Designing Schafer Opera

Cinnabar Phoenix takes flight again in the Wolverton Hills

You pretty much have to own a car if you're going to follow the work of composer R. Murray Schafer. Although his music is also performed in normal concert settings around Toronto, his great life's work is his 12-part Patria Cycle of operatic spectacles, staged all over central Canada in a variety of settings over the course of several decades, and loosely linked by a parallel mythological continuity.
Even before Patria, Schafer was creating works like Music for Wilderness Lake (1979), performed by trombonists located strategically in the underbrush around the edges of a wooded lake. In Toronto, Schafer has used the Ontario Science Centre for his all-night pageant Patria 6: Ra (1983), based on Egyptian myth, and Union Station after midnight for Patria 4: The Alchemical Theatre of Hermes Trismagistos (1992). The Princess of the Stars: The Prologue was presented on lakes in Ontario and Banff (using canoes). Patria 3: The Greatest Show duplicated (and destroyed) a carnival fairground in Peterborough. Patria 10: The Spirit Garden created a planting ritual last spring on the former monastery that is now the St. Norbert Arts Centre just south of downtown Winnipeg. Now Patria 8: The Palace of the Cinnabar Phoenix transforms a lakeside Ontario property into an enchanted Chinese kingdom.
As usual, Schafer is working with a crême-de-la-crême creative team: choreographer Robert Desrosiers directs; musical direction is by Alex Pauk and Peter Tiefenbach, and Toronto's imaginative brother-and-sister team Puppetmongers Powell have been called in to create the show's actors, elaborate four-foot puppets opulently costumed in Tang Dynasty court robes. Four singers give voice to all the roles, accompanied by La Jeunesse Choir and a hand-picked team of musicians, including flautist Robert Aitken and Chinese erhu virtuoso George Gao.
For visuals, Schafer has called upon his long-time collaborators, Jerrard and Diana Smith, who have been with him since the beginning of the Patria Cycle two decades ago. "It's a ritual of trying to bring back the Cinnabar Phoenix, which has sunk in the lake with its palace, and there's strife and discord in the land," explains Diana Smith, who has designed the costumes for both puppets and singers. Jerrard Smith is responsible for the sculpting of the puppets' faces, the palace set and the Pagoda Boat, which carries the Emperor and his courtiers across the water to his Summer Palace.
The Smiths are familiar with the special challenges, and the enormous creative possibilities, of using an unusual outdoor venue to stage a major operatic production. "You can add elements of sound, space, temperature and humidity," points out Jerrard Smith.
"You get to invent the theatre," adds Diana Smith.
Jerrard Smith concurs: "It's not a question of taking a piece out of the theatre and doing it in a weird space," he says. "The piece is written for the space."

The Palace of the Cinnabar Phoenix runs from September 13 to 16 outdoors at Wolverton Hills, just over an hour east of Toronto. For tickets, information and directions, call 1-800-814-0055 or 705-876-6323.

Publication Date: 2001-09-09
Story Location: http://tandemnews.com/viewstory.php?storyid=378