What do costumes, political intrigue, epic stories and the Stroum Jewish Community Center make you think of? If you said Purim, you would be very close. Now shift your thinking to the stage, add a good strong singing voice or two, and think of the opera. Seattle Opera and the SJCC on Mercer Island have decided to present a new lecture series exploring the connections between this high art form and our Jewish heritage.
Seneca Garber, Education Associate with the Seattle Opera, says the idea for this series came about when Joyce Rivkin, an active member of Mercer Island’s Jewish community as well as the Seattle Opera, suggested a lecture series that could be a bridge between the two groups. This idea fit in well with plans that the Seattle Opera already had for a new program on Mercer Island. Hoping to do something a little different than the standard lecture series, the folks in the education department saw a great opportunity to focus the series on the contributions to opera by famous Jewish singers and composers and also to explore how faith and culture are intertwined.
In the first program, which is free to the public and intended as an introduction to the series, Garber will give a preview of the upcoming opera season using recorded music of great singers of the past. Cantor David Serkin-Poole of Temple B’nai Torah will then talk about singing and opera and the interrelationship of faith and culture, and how they come together in this singular art form.
Roni Antebi, the adults and seniors program coordinator at the JCC, explains that, “while the inherent focus of the lecture series is a religious Jewish component, we hope the series can be for people of all faiths, backgrounds and affiliations to learn more about how art and religion intertwine.”
Ms. Antebi added that all JCC-sponsored programs are designed to enrich the lives of its members as well as to open its doors to the greater community.
The series begins on the evening of Monday, April 14 with an introductory preview called “Opera Sings the Soul, Exploring Opera’s Cultural Connections.” Garber hopes the series can excite younger people or anyone who may not have given opera a chance, but are open to learning about it. He also hopes to reinvigorate the opera’s current season ticketholders. He believes the series can bring a new perspective to the familiar art form and enrich the experience of people who attend these events — perhaps to get them thinking about opera and other forms of cultural vocal music, like Jewish cantorial music, in ways they hadn’t thought of before.
A kosher dessert and coffee reception will follow the first collaboration between the Seattle Opera and the Stroum JCC.
These lectures will mix discussions about famous Jewish opera singers, such as Jan Peerce, Beverly Sills, Robert Merrill and Roberta Peters with interviews of Jewish members of the local community who have been involved in bringing opera to the Seattle area.
Interviews for the new series are being planned and may include such specialists as Mina Miller, artistic director of Music of Remembrance, who brought the performance of the Holocaust-era children’s opera Brundibar a couple of years ago, and Peter Kazaras, the world-renowned tenor-turned-stage director who currently serves as Artistic Director of the Young Artist Program.
The series will stop during the summer and then pick up again in the fall, although there may be one additional lecture offered this summer.
Singing the soul
