‘Hoffmann’ opera features favorites

Published 9:00 pm Thursday, May 5, 2005

French composer Jacques Offenbach was famous for his operettas, bubbly, lighthearted musicals that satirized the conventions of the day.

But he wanted to write serious opera, and the result was “Tales of Hoffmann,” one of the most popular operas in the repertoire.

Like a story lifted straight from grand opera, Offenbach (1819-1880) never got to see a full performance, dying during a rehearsal. But his opera lives on, subject to countless musical revisions because – well – the composer wasn’t around to have the final word.

Today, it’s a staple of opera companies around the world, full of wonderful melodies (Rossini dubbed Offenbach the “Mozart of the Champs-Elysees”) and a fantastic story of a poets failed search for true love.

Seattle Opera opens “Tales of Hoffmann” on Saturday, marshalling its resources to stage a new production that is a musical blend of several versions of the opera and with a cast of Seattle Opera favorites, including Vinson Cole.

The Seattle tenor takes the lead role of the beer-drinking poet who relates to his buddies three stories of disillusionment in his search for love.

In the first, he is tricked into loving Olympia, a woman who is, in reality, a mechanical doll. In the second story, he falls for Antonia, a frail girl who literally sings herself to death. The third story finds the poet Hoffman in thrall of a scheming courtesan named Giulietta. She steals his reflection and his soul with a trick mirror.

And there’s an evil villain in each of the tales ready to foil the poet Hoffman at every turn.

Offenbach based his opera on the stories of the author E.T.A. Hoffmann, whose strange writings made him a kind of 19th century version of our own Stephen King.

Cole, who alternates the role of Hoffman with tenor John Uhlenhopp, leads a cast of singers that includes many Seattle Opera regulars.

Among them are soprano Marie Plette, who sings the role of Antonia (alternating with Spokane native Heather Parker) and soprano Harolyn Blackwell, who sings Olympia (alternating with Julianne Gearhart).

Venezuelan mezzo-soprano Nancy Fabiloa Herrera makes her Seattle Opera debut as Giulietta and bass John Relyea sings all the villain roles.

Dean Williamson makes his Seattle Opera conducting debut, Chris Alexander is the director with sets by Robert A. Dahlstrom.

There are nine performances of “Hoffmann,” sung in French with English captions, through May 22.

Bill Mohn photo

Harolyn Blackwell and Vinson Cole rehearse for Seattle Opera’s “Tales of Hoffmann.”