Concert Operetta Theater's "Naughty Marietta'

Resurrecting Victor Herbert
(not to mention my lost youth)

TOM PURDOM

The music of my youth was composed a full generation before I was born. In the late ’40s and early ’50s, when I was transiting the passage from childhood to my first attempts at impersonating maturity, Hollywood produced several films based on the operettas that had captivated theater audiences in the first third of the 20th Century. Impressionable adolescent minds could also be exposed to a weekly radio program, the “Lux Musical Theater,” that presented condensed versions of the operetta repertoire with a tenor named Gordon MacRae. High school talent shows still included tenors and basses singing songs like "Stout Hearted Men". I even attended a high school production of Sigmund Romberg’s The Student Prince.

Broadway belonged to Rogers and Hammerstein, and crooners dominated popular music; but Romberg and Victor Herbert wrote the songs that stirred my teenage fancies. Their settings and plots matched a reading diet that included Alexander Dumas, Rafael Sabatini and the historical novels that populated the best-seller lists in that era. Who wouldn’t want to be a student in Heidelberg, hurling tenor arias at a chorus of beer drinkers? Or a dashing rebel riding across the desert singing "One Alone"?

So you’ll have to take that bit of personal history into account in evaluating any review I write of a performance by the Concert Operetta Theater. Some people get all warm inside when they hear a snatch of Frank Sinatra or the rock group that happened to be leading the charts when they first started dating. I have a weakness for "Wanting You" and "The Riff Song."

A soprano with a problem

The Concert Operetta Theater draws on the huge pool of classically trained singers based in our region to present classic operettas concert-style, without sets or costumes. They leave the details up to your imagination and concentrate on the music and the dialogue.

The Saturday performance of the troupe’s latest production achieved all the important objectives despite an all too common difficulty. The soprano who played Marietta, Allison Hymel, was experiencing a problem with her voice, so she shared the role with Elizabeth Stevens, a young soprano who has been winning kudos on the international competition circuit. Stevens sang Marietta’s big numbers and Hymel handled the speaking parts and the rest of the singing assignments.

I don’t think I’ll offend anybody if I opine that most operetta numbers lie well inside the range of vocalists who have assaulted the peaks of the grand opera literature. In the leading roles, Hymel managed a flashy singing-over-the-chorus moment, despite her troubles, and her alter ego Stevens showed off a full, rich soprano and added some interesting sultry overtones to her first number. Joseph Demarest seemed believably stolid as Captain Dick and properly romantic when it came time to sing "I’m Falling in Love with Someone."

In the supporting roles, Brendan O’Brien did a fine job with a comic part that could seem ridiculous in the wrong hands; Kristina Moore brought a sweet lyrical mezzo to "Under the Southern Moon," and bass baritone Edward Albert scored with a vigorous assertion of the idea that men are the marionettes of women.

Who knew singers could act?

I was especially impressed with the quality of the acting. There’s no reason, after all, why a vocalist who can hit high notes should be able to recite dialogue in a natural, effective manner. Edward Albert did a particularly notable job. His character, Etienne, plays a pivotal role in the goings-on, and he handled the role with a style that helped tie everything together.

Violinist Richard Vanstone was the production’s unsinging hero. He substituted for an entire violin section and carried off some of the score’s most important effects all by himself. His solo rendition of the recurring theme, “Ah sweet mystery of life and love,” was one of the high points of the evening.

This is only the second time I’ve managed to attend a Concert Operetta Theater production, despite my youthful predilections. The other event was a potpourri of songs associated with Jeanette McDonald and Nelson Eddy that packed all the effect I hoped for. If you’ve developed the attitudes demanded by the operetta tradition, you’ll probably enjoy this company’s efforts. If you haven’t, then I suppose you’ll just have to spend your life wondering why something seems to be missing.