Photo Credit: Carlisle Floyd
The Florentine Opera will open the 2018-’19 season with Carlisle Floyd’s 2016 opera Prince of Players. Floyd based many of his operas in Southern locales, among them his best-known work, Susannah, which was performed with great success by the company in 2012. The Milwaukee company has also staged Floyd’s Wuthering Heights, a tenderly romantic work inspired by the subdued intensity of the famous novel. It was recorded on a prize-winning CD based upon a 2011 Florentine performance. The composer was present at that performance and will most likely be on hand for Prince of Players.
Although the Prince of Players’ scenario does not seem to lend itself easily to the musical stage, Floyd has shown a remarkable capacity to combine melody, a dramatic scenario and a carefully developed libretto. One waits with eager anticipation for what promises to be an unusual evening at the opera.
Prince of Players is a story of Edward Kynaston (c.1640-1712), a popular Restoration actor whose career suffered a rapid decline resulting from Charles II’s edict that males could no longer perform female roles on stage. The opera follows Kynaston’s fall from stardom, his descent into the theatrical lowlife of the period and his struggle to regain his prestige against the colorful background of 17th-century London.
In a recent interview, Carlisle Floyd spoke about his career and his sources of inspiration.
What are your own favorite operas?
Well, if you’re talking about my favorite opera that I wrote, I’ll give you the answer I always give: Whichever opera I’m working on and focusing on at the moment is my favorite. If you’re referring to operas written by others, I’d say all of Giuseppe Verdi’s works have inspirited me.
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What inspired you to go after this subject matter for Prince of Players?
I don’t create the subject matter; I watched the film Stage Beauty, which was based on a play by Jeffrey Hatcher, and thought it was very good material for a libretto with an interesting array of characters and a very strong through-line dramatically. Dealing with the concept of identity, whether personal, professional, gender or relationship roles, provided me with a great deal of emotional treasure to mine.
When you go to create an opera, what determines your subject choice?
What always guides me is the simple question: Is this an ordinary day? Because an opera’s story cannot be an ordinary day. There must be crisis. And then resolution of some sort. Kynaston’s day begins as an ordinary one, then he loses his lover, is betrayed by his dresser and stripped of his stardom and the only profession he’s ever known. That’s a crisis.
What do you think is more important, the music or the libretto?
Ultimately, the music is most important, but in the beginning stages of creating an opera, it’s the libretto. It must be a strong story, written well and economically. In the end, even if the music works, if the libretto is weak, the opera will not succeed.
When you were creating Wuthering Heights, was the novel or the film your main inspiration?
Certainly, it was the novel. You get much more of the story and character development. But I did not choose the subject matter; instead, it was presented to me by the fledging Santa Fe Opera Company as its first commission [1958]. Its general director, John Crosby, had attended a concert by my friend, soprano Phyllis Curtain, and heard an aria that I had written for her from a scene I had taken from Charlotte Brontë’s novel. Afterward, he came backstage and told me he’d like to hear “the rest of the opera.” When I explained that there was no “rest of the opera,” he decided right then and there to commission one.
Is there anything you’d like to add?
Only that I am so grateful to the Florentine Opera and its underwriters for their commitment to record all my un-recorded operas and to included Prince of Players in this series. Being associated with the stellar reputations of the Florentine Opera, as well as the recording and distribution companies, makes this a very exciting and unforgettable project for me!
The Florentine Opera performs Prince of Players Oct. 12 and 14 at Uihlein Hall in the Marcus Center for the Performing Arts, 929 N. Water St. For tickets, call 414-291-5700 or visit florentineopera.org.
