Yvonne Fontane - Artistic Director
Parallel with her singing career, 2004 marked the start of Yvonne's work as artistic director with the highly acclaimed production of CARMEN at Stowe Opera.
Her opera productions endeavour to tell stories with so much true emotion that audiences will once again understand why protagonists and choruses break into song to express their feelings. She challenges audiences to allow themselves to raise onto a similarly heightened emotional level as the characters on stage, to truly experience their emotional journey.
PLEASE SCROLL DOWN TO FIND OUT ABOUT PAST AND FUTURE PRODUCTIONS
Directing CARMEN at STOWE OPERA in 2004
Yvonne's first production as artistic director was CARMEN at Stowe Opera in 2004. After having sung the role many times in several different productions, she was given a great chance to collect some of the many questions and paradoxes that the opera had posed to her over the years and find, together with a brilliant team, some answers and solutions.
Musical Director and director of Stowe Opera, Robert Secret and designer Ian McKillop gave Yvonne the support she needed whilst directing and singing the role of Carmen. So too, were the soloists and 25 devoted chorus members who all had to accept the unusual idea of performing with their artisitic director.
Yvonne's 2004 production of Carmen was acknowledged by Roderick Dunnett in OPERA NOW under "WHO'S HOT" and called a "revelation".
For an indepth on-line review by Roderick Dunnett of
Stowe Opera's Carmen, please click here
"Fontane is a super-effective director. One only had to watch the chorus moves, its management and manipulation, in Act I, or her shifting blockings also evidenced early in Act IV, to see how clever she is at putting people in the right place. Individual chorus members had small moves, vignettes, flirtations, marital tiffs, modest in themselves, but which added much to the action."
"The mere fact that this Carmen presented so many paradoxes, and invites so many conflicting responses, is a measure of how far Fontane has managed to penetrate plot and personality, and get others to do so around her."
"This staging by Yvonne Fontane, who not only sang the title role, but directed the production as well, is indeed Stowe's punchiest and raunchiest to date; a Carmen that would have graced Sadler's Wells, and not have disgraced the Coliseum."
(MVDAILY.COM, Roderick Dunnett) Stowe Opera 2004
"In the opera...Fontane really makes her presence felt, incorporating ideas that make much dramatic sense...Fontane not only directs, she also sings Carmen. It soon becomes clear, however, that manipulating everybody else into the shadows is not part of Fontane's agenda...In a curiously touching scene, Michaela doesn't just limply proffer a letter from Jose's mother, she arrives complete with rug and picnic, to firmly remind him of the pleasures of home cooking.
But the major dramatic focus is on depicting Carmen and Jose as social equals - from utterly, and explosively different social backgrounds certainly, but equals nonetheless."
(The Oxford Times)
Click here for images of CARMEN
Directing Mozart's COSI FAN TUTTE at STOWE OPERA in 2005
In 2005, Robert Secret, MD of Stowe Opera, asked Yvonne to return as Artistic Director and she was now looking to make equal sense of the complex and, musically most beautiful piece COSI FAN TUTTE.
The cast consisted of the vocally, as well as dramatically strong singers Simone Sauphanor (Fiordiligi), Rebekah Coffey (Despina), Nicholas Ransley (Ferrando), Adrian Powter (Guglielmo), Simon Wilding (Don Alfonso) and Yvonne Fontane herself (Dorabella). With Robert Secret on the baton, the inspired stage and lighting designs of Ian McKillop, and the sensitive costume designs of Nicholas Boiselle, this promised to be another summer of working with a great team.
To Yvonne's mind, Cosi fan tutte is potentially a very one-sided study of human nature, claiming that the emotional arm of all women can be twisted if man only perseveres long enough.
However, in this instance the two men in question, Guglielmo and Ferrando, have to go into the realm of great pretence and lies in order to make the point of their bet and win it. And the two prove to be formidable experts in these non-virtues: "Cosi fan Tutte" when it comes to men as well?
What good is any information acquired under false pretences? And at what cost does one now own this knowledge?
In the opera, the men's competitive streak, their male ego and pride drives them to losing their bet to Don Alfonso, the stirrer of their egos. The fact that they succeed in breaking the women's resolve can make neither them nor the women feel very good. Surely, after such escapades as described by Lorenzo da Ponte, librettist of Cosi, the ending will have to be a far cry from the seemingly shallow and frivolous opening of the plot.
"Above all, Stowe is unafraid to play things straight... Fontane kept things intelligently straightforward and allowed Da Ponte's subtle homily to speak for itself... The ensuing crisp changes between the "wrong" couples, plus the set-to between Fiordiligi and Ferrando were beautifully carried off."
"Simon Wilding's Don Alfonso appeared hypermanic, but his isolation near the close, and the contrast between one couple's reconciliation and the other's continuing estrangement, were well-considered touches."
(OPERA) Stowe Opera 2005
Click here for images of COSI FAN TUTTE
Directing CARMEN at LAKELAND OPERA in Cumbria in 2005
In November 2005, Yvonne Fontane was asked at short notice to act as Artistic Director by Lakeland Opera for their production of CARMEN which went on a small tour through Cumbria and ended with three performances at the Theatre by the Lake in Keswick.
"(Director) Yvonne Fontane did a wonderful job. I shall long recall the Freudian swooning of the ladies on the arrival of the .. bullfighter Escamillo.. This was a thoroughly intelligent.. production."
(Whitehaven News) Carmen, Lakeland Opera 2005
Directing CAVALLERIA RUSTICANA & PAGLIACCI at LAKELAND OPERA in 2007
After a successful production of CARMEN in 2005, Yvonne returned to Lakeland Opera in October/November 2007 to direct PAGLIACCI and CAVALLERIA RUSTICANA. This production went on a small tour to the Keswick Theatre by the Lake, The Coronation Hall in Ulverston and the Sands Centre in Carlisle.
David Sutton, who has worked at ENO, WNO and Scottish Opera had now been appointed as the company's Musical Director and this truly marked a new beginning for Lakeland Opera.
Both operas were written in the genre of Italian “verismo” – the true and honest portrayal of every day life. The style of “verismo” – realism and naturalism - began to emerge during the second half of the 19th century.
The great musical and dramatic effect of the two operas is due to their clearly structured stories together with the undeniable, emotional power of the strong and beautiful phrases of Belcanto.
The passionate nature of both dramas is intense and riveting. It challenges the singers and the orchestra to find shades and colours within their performances that can reflect with honesty, the strength of the characters’ emotions.
The realism of the operas show that love can both set you free, but also hold you in a strong grip of confusing emotions such as jealousy, frustration and doubt - specially within the sometimes devastating confines of rigid social and religious rules.
Although written over 100 years ago, what unfolds in the operas can be made relevant to our emotional lives in this day and age.
It is easy to identify with the characters if we as the audience accept their heightened emotional state and allow ourselves to experience their journey on a similar level. Yvonne was asked by the company to sing the role of Santuzza and was joined by a dramatically and vocally very strong cast: Andy Morton Canio/Turridu, Michaela Bloom Nedda, Craig Smith Tonio/Alfio, Douglas Nairne Silvio, Anando Mukerjee Beppe, Mary Burman Mamma Lucia.
Set and lighting was once again taken on by the young and very creative designer Lois Maskell who also worked with Yvonne on Lakeland Opera's CARMEN production in 2005.
www.lakelandopera.org.uk
Directing THAT MAN STEPHEN WARD at the HAMPSTEAD AND HIGHGATE FESTIVAL in 2008
George Vass, director of the Hampstead and Highgate Festival asked Yvonne to act as Artistic Director for THAT MAN STEPHEN WARD, a piece written by the young composer Thomas Hyde for baritone, small orchestra, one actress and two dancers.
The subject matter are the various agonising thought processes that set Stephen Ward's urge into motion to commit suicide after his trial in 1963.
This production, which took place in May 2008 was in close collaboration with the composer and posed many new but nevetheless welcome challenges.
www.hamandhighfest.co.uk
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