World Premiere Of The Inventor

We love it when our globe-trotting, opera-loving friends visit other cities. That's because they love telling us all about the amazing operas they saw! D.S. Spring, a long-time patron and subscriber to Vancouver Opera loves to share her thoughts on the operas she's seen on her travels. Last year, she enjoyed operas in London, Paris, Santa Fe and Seattle.

D.S.'s shares with us her most recent trip to Calgary:



2 February 2011
The Inventor

Calgary Opera’s General Director, Bob McPhee, continues to be the most adventurous of opera company CEOs in Canada by staging one contemporary opera per year. This year it was not only a contemporary opera, but also a world premier with the production of The Inventor composed by Vancouver’s own Bramwell Tovey. Even though it is Tovey’s first opera, it is not the case for the librettist, John Murrell, who seems to be on a roll taking obscure Canadian characters (like Lillian Alling) and writing an opera about them.

The Inventor is about Sandy Keith, a black sheep in the Alexander Keith brewing family of Halifax, who reinvents himself several times after swindling associates of rather questionable money-making schemes. It has an all-Canadian cast along with Director, Kelly Robinson, who also directed Lillian Alling for Vancouver Opera, and Designer Bretta Gerecke, who created a stunning versatile set for this production.

Tovey’s music is quite sophisticated. It supported the singers well and strongly evoked the memories, feelings and desires of the characters on stage. The casting was perfect with baritone James Westman as Sandy Keith, tenor Roger Honeywell as Luther Smoot, bass Philllip Ens in several roles, soprano Laura Whalen as Mary, soprano Erin Wall as Cecelia and mezzo Judith Forst as Louise, Cecelia’s mother. With such good singers it was unfortunate that Tovey did not compose more melodic arias for them.

As a new opera being performed for the first time, the story of The Inventor hangs together quite well mainly because of the experienced librettist Murrell. However, to be a memorable opera and one that should be performed again, some minor revisions would be in order. A few arias especially in the first act should be rewritten to be more appealing to a contemporary audience and a couple of the characters, namely Cecelia and Louise, require a bit of tweaking in order for the denouement to be more effective. It is hoped that there will be a revision and a second chance to see this interesting opera.

~ D.S. Spring