MUSIC
DECEMBER
December is a lighthearted story about travel, family, holiday stress, relationships, and remembering not to wrap your presents before you fly. Julia and Natasha are in the first year of their relationship and they are preparing to meet Julia’s parents for the first time. They are taking a trip to Julia’s family home for Christmas and the opera follows them as they prepare and pack for the trip, and their time waiting/stressing at the airport security line. Their trip is with the fictional Top Priority Air, represented by a Top Priority Air spokesperson, a customer service representative, and a security officer.
Newest EP
December (2019) was written for Essential Opera with support from the SOCAN Foundation.
Maureen Batts, soprano - Top Priority Air Spokesperson, Top Priority Air Customer Service, Security Officer
Erin Bardua, soprano - Julia
Danielle Buonaiuto, soprano - Natasha
Composer, Monica Pearce
Tara Scott, conductor
Jennifer Jones, violin
Anne Simons, violin
Alexandra Bates, viola
Hilary Brown, cello
Ben B. Creelman, producer, audio engineer, Leaf Music
Jeremy VanSlyke, mastering, Leaf Music
Jennifer Nulsen, audio engineer, Swan Studios NYC
Recorded November 25, 2020
The Peggy Corkum Music Room, Halifax, NS
Swan Studios, NYC
Album artwork, Tom Belding
PRODUCTION TEAM
Etiquette: A Glimpse of 1920s Icons by composer Monica Pearce presents a unique musical portrayal of three influential women from the 1920s: author Dorothy Parker, socialite Emily Post, and politician Nancy Astor. Taking inspiration from Parker’s witty and biting review of Post’s book “Etiquette”, published in 1927, this opera provides a snapshot of these figures and their era. Commissioned by Essential Opera, this world-premiere recording showcases traditional themes in a new light, in line with the age-old tradition of revisiting the past to illuminate the present.
ETIQUETTE
Recorded April 2022 at St. Andrew’s United Church, Halifax, NS
Maureen Batt, soprano – Dorothy Parker
Erin Bardua, soprano – Emily Post
Lucy Hayes Davis, mezzo-soprano – Nancy Astor
Tara Scott – music director, piano
Brad Reid – clarinet
Monica Pearce – composer
John Terauds – librettist
Jeremy VanSlyke – recording producer
Ben B. Creelman – recording engineer
Ben B. Creelman, Haruka Nagata – editing and mixing
Nathan Cann – mastering
PRODUCTION TEAM
Mirror, Mirror is a mini-opera composed by Anna Pidgorna based on the Grimm fairy tale Snow White. This story uses the Snow White/Evil Stepmother template to look at how women and their relationships with one another are affected by external pressure to be forever young and beautiful. In the piece, the loving Mother Queen is transformed into the Evil Queen, triggered in part by her own obsession with her looks and how she is perceived, and in part by her daughter Snow White’s transformation from a child into a beautiful young woman. Snow White, meanwhile, in absorbing her mother’s messages about the paramount importance of beauty, is in turn destined to become an Evil Queen in her own right.
The characters embody the triune relationship of the Maiden, Mother, and Crone, both in how they interact with one another and in that every woman will be each of the three during her life. The Crone represents the logical conclusion of the Queen’s path; the Queen at one point would have been innocent and fresh like Snow White; Snow White is, by the end of the piece, well on her way to becoming a Queen. As a final act of (self?) sabotage, the Crone provides Snow White with the instrument of her destruction: an apple as poisonous as it is beautiful.
MIRROR, MIRROR
Producer: Essential Opera
Music and libretto: Anna Pidgorna
Mother Queen/Evil Queen: Erin Bardua, soprano
Snow White: Maureen Batt, soprano
Voices in electronics: Erin Bardua, soprano
Camera operators: Erin Bardua, Maureen Batt, Richard Belding, Elizabeth Jewett, Vicki St. Pierre
Audio recording: Leaf Music (Producer: Jeremy VanSlyke, Associate Producer: Ben B. Creelman)
Film editor: Tom Belding