she sang at the opening ceremony of the Salt Lake City Olympics. Like Viardot, composers are vying for her (professional) attention, and she just wrapped up a premiere run of "Three Decembers," the latest opera written for her by Jake Heggie, in Houston. We were lucky to catch up with her.
Frederica von Stade above, and in "Three Decembers" below
So she was in Houston for "Three Decembers"? "Yeah, the last performance is tomorrow night [Saturday last week], I come home on Sunday, and we start rehearsal on Monday for the Pauline Viardot show." How did that run go? "It's coming to San Francisco in December. It's a wonderful opera by Jake Heggie on a play by Terrence McNally. It's a story about the relationship between an actress and her 2 children that spans 2 decades. The mother has an important secret about the father which I can't reveal. It's a chamber opera, for 11 instruments and 2 pianos. It's very touching, very funny, and it's one of Jake's best pieces. I'm very prejudiced, I believe in him a lot, I've seen the triumph of Dead Man Walking and I think it will be another one, another triumph." Eleven instruments! How is that going to fill the War Memorial Opera House? "Oh no, it's in Berkeley, it's at Zellerbach Hall. Even Zellerbach is big for this, but they have ways of making it intimate."
So we were curious to see how different our show would be from Houston's. "Every production you do is from scratch, everybody is in a different place in their life. We'll have a little bit of an advantage because we've done it already, but it will be a whole different performance." We meant, will the music or the libretto be updated? "Oh no, it will be the same! There's not one extra note in it, it's just perfect. And I've seen the effect it had on the public down here, people are so moved and touched by it."
We're definitely looking forward to that one. So Thursday's show about Viardot, how did it came about? "I was asked! By Judy Flannery who was putting this together. It's a wonderful idea, it's very beautiful songs, the world is always in need of beautiful music. Pauline Viardot was the child of Manuel Garcia, she was studying with Liszt, she was in love with Turgenev, she was a little bit like Alma Mahler."
"It was a wonderful idea to put this together, and it's a thrill that Marilyn Horne is in this. It's like having Viardot herself, it's even more special. Marilyn means a great deal to the opera world in general and the world of song. The fact that she knew the family of Pauline Viardot and sung Pauline Viardot's music. They were two great amazing artists, they both affected the world of song in a significant way."
The show has been performed in Paris and London, and at the time, French actress Fanny Ardant was the host. We have been looking forward to Sundays thanks to Fanny! "Fanny Ardant, elle etait fantastique," Flicka said, in French so good we were concerned she would keep the interview in French. We don't want to translate! Luckily, she reverted to English: "Fanny was fantastic, in English and in French. What's special in Marilyn is that she hasn't done anything in a while, and she knew the family of Pauline Viardot."
Pauline Viardot inspired Chopin, Berlioz, Saint-Saëns, Liszt. A lot of composers, including Jake Heggie, but also Dominick Argento or Richard Danielpour have composed for Flicka. Does she relate to Viardot?
"We all relate to Pauline Viardot very specifically. We relate because her father was a singing teacher, and set a standard for singing that is still important today. Also, it's a discovery of learning her music. It's a beautiful idea to present it in this way, like a salon, like the songs were presented at the time of Viardot. The concept of the show is that we do not perfom in a concert hall, we perform in somebody's living room."
We rephrased our question: like Viardot, all this guys wrote stuff for you! "I've been lucky to do a lot of stuff written for me, it meant a great deal, to be able to collaborate, to ask questions, to make comments, to say this note too high, or too low. We're in a very creative time that's very exiting in the US right now. There are lots of new operas being written, and we're expressing ourselves, not in English, but in the American idiom. Take Dead Man Walking for instance [Jake Heggie's opera], what's more American than capital punishment?"
Smarty pants we, we interrupted it was not something to be proud of..."Of course not, but we have to deal with it. What opera do you know where there's no tragedy? What about that show about the French revolution, les Miserables? We have the worst prison system in the world, well, almost the worst." Those are subjects worthy of being tackled, indeed.
Flicka is from the East coast, how did she end up with a 510 cell phone number? "I'm in the 510, I married a Californian almost 20 years ago! I do go east when I can, but I'm a Californian, I'm so happy to be here."
We kinda assumed that age would be a taboo topic, but she reminisced about Paris since we are French: "I was in Paris when I was in 18, I was there in 1963. I lived there when Kennedy was assassinated here. I had this amazing year, it was very different back then, not as clean as it is now." She has been honored as Officier des arts et des lettres by France's president, Jacques Chirac. "Yeah. But I knew Chirac already when he was mayor of Paris, I was there in the time of Giscard d'Estaing. I worked at the Opera de Paris when Liebermann was the director."
Talking about Opera director, Lofti Mansouri, former head of the SF Opera, is stage directing the Pauline Viardot show. "He's amazing man of the theater, he was general manager in SF and a wonderful director. I've been lucky to do several productions with him, it's wonderful to have him there, the atmosphere is very meaningful to the people in the music business."