Q & A: Matthew Shilvock On The 2019-20 San Francisco Opera Season

By Francisco Salazar

 

The San Francisco Opera has announced its 2019-20 season featuring a wide array of repertory from Mozart and Verdi to Britten and Mason Bates. It’s a season that also includes company debuts, role debuts, and U.S. debuts. 

OperaWire had a chance to speak with General Director Matthew Shilvock on the new season and what excites him about many returning masterpieces.   

OperaWire: How did you choose the repertoire when you were thinking about the 2019-20 season?

Matthew Shilvock: I think a lot about San Francisco Opera’s artistic, technical, and administrative forces and an audience that we have. The audience is experimental and that allows us to think broadly when we program. The ability to delve into the repertoire and see pieces that we have not seen in 35 years like “Ernani” or “Roméo et Juliette,” and to combine them with the more canonical pieces is great. The underlining objective is to make sure we have eight titles that are completely compelling to audiences and take us on a journey over the course of a year. And we want our audience to engage with themselves and think about their humanity and relationships and I think this is a season about how human beings interact with each other. 

Just look at the relationships from the romantic in
“Roméo et Juliette,” the internal relationships in “Billy Budd,” the familial relationships in “Hansel and Gretel,” and the erotic relationships in “Manon Lescaut.” These are all ways in which human beings interact with each other.  

OW: Why did it took so long to bring back operas like “Billy Budd,” “Roméo et Juliette” and “Ernani” back to the repertoire, especially since they have become such staples?

MS: For a company that can do any piece in the repertoire, it ends up taking quite a long time to cycle through that repertoire. And that sometimes means 30-year gaps for pieces that are relatively well-known like “Roméo et Juliette.” 

But to bring back “Roméo et Juliette” with Bryan Hymel and Nadine Sierra, both in role debuts. [They] are artists of incredible heart and they are fixtures of Gounod’s music. This production by Jean-Louis Grinda is a beautiful renaissance set that allows the piece to speak and I think it will be exciting. 

Then “Billy Budd” will be the return of Benjamin Britten after 15 years and he is a composer that has such an incisive way to tell stories on the opera stage. The marriage of text and music brings an energy that drives the pieces. The production will be by Michael Grandage which I am thrilled to bring because it was his first opera production, which he did for Glyndebourne and the reviews were through the roof. It has such a cinematic quality and a sense of claustrophobia that is necessary for the piece. The cast is also great with John Chest, Christian Van Horn, and William Burden and I am excited to see what they do.

OW: One of the interesting new productions is Mozart’s “Le Nozze di Figaro” because it will be part of a trilogy which connects the three Da Ponte operas into one story. Tell me a little about the idea of the production and what inspired it?

MS: One of the key priorities is to revitalize the core repertoire. Our last production of “Le Nozze di Figaro” was disposed of so I realized we needed a new “Don Giovanni” and “Le Nozze di Figaro” and I thought we should create it as a trilogy. I thought it was a way of not only investing into one piece but three. We designed it for the San Francisco stage and the audience and the idea is for them to last for decades to come. Micheal Cavanaugh came to mind because of our previous collaborations and it just so happened that he already had the idea. So it moved to that point. 

The idea is that all pieces take place within the construct of this great American house in which the drama unfolds in three centuries. We begin during post-revolutionary America with a great sense of opportunity and it translates really well in “Le Nozze di Figaro.” Then we move to the 1930s where America is in the crossroads between the Great Depression and the second World War. In this “Così Fan Tutte,” it’s about trying to find out what kind of country America wants to be. It’s like the characters who try to come to grips with who they are, but of course they are not successful. It’s tension that does get resolved. 

Then you move forward 150 years further along in a dystopian future and society has crumbled. The house is still there but its crumbling and the bonds that have held society together have been fragmented and break when Giovanni is sent to hell. Then there is the epilogue and that becomes the rebirth with the house and society being rebuilt. The idea of creating this meta-narrative is really exciting. 

OW: Are you planning to present all three works as a trilogy in a future season?

MS: It’s something we are talking about and it could be done. Technically it’s not prohibitive and as we begin to emerge with the new productions we will begin to explore that. 

 OW: Tell me about the casting choices and how you balanced between the rising stars and established singers?

MS: I think we try to pick them with great sensitivity. We want to try the best voice but we are also focused on bringing the best ensembles because these are stories being told by people interacting with each other and we spend a lot of time thinking how the artists will be connecting together. 

As I look at the season I am astounded by the number of debuts and we have a number of U.S. debuts with up and coming stars like Louise Alder, Jennifer Davis, and Simone Piazzola and house debuts like Michelle Bradley and Franco Fagioli. A lot of singers are also making role debuts like in the “Manon Lescaut,” “Roméo et Juliette,” and “Ernani.” It’s thrilling to see the energy of these singers birthing their interpretations of these roles and there will be a lot of creative energy that will be given to the audience. 

OW: The “(R)evolution of Steve Jobs” is making its San Francisco Opera debut. Tell me about the importance of bringing modern opera to the main stage?

MS: It is important to bring and invest in the future of the repertoire and San Francisco has long been one of the mainstays in that. Not only do we commission new works but we also present new works into America.  It is possible in this community because of the curiosity of San Francisco audiences and the energy of the audience. So a piece like “Steve Jobs” is a reflective piece about who we are as a community. I am very excited about what it could mean about allowing this community to see its own story told on stage. It’s not only about Steve Jobs but its a piece about the Bay Area through the lens of the Bay Area. 

And what is great is that we are working on a number of pieces in the future which bring great energy. I think Steve Jobs will be something invigorating for our audience.  

 

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