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January 16, 2009
Israeli singer will star in Carmen
Rinat Shaham plays the title role in the beloved opera that's coming soon to Vancouver.
DANA SCHLANGER
Perhaps the most popular opera of all times, Bizet's Carmen returns to Vancouver for six passionate performances, Jan. 24-Feb. 5, at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre. The evocative traditional production of this unforgettable love-story-gone-wrong features the sizzling-hot mezzo-soprano Rinat Shaham in the title role. With a stellar international cast and gorgeous sets and costumes, Carmen will appeal both to new opera audiences and to opera goers who return again and again to the excitement and beauty of Bizet's masterpiece.
The Israeli-born Shaham has received accolades for her operatic and concert performances throughout the world, particularly for her portrayal of Carmen. The U.K. Independent calls her a sensation, "[using] the music like promises and threats." Her upcoming engagements include a solo in the New York Festival of Song and Carmen with New Orleans Opera, the Israeli Opera and Opera Köln.
The Jewish Independent talked to Shaham this week, during rehearsals.
JI: It is very exciting for our community to see a production of Carmen with an Israeli singer in the title role, so I can't help but ask: as critics rave about your take on the character and your voice, do you feel that you bring something different, another dimension to Carmen?
RS: For this, I think it's the Israeli side in me that I have to be thankful for! Politically sometimes it's not so great to have all that chutzpah, but when it comes to the stage, it's a big perk for me, to bring out all that strength, the big personality that's a huge part of Carmen. And all this chutzpah is also very Mediterranean....
I definitely hope that I'm adding another dimension to the role. Sometimes it may seem like an easy one, if you look good and can sing, it seems like whatever you do people will still love it. You can be an average Carmen and still be successful. I want to not be an average Carmen: my way of doing it, or the way I strive to do it, is by using everything that I have in me, inside of my personality. That's why I also love to do this role so much, because it calls for a side of my personality that I don't usually flaunt, but when I do Carmen I really need to use all of it, the big, big charisma and a lot of guts. However, there's not only the raunchiness and sexiness, there is something very human about her. Sometimes it's easy to do a generic Carmen, sometimes it's easy to forget that Carmen is not only this femme fatale, but she's also afraid, she's also funny, she's also a little childish in a way.... I like to say that she's a rainbow of colors and I like to bring all of it on the stage.
JI: When you started learning the role of Carmen, did you fall in love with it immediately, did you feel it was you?
RS: Yes, I felt it was me, immediately. When I first did it, it was in Austin, Tex., and I was very afraid of it, because it's such a known opera and there's a lot of expectation. But I managed and once I performed it, I felt that there was nothing else in the entire mezzo repertoire that fits me more than this role just character-wise.
JI: Do you worry that you're going to be "stuck" with it? That everybody will only book you as Carmen?
RS: Right now, that's what's happening and I love it! I'm very happy also if other roles are coming my way, new roles, roles that interest me, but at the same time, re-visiting Carmen over and over again is never boring, there's always something new.
JI: That's great, because not only is it a wonderful performance experience, but it affords huge and very positive exposure....
RS: Yes, I love it and I do also have a big mortgage in New York City! So I thank Bizet every day, every morning when I wake up.
JI: You are now based in New York, but you studied at the renowned Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. It's notoriously difficult to get into Curtis. Did you go there straight from Israel?
RS: Yes, I was accepted. The guy who runs the vocal program, Mikael Eliasen, is known for wanting to find the "something else" factor in the singers, which is charisma, personality, on top of talent. At the time I didn't have too much fine technique, obviously, I was young, but I think he could see something else in me and therefore he accepted me.
JI: Did you always know you wanted to sing or was it something that you came to rather late?
RS: I come from a musical family and I always sang, even as a baby, but I didn't really think, actually I never thought, I was going to become a singer. I wanted to be an actress, that's what I was working for, I was going to all these drama schools.... But at one point I realized that singing opera combined acting and music, which was very natural to me, so they just went hand in hand....
My father is a musician, my brother is a fabulous violinist, Hagai Shaham, and my sister and mom are big music lovers. My father, he plays all the instruments – he's now retired, he was a music teacher in elementary school. Everybody from my hometown, Kiryat Bialik, went through him, including me and my sister and brother.
JI: There are more good singers coming out of Israel than ever before, do you feel part of it, do you feel representative of this trend?
RS: When I left Israel to go and study in the United States, I had this thought in my mind that if I succeed, that's going to be my contribution back to Israel. It's hard to have an international career out of Israel. I felt at the time that I needed to go and study abroad and be immersed in different languages, different styles of music and different people and my hope was that I'll become successful and always be happy that everywhere in my biography it says "Israeli," because I think it's a positive contribution. But at the time, I also just felt that I wanted to start a new life and see what happens. You know, I was the fat kid, socially a little bit awkward, so I wanted to go somewhere where nobody knows me and see what happens.
JI: How does the Vancouver production feel for you?
RS: Great! I have done the production itself before in Miami, with David Gately, who's a great director. This time around, it's slightly different, different cast, different conductor. I love working here and I find the cast really lovely, genuinely nice people, it's a great work process. I have sung in Vancouver before – I did my first-ever Cherubino role in Marriage of Figaro and my second-ever professional job here, 12 years ago. I had great memories and was really looking forward to being back. I'm only sorry it took so long. I'm happy to be back and I hope I'll be back more often.
JI: Is there something else that you would like to share with our readers?
RS: I would like to send my genuine thanks to your readers, especially these days. I'm so happy to hear that the opera company here in Vancouver is doing well and Carmen is almost sold out – a big thank you to the people who support it and come to watch and love opera!
Dana Schlanger is a Vancouver freelance writer and director of the Dena Wosk School of Performing Arts at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver.
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