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Repertoire guide for Opera in the Park 2012

Artists The stars of Opera in the Park 2012

Opera in the Park 2012 Repertoire

The Music for Opera in the Park 2012

Watch and Listen Videos and recordings of the music for Opera in the Park 2012

Explore and Learn

Information, lyrics, and more about the works and songs of Opera in the Park 2012

SATURDAY, JULY 21, 2012 | GARNER PARK

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ARTISTS

CAITLIN LYNCH | SOPRANO Madison Opera Debut

Recently: First Lady, Die Zauberflöte (Dallas Opera); Countess, Le Nozze di Figaro (Lyric Opera Baltimore); Eliza, world premiere of Dark Sisters (Gotham Chamber Opera); Micaëla, Carmen (Seattle Opera); Konstanze, Die Entführung aus dem Serail (Arizona Opera); Eliza, Dark Sisters (Opera Company of Philadelphia); Upcoming: Donna Elvira, Don Giovanni (Madison Opera); Biancafiore, Francesca da Rimini (Metropolitan Opera) Website: www.caitlinlynchsoprano.com

EMILY FONS | MEZZO-SOPRANO Madison Opera Debut Recently: Masha, Moscow Cheryomushki (Chicago Opera Theater); Nicklausse, The Tales of Hoffmann, Fyodor, Boris Godunov, and Mercedes, Carmen (Lyric Opera of Chicago); Flora, La Traviata (Santa Fe Opera); Megacle, L’Olimpiade (Garsington Opera)

RUSSELL THOMAS | TENOR Madison Opera Debut Recently: Hoffmann, The Tales of Hoffmann (Canadian Opera Company); Foresto, Attila (Seattle Opera); Prince, A Flowering Tree (Cincinnati Opera); Andres, Wozzeck and Tamino, The Magic Flute (Metropolitan Opera) Upcoming: Foresto, Attila (Teatro Municpal Santiago); Tito, La Clemenza di Tito (Metropolitan Opera); Gabriele Adorno, Simon Boccanegra (Royal Opera Covent Garden) Website: www.russell-thomas.com

MATT BOEHLER |BASS Madison Opera Debut

Recently: Bass Soloist, Kepler (Spoleto Festival USA); Fyodor Drebednov, Moscow Cheryomushki (Chicago Opera Theater); Nourabad, The Pearl Fishers (Hawaii Opera)

Upcoming: Leporello, Don Giovanni (Madison Opera); Sparafucile, Rigoletto (Minnesota Orchestra); Hotel Manager, Powder Her Face (New York City Opera); Sarastro, Die Zauberflöte (Theater St. Gallen)

Website: www.mattboehler.com

GARY THOR WEDOW | CONDUCTOR Madison Opera Debut Recently: Orpheus (New York City Opera); Orpheus and Euridice (Seattle Opera); Le Donne Curiose (Wolf Trap Opera); Agrippina (Boston Lyric Opera) Upcoming: La Finta Giardiniera (Merola Program at San Francisco Opera); LaVoix Humaine / Suor Angelica (Seattle Opera); Rinaldo (Portland Opera)

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1. Star-Spangled Banner Chorus

2. Prelude & Hymn to the Sun Iris (Mascagni) Chorus

3. Volate Amori Ariodante (Handel) Ms. Lynch

4. La Ci Darem La Mano Don Giovanni (Mozart) Ms. Fons, Mr. Boehler

5. Ah, Fuggi il Traditor Don Giovanni (Mozart) Ms. Lynch

6. Catalogue aria Don Giovanni (Mozart) Mr. Boehler

7. Chi il Bel Sogno La Rondine (Puccini) Ms. Lynch

8. Violin aria The Tales of Hoffmann (Offenbach) Ms. Fons

9. Ma Se M’e Forza Perderti Un Ballo in Maschera (Verdi) Mr. Thomas

10. Volta la Terrea… Signori, Oggi d’Ulrica Un Ballo in Maschera (Verdi) Ms. Cisler, Mr. Thomas,

Mr. Rush, Mr. Dunbar,

Mr. Boehler, Chorus

-------INTERMISSION------

11. Anvil Chorus Il Trovatore (Verdi) Chorus

12. La Donna è Mobile Rigoletto (Verdi) Mr. Thomas

13. Quartet Rigoletto (Verdi) Ms. Lynch, Ms. Fons,

Mr. Thomas, Mr. Boehler

14. Barcarolle The Tales of Hoffmann (Offenbach) Ms. Lynch, Ms. Fons, Chorus

15. Modern Major General The Pirates of Penzance (Sullivan) Mr. Boehler, Chorus

16. Be My Love The Toast of New Orleans (Brodzky) Mr. Thomas

17. Ice Cream She Loves Me (Bock / Harnick) Ms. Fons

18. Almost Like Being in Love Brigadoon (Loewe) Ms. Fons, Mr. Boheler

19. Can’t Help Lovin’ That Man Show Boat (Kern) Ms. Lynch, Chorus

20. Make Our Garden Grow Candide (Bernstein) Full Company, Chorus

OPERA IN THE PARK 2012 REPERTOIRE (SUBJECT TO CHANGE)

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Prelude & Hymn to the Sun | Iris (Mascagni)

Audio: Hymn to the Sun - Iris

CD: Dessi, Cura, Ghiaruov, Gelmetti, Opera di Roma (BMG Riccordi)

Volate Amori | Ariodante (Handel)

Audio: Volate, amori - Ariodante (Claycomb)

Video: Volate, amori - Ariodante (Koppelstetter)

CD: von Otter, Podles, Dawson, Croft, Minkowski (Archiv)

La Ci Darem La Mano | Don Giovanni (Mozart)

Video: La ci darem la mano - Don Giovanni (Terfel, Hong)

CD: Gilfry, D'Arcangelo, Silvestrelli, Gardiner (Archiv Produktions)

CD: Ramey, Tomowa-Sintow, Baltsa, Burchuladze, Battle, von Karajan (Deutsche Grammophon)

DVD: Terfel, Furlanetto, Fleming, Kringelbron, Groves, Hong, Relyea, Levine (Deutsche Grammophon)

DVD: Keenlyside, Ketelsen, Vargas, DiDonato, Poplavskaya, Mackerras (Opus Arte)

Ah, Fuggi il Traditor | Don Giovanni (Mozart)

Video: Duet and Aria - Don Giovanni (Gilfry, Nikiteanu/Bartoli)

Video: Duet and Aria - Don Giovanni (Maltman, Siurina, Röschmann)

Catalogue aria | Don Giovanni (Mozart)

Video: Catalogue Aria - Don Giovanni (Furlanetto)

Video: Catalogue Aria - Don Giovanni (Pape)

Chi il Bel Sogno | La Rondine (Puccini)

Audio: Chi il bel sogno - La Rondine (L. Price)

Video: Chi il bel sogno - La Rondine (Gheorghiu)

CD: Te Kanawa, Domingo, Maazel (Sony Classical)

Violin aria | The Tales of Hoffmann (Offenbach)

Video: Violin Aria - Hoffmann (Mentzer)

Video: Violin Aria - Hoffmann (Lindsey)

CD: Sutherland, Domingo, Bonynge (Decca)

Ma Se M’e Forza Perderti | Un Ballo in Maschera (Verdi)

Video: Ma se m'e forza perderti - Ballo (Pavarotti)

Audio: Ma se m'e forza perderti - Ballo (Tucker)

CD: Domingo, Ricciarelli, Bruson, Obraztsova, Grubovera, Abbado (Deutsche Grammophon)

CD: Bergonzi, Price, Merrill, Verrett, Frist, Leinsdorf (RCA)

CD: Callas, Di Stefano, Gobbi, Barbieri, Ratti, Votto (EMI)

Volta la Terrea… Signori, Oggi d’Ulrica | Un Ballo in Maschera (Verdi)

Audio: Act 1 Aria and ensemble - Ballo (Pavarotti, Battle)

Anvil Chorus | Il Trovatore (Verdi)

Video: Anvil chorus - Trovatore (Metropolitan Opera, Levine)

WATCH AND LISTEN

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CD: Price, Domingo, Milnes, Mehta (RCA)

La Donna è Mobile | Rigoletto (Verdi)

Video: La donna e mobile - Rigoletto (Pavarotti)

Video: La donna è mobile - Rigoletto (Kaufmann)

Quartet | Rigoletto (Verdi)

Audio: Rigoletto Quartet (Domingo, MacNeil, Cotrubas, Jones)

Audio: Rigoletto Quartet (Gruberova, Fassbaender, Shicoff, Bruson)

Video: Rigoletto Quartet (Callas, Lazzarini, Gobbi, Di Stefano)

CD: Sutherland, Pavarotti, Milnes, Bonynge (Decca)

Barcarolle | The Tales of Hoffmann (Offenbach)

Video: Barcarolle - Hoffmann (Netrebko, Garanča)

Video: Barcarolle - Hoffmann (Brower, Damrau)

Modern Major General | The Pirates of Penzance (Sullivan)

Video: Modern Major General - Pirates (Feature film starring Kevin Kline)

CD: Ainsley, Allan, Mackerras

DVD: Motion Picture (Kline, Lansbury, Ronstadt)

Be My Love | The Toast of New Orleans (Brodzky)

Audio: Be My Love - New Orleans (Lanza)

Audio: Be My Love - New Orleans (Wunderlich)

Ice Cream | She Loves Me (Bock / Harnick) Video: Ice Cream - She Loves Me (Bongfeldt)

Audio: Ice Cream - She Loves Me (Cook)

CD: Original Broadway Recording - She Loves Me (Bock, Harnick, Cook, Massey)

Almost Like Being in Love | Brigadoon (Loewe)

Audio: Almost Like Being in Love - Brigadoon (Barrett, Luker)

CD: Original Broadway Recording - Brigadoon

Can’t Help Lovin’ That Man | Show Boat (Kern)

Video: Can't help lovin' that man - Show Boat (from the film, sung by Ava Gardner)

CD: Hadley, Stratas, Hubbard, Garrison (EMI)

DVD: Motion Picture (Grayson, Gardner, Keel)

Make Our Garden Grow | Candide (Bernstein) Video: Make our garden grow - Candide (Hadley, Anderson, Bernstein)

Video: Make our garden grow - Candide (Groves, Chenoweth, Allen, LuPone, Blumenkrantz)

CD: Candide - Original Broadway Recording (1956)

CD: Candide - Bernstein (Hadley, Andrerson, Green, Ludwig, Gedda, Bernstein)

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The Star-Spangled Banner The lyrics of America’s national anthem are taken from the poem Defence of Fort McHenry, written in 1814 by Francis Scott Key. The poet penned the lines after witnessing the bombardment of Fort McHenry in Chesapeake Bay by the British Royal Navy. The poem was set to the tune of a popular British song. The poem has four stanzas, but only the first stanza is commonly sung. Although in use for over a century after its creation, the patriotic song of the United States of America did not become the official national anthem until March 3, 1931. Read the text of The Star-Spangled Banner. Image: Professional flag restorer Amelia Fowler and hear team work on restoration and preservation of the flag that flew over Fort McHenry (1914—Courtesy of the Smithsonian collection).

♫ Prelude & Hymn to the Sun | Iris (Mascagni)

Iris is a three-act Italian opera by Pietro Mascagni, to a libretto by Luigi Illica. The opera premiered on November 22, 1898 at the Teatro Constanzi in Rome. Set in 19th-century Japan, the opera tells the story of Iris, a beautiful girl who is devoted to her blind father. Prince Osaka seeks to possess Iris and arranges for her to be abducted to a brothel. Her father searches the land for her, but upon finding her in the brothel, he believes she has lost her honor and curses her. Iris commits suicide by drowning herself in a sewer. “Hymn to the Sun” occurs in the opening scene of the opera. Image: Hariclea Darclée in the world premiere of Iris (1898).

♫ Volate Amori | Ariodante (Handel) Ariodante is a three-act Italian opera by George Frideric Handel, to an anonymous libretto based on the work of Antonio Salvi. The opera premiered in the Covent Garden Theatre in London, on January 8, 1735. In the opera, the betrothal of Ariodante to Ginevra, daughter of the King of Scotland, is threatened by Ariodante’s rival, Polinesso. Dalinda, friend of Ginevra, is unwittingly used by Polinesso to spread the rumor that Ginevra is his lover. The King disowns Ginevra, and heart-broken Polinesso tries but fails to kill himself. Polinesso sends assassins to kill Dalinda, the only witness to his scheme. However, Ariodante drives off the assassins. Polinesso seeks to win the King’s favor by defending Ginevra’s honor in a tournament. He loses to Ariodante’s brother, Lurcanio, and with his last breath confesses his guilt. The King pardons Ginevra. Ginevra’s aria is sung in Act I after she and Ariodante pledge their love to one another. “Volate, amori, di due bei cori la gioia immensa a celebrar!” (“Fly, ye Cupids, to celebrate the immense joy of two loving hearts!”). Image: George Frideric Handel (1749, by Thomas Hudson).

EXPLORE AND LEARN

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♫ La Ci Darem La Mano | Don Giovanni (Mozart)

Don Giovanni is a two-act Italian opera by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, to a libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It premiered at what is now the Estates Theatre in Prague on October 29, 1787. One of the world’s most performed operas, Don Giovanni tells the story of a lothario whose misdeeds eventually see him dragged down to hell. Madison Opera is presenting Don Giovanni during the 2012/13 season, and a full synopsis is available here. The duet “La Ci Darem La Mano” (“There we’ll take hands”) begins when the wealthy Don Giovanni attempts to seduce the innocent (and betrothed) peasant girl Zerlina with promises of marriage. Read the Italian and English lyrics side-by-side here. Image: Bronze sculpture by Anna Chromý titled “Il Commendatore” (2006-2011). The fifteen-foot tall white marble statue sits in the square outside of the opera house where Don Giovanni premiered.

♫ Ah, Fuggi il Traditor | Don Giovanni (Mozart)

Just as Zerlina is about to fall into Don Giovanni’s clutches, they are interrupted by one of his scorned lovers, Donna Elvira, who warns the impressionable Zerlina to be wary of the Don’s ways as she sings “Ah, Fuggi il Traditor” (“Ah, flee from the traitor”). Read the Italian and English lyrics side-by-side here.

♫ Catalogue aria | Don Giovanni (Mozart)

One of opera’s most famous arias, the Catalogue aria is a description of Don Giovanni’s global conquests. The aria is sung by Leporello, Don Giovanni’s long-suffering servant, in order to stall Donna Elvira while Don Giovanni makes a quick escape. The aria details Don Giovanni’s preference for literally any woman; or, as Leporello puts it, “Purché porti la gonnella, Voi sapete quel che fa.” (“If she wears a skirt, you know what he does”). Read the Italian and English lyrics side-by-side here. Image: A scene from Don Giovanni (Virginia Opera) featuring the scenery Madison Opera will use for the production in April 2013. Click on the image to view a slideshow.

♫ Chi il Bel Sogno | La Rondine (Puccini)

La Rondine (The Swallow) is a three-act opera by Giacomo Puccini, to an Italian libretto by Giuseppe Adami based on a German libretto by Alfred Maria Willner and Heinz Reichert. It premiered at the Grand Théâtre de Monte Carlo on March 27, 1917. Set on the Riviera in Paris during the French Second Empire, the opera follows the emotional life of Magda, mistress of the wealthy Parisian banker Rambaldo. Magda finds the opportunity to know true love when she meets Ruggero, a young man from the provinces. Magda leaves Rambaldo and her life of luxury to live in a cottage with Ruggero. Despite their mounting debt, Ruggero believes they can be happy together and writes to his parents for permission to marry her. Magda believes his family would never accept a woman like her and returns to Rambaldo, leaving Ruggero heart-broken. In the aria “Chi il bel sogno” (“Glorious dream”), Magda sings the story of a woman named Doretta and her yearning for blissful happiness. Read the Italian and English lyrics side-by-side here. Image: Lucrezi Bori as Magda in the Metropolitan Opera premiere of La Rondine (1928).

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♫ Violin aria | The Tales of Hoffmann (Offenbach) The Tales of Hoffman is a French opera in three acts by Jacques Offenbach. The libretto was written by Jules Barbier and Michael Carré, based on their play of the same title. The play and the opera were taken from short stories by E.T.A. Hoffmann. The opera’s first public performance was at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on February 10, 1881. Offenbach died before completing the opera, and the version that premiered was by Ernest Guiraud. The prologue and epilogue of the opera are set in a wine-cellar under the Nuremberg opera house, where the drunken and dissolute poet Hoffmann is regaling his students with tales of his three great loves. The three acts of the opera (Olympia, Antonia, and Giulietta) recount Hoffmann’s infatuation with a mechanical animated doll destroyed by its creator (Olympia), his genuine but thwarted love with a consumptive singer who is forced to sing herself to death (Antonia), and his idle dalliance with a courtesan who steals Hoffmann’s reflection from a mirror (Giulietta). The “Violin aria” is sung by Hoffmann’s poetic Muse, who has disguised herself as his closest friend Nicklausse in the hope of convincing him to be once again fully devoted to poetry. Read the French and English lyrics side-by-side here. Image: The original cast at the end of the Antonia act from the 1881 premiere.

♫ Ma Se M’e Forza Perderti | Un Ballo in Maschera (Verdi)

Un Ballo in Maschera (A Masked Ball) is a three-act Italian opera by Giuseppe Verdi, to a libretto by Antonio Somma loosely based on the play Gustave III (1833) by French playwright Eugène Scribe. The opera premiered in Rome on February 17, 1859. Both the play and opera concern the historical assassination of King Gustav III of Sweden, and thus faced serious opposition from the censors. As a result, the premiere of Verdi’s opera fictionalized the characters and set the action in late 16th-cenutry Boston. Many modern productions have reverted to the original 18th-century Swedish setting and characters. The opera tells of the innocent love between King Gustav and his best friend’s wife, Amelia, and how that love is used in a political intrigue that leads to tragedy. Madison Opera’s 2012/13 season opens with this lush opera, and a synopsis can be found here. In the aria “Ma Se M’e Forza Perderti” (“But if I am forced to lose you”), King Gustav resolves to rid himself of temptation and avoid sorrow by sending Amelia and her husband away. Read the Italian and English lyrics side-by-side here. Image: King Gustav III of Sweden (1777, by Alexander Roslin) and the costume he

wore to the fatal masked ball (now on display at The Royal Armory, Stockholm).

♫ Volta la Terrea… Signori, Oggi d’Ulrica | Un Ballo in Maschera (Verdi)

The young page Oscar tells King Gustav about the fortune-teller Ulrica, who has been accused of witchcraft and is to be banished. In “Volta la Terrea” (“Once the ashen face”) Oscar tells the King of Ulrica’s talents at stargazing, and urges him to pardon her. In “Signori, Oggi d’Ulrica” (“Gentleman, I now invite you to Ulrica’s dwelling”), King Gustav and his men resolve to go to Ulrica’s cavern in disguise, despite the inherent danger involved. Read the French and English lyrics side-by-side here. (see page 8 of the PDF). Image: A scene from Un Ballo in Maschera (Lyric Opera of Kansas City) featuring the scenery Madison Opera will use for the production in October 2012. Click on the image to view a slideshow.

-------INTERMISSION------

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♫ Anvil Chorus | Il Trovatore (Verdi)

Il Trovatore is a four-act Italian opera by Giuseppe Verdi, to a libretto by Salvadore Cammarano based on the play El Trovador (1836) by Antonio Antonio García Gutiérrez. It premiered at the Teatro Apollo in Rome on January 19, 1853. Extremely popular for its musical beauty, Il Trovatore is nonetheless felt to have an awkwardly complex plot—even for a Verdi opera— due largely to the complicated “back story” that occurs before the overture even begins. Read the synopsis and NPR’s interesting modern take on the back story here. The Anvil Chorus from Act II is sung by Spanish Gypsies striking their anvils at dawn. The chorus sings of the happiness of hard work, wine, and Gypsy women. Read the Italian and English lyrics side-by-side here. Image: The Anvil Chorus scene from the Metropolitan Opera production (April 2011, photo by Ken Howard).

♫ La Donna è Mobile | Rigoletto (Verdi)

Rigoletto is a three-act Italian opera by Giuseppe Verdi, to a libretto by Franceso Maria Piave based on the play Le Roi S’amuse (1832) by Victor Hugo. It premiered at La Fenice in Venice on March 11, 1851 as part of a double-bill with a ballet version of Faust. As with Un Ballo in Maschera, the initial incarnation of Rigoletto met with disapproval from the censors and it underwent a number of changes before making its successful debut. The opera is set in 16th-century Mantua and tells the story of the licentious Duke of Mantua, the Duke’s jester Rigoletto, and Rigoletto’s daughter Gilda. Both the Duke and Rigoletto are cursed by a nobleman who has been wronged by them. The curse terrifies Rigoletto, but the Duke dismisses it. The Duke, disguised as a student, has been secretly courting Rigoletto’s daughter, whom the jester keeps hidden away in their home. Courtiers trick Rigoletto into helping them abduct Gilda, and before Rigoletto figures out what has happened, Gilda has already been seduced by the Duke. Rigoletto hires the assassin Sparafucile to kill the Duke, but Sparafucile is persuaded by his sister Maddalena to spare the Duke and instead kill the first stranger to enter their inn. Gilda overhears the siblings, and out of love for the Duke sacrifices herself. Rigoletto arrives to claim the body of the Duke only to discover that it is his daughter who has been assassinated. He falls over her body, the nobleman’s curse ringing in his ears. In the opening of Act III, the Duke sings the famous aria, “La Donna è Mobile” (“Women are fickle”), claiming that all women are fickle and will betray any man who falls in love with them. Read the Italian and English here. Image: Costume designs from the premiere production (1851).

♫ Quartet | Rigoletto (Verdi)

Rigoletto and a crestfallen Gilda watch through holes in the inn’s walls as the Duke seduces Maddalena. As Maddalena flirts with the Duke, Gilda wonders how she could have ever loved such a cad, and Rigoletto vows revenge on the shameless Duke.

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♫ Barcarolle | The Tales of Hoffmann (Offenbach)

The Barcarolle (“Belle nuit, ô nuit d'amour” | “Beauteous Night, O Night of Love”) is perhaps the most famous number from the opera. Barcarolles were folk songs sung by Venetian gondoliers, and the term (taken from the Italian barca, ‘boat’) has come to mean any piece of music composed in that style. Offenbach originally wrote the piece as “The Elves Song” for the opera Die Rheinnixen, which premiered in Vienna seventeen years before The Tales of Hoffmann. When Ernest Guriaud completed Offenbach’s unfinished The Tales of Hoffmann, he incorporated an excerpt from “The Elves Song” to stand as the Barcarolle. The Barcarolle has been heard in James Cameron’s Titanic , and was the tune for “Tonight is So Right For Love” from the Elvis Presley film G.I. Blues. In the opera, the courtesan Giulietta and Hoffmann’s friend Nicklausse sing this languid tune as they lounge with Hoffmann in a Venetian palace on the Grand Canal. Read the French and English lyrics here. Image: Romanian soprano Virginia Zeani as Giulietta (1966, Geneva). Zeani was one of the first sopranos to sing all four principal heroines in a single performance.

♫ Modern Major General | The Pirates of Penzance (Sullivan)

The Pirates of Penzance is a comic operetta in two acts by Arthur Sullivan, with libretto by W.S. Gilbert. The operetta premiered at the Fifth Avenue Theatre in New York City on December 31, 1879. The plot concerns the adventures of Frederic, who was accidently apprenticed by his nurse Ruth to a gang of pirates. Frederic discovers on his twenty-first birthday that he was born in a leap year on February 29, and thus technically has many more years left in his apprenticeship. He yearns for a lawful life with his love Mabel, the daughter of Major-General Stanley, but is forced by honor to help the pirates fight the forces of law and order. Everything ends happily when an appeal is made to the pirates, who turn out to be noblemen who have gone astray. “Modern Major General” is arguably the most famous tune produced by Gilbert and Sullivan. It is not uncommon for modern performances to add one or two humorous topical stanzas to the end of the song, much as the original lyrics did at the premiere. In the operetta, Major-General Stanley sings his signature tune at his first appearance. Read the lyrics here. Image: Major-General Stanley surrounded by pirates, proper ladies, and the Union Jack (Carl Rosa Opera, Cornwall).

♫ Be My Love | The Toast of New Orleans (Brodzky)

The Toast of New Orleans is a musical film starring Mario Lanza and Kathryn Grayson. It was released on August 24, 1950, and tells of a New Orleans fisherman who falls in love with a star opera soprano. The film was a major technical production for MGM, requiring 35 different sets and monopolizing three adjoining sound stages. “Be My Love” was composed by Nicholas Brodzky with lyrics by Sammy Cahn. The song was nominated for an Academy Award, and has received numerous covers in multiple languages. Read the lyrics here. Image: Lanza and Grayson in one of the operas-within-the-movie, singing the love duet from Madama Butterfly.

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♫ Ice Cream | She Loves Me (Bock / Harnick)

She Loves Me is a musical with book by Joe Masteroff, music by Jerry Bock, and lyrics by Sheldon Harnick. It is the fifth adaptation of the play Parfumeri by Hungarian playwright Miklos Laszlo, and modern audiences are probably most familiar with the story as the movie You’ve Got Mail starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. The musical premiered on Broadway in 1963. While She Loves Me was not a commercial success, it received rave critical reviews and made a triumphant Broadway revival in 1993. The plot is about shop employees Georg Nowack and Amalia Balash, who fight like cats and dogs while being unaware that they are each other’s secret pen-pal. In the second act, Georg offers Amalia vanilla ice cream as a gift to apologize for his rude behavior the night before. Amalia, writing to her pen-pal, gets distracted by thoughts of Georg’s surprising kindness. Read the lyrics here. Image: Jacquelyn Piro as Amalia, enjoying her gift of vanilla ice cream (2003, Pittsburgh CLO).

♫ Almost Like Being in Love | Brigadoon (Loewe)

Brigadoon is a musical with music by Frederick Loewe and book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner. The musical premiered at the Ziegfeld Theatre on Broadway on March 13, 1947. It has received a film and a TV adaptation, the former starring Gene Kelly and Cyd Charisse and the latter starring Robert Goulet and Peter Falk. The plot concerns Tommy Albright and Jeff Douglas, two modern-day American hunters who get lost in the highlands of Scotland. They stumble upon an 18th-century village called Brigadoon, which does not appear on any map because it is enchanted and appears for only a single day once every century. As a result of a prayer by the local preacher asking that God protect the village from witches, the inhabitants of Brigadoon fall asleep every night only to wake up one-hundred years later. If any of the villagers were to leave Brigadoon, the village and all of its inhabitants would disappear forever; however, an outsider could remain in the village providing he or she loved someone in the enchanted town. Tommy, who has a fiancé awaiting him in New York, falls in love with Fiona but is convinced by Jeff that his rightful place is in the modern world. In Act I, Tommy and Fiona begin to fall for each other and sing the charming duet “Almost Like Being in Love.” Read the lyrics here. Image: Gene Kelly and Cyd Charisse in the film version of Brigadoon (1954).

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♫ Can’t Help Lovin’ That Man | Show Boat (Kern)

Show Boat is a two-act musical with music by Jerome Kern and book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, based on the novel by Edna Feber. The musical opened at the Zeigfeld Theatre on Broadway on December 27, 1927. The musical spans forty years and revolves around the performers on the show boat Cotton Blossom, an entertainment vessel owned by the Hawk family. When it is discovered show star Julie La Verne is a mulatto and thus illegally married to a white man, she and her husband Steve Barker are forced to leave the Cotton Blossom. Magnolia Hawk, the daughter of Captain Hawk, becomes the new star with her leading man, Gaylord Ravenal. The two fall in love, marry, and move to Chicago to start a new life of luxury. Six years later, Gaylord’s gambling addiction has drained their finances. Shamed and depressed, Gaylord leaves Magnolia, not realizing that she is pregnant. Magnolia auditions for a job at the Trocadero club, where Julie has been working in an alcoholic stupor since Steve abandoned her. In Act I, Julie sings “Can’t Help Lovin’ that Man” in the Cotton Blossom’s kitchen. Read the lyrics here. Image: The cast of the premiere production of Show Boat (1927).

♫ Make Our Garden Grow | Candide (Bernstein)

Candide is a comic operetta with music by Leonard Bernstein, lyrics by Richard Wilbur, John Latouche, and Dorothy Parker, and libretto by Lillian Hellman after Voltaire’s satirical novel of the same name. It premiered at the Martin Beck Theatre in New York on December 1, 1956 to largely negative reviews. The show underwent a number of revisions starting in 1974 led by Harold Prince. Hellman would not permit any of her work to be used for revivals, and so Prince commissioned new lyrics from Stephen Sondheim with a new libretto by Hugh Wheeler, which is more faithful to the novel and has largely been used in place of Hellman’s in subsequent productions. The operetta tells the story of the young Candide, who is determined to adhere to his tutor’s creed of mindless optimism. Over the course of the operetta, Candide is banished from his homeland, captured by Bulgarian raiders, beaten and left for dead by soldiers of the Spanish Inquisition, robbed, and repeatedly separated from the woman he loves, Cunegonde (who suffers a number of horrendous events herself). Despite it all, Candide stubbornly clings to his tutor’s “the best of all possible worlds” philosophy and believes that everything that has happened is for the best. At the end of the operetta, Candide tells Cunegonde and their destitute band of followers that they will cease wondering about the meaning of a meaningless life and instead adopt the new philosophy of his tutor: a work ethic. In the finale, they all happily sing “Make Our Garden Grow”, extolling the virtues and true paradise of hard work. Read the lyrics here. Image: A scene from the New York City Opera production of Candide (2008).

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