The crowd went nuts. Leaping to their feet, they cheered the singers, who took bow after bow. The new production was a smash; the premiere of the one-act opera “Cavalleria Rusticana” — “Rustic Chivalry” — made struggling composer Pietro Mascagni famous and rich overnight.
This was springtime 1890 in Rome, and the start of “Cavalleria’s” run all across Europe; meantime Mascagni received the King’s Order of the Crown of Italy, and a hero’s welcome back in his home town of Livorno.
Saturday night, May 5, this popular opera will come to Port Angeles. And “Cavalleria,” based on a short story about romance, passion and “small-town karma,” as Port Angeles Symphony conductor Jonathan Pasternack puts it, is an opera people can relate to.
Pasternack chose it for the Port Angeles Symphony Orchestra and Chorus’ 2017-2018 season finale concert — and then added another beloved classic, Edvard Grieg’s Piano Concerto. Guest artist Alexander Tutunov will join the 70-piece orchestra to perform it.
The venue: the Port Angeles High School Performing Arts Center, 304 E. Park Ave., where the orchestra will take the stage while the 35-voice Port Angeles Symphony Chorus sings from risers placed in front of the stage.
Soloists — internationally known soprano Kristin K. Vogel of Edmonds, baritone Joel Yelland, soprano Cynthia Webster and lyric tenor Robin Reed of Sequim, and soprano Vicki Helwick of Port Angeles — will make entrances and exits as the characters of “Cavalleria.”
Pasternack will hold a pre-concert chat onstage at 6:40 p.m. Saturday; during the talk he’ll take questions from the audience. The conversation wraps up at 7 p.m. and the performance will start at 7:30 p.m.
Tickets are $12 for students and seniors, $15 general admission and $20 to $30 for premium reserved seats, from outlets including Port Book and News in downtown Port Angeles, the Joyful Noise Music Center in downtown Sequim and the Port Angeles Symphony at 360-457-5579.
Tickets will be sold at the door the night of the concert, if still available.
As always, the public is also invited to the orchestra and chorus’ final rehearsal at 10 a.m. Saturday. Admission to this working rehearsal is $5 per person or $10 per family.
Pasternack, who became conductor and music director in 2015, has long wanted to offer this experience to audiences here. He loves the fact that opera, wherever it’s performed, is a gorgeous spectacle. And for this one, Pasternack added, he’s found just the right soloists.
“I know there are lots of really good singers around who are constantly looking for roles. But I didn’t know till I looked into it how much talent we have on the Peninsula,” he said.
Reed, a lyric tenor who retired to Sequim some years ago, was a professional opera singer in Europe, for example.
Then there’s Vogel in the lead role of Santuzza.
“She has an amazing voice, a beautiful voice,” Pasternack said, “as well as wonderful musicality and poise. She is, for me, the consummate professional opera star.”
For those who don’t speak Italian, supertitles are planned, but “Cavalleria” is easy to understand, Pasternack and Vogel agree. We have a man, Turiddu, and a woman, Lola, from a Sicilian village; they promise to wait for each other when he goes off to war. But she doesn’t wait. She marries a wealthy swell, Alfio. When our Turiddu returns and finds out, he embarks on a new relationship with Santuzza in hopes of arousing Lola’s jealousy.
“It works. Lola steals him back,” said Vogel.
At this point we learn more about the honor code in this village, the rustic chivalry of the title. The two men engage in a duel.
This is one intense drama, said Vogel — all on the wings of “melodies that are just so gorgeous. It’s beautiful music to sing, exciting music to sing.”
“Cavalleria” is a stunning piece, filled with raw desire, added Reed, who sings the role of Turiddu.
“If you have not seen or heard this opera before, this is the perfect opportunity to experience (it) in a relatively short format,” he said.
As for Tutunov, who will follow “Cavalleria” with his performance of Grieg’s Piano Concerto, this is a harmonious pairing.
Like the opera, Grieg “speaks to the heart,” said the pianist.
The composer wrote it while gazing at the ocean, so it’s about the waves, the whitecaps and everything in between. These reflect “raw emotions. I don’t think anybody could not be moved.”
Tutunov, who was born and educated in the former Soviet Union, is now a professor of music at Southern Oregon University in Ashland. He’s been coming to perform with the Port Angeles Symphony since he first met Nico Snel, the symphony’s late conductor, some 20 years ago.
The Port Angeles Symphony’s 2018-2019 season of five full-orchestra concerts, two pops concerts and six chamber orchestra performances in Sequim and Port Angeles will begin in September, and season tickets are on sale. Brochures and ticket packages will be available at Saturday’s concert.
For more information about the orchestra, founded in 1932, see www.PortAngelesSymphony.org.
