“The Tale of the Silly Baby Mouse” Press Release
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OSO Baby Mouse Press Release
On Site Opera
presents Shostakovich’s
The Tale of the Silly Baby Mouse
English Translation by Manashir Iakubov
part of Animal Tales Extravaganza at the Bronx Zoo
Saturday, June 23, 2012 at 1:30 & 3:30pm
Sunday, June 24, 2012 at 1:30 & 3:30pm
Asia Plaza Stage at the Bronx Zoo
2300 Southern Boulevard, Bronx, NY
Free with Zoo Admission
Jennifer Peterson, conductor | Eric Einhorn, director | original puppets designed by The Puppet Kitchen
with Rebekah Camm, Blythe Gaissert, Christy Lombardozzi, Marc Webster, Michael Weyandt, & Melissa Wimbish
On Site Opera: www.osopera.org Bronx Zoo: www.bronxzoo.com
Bronx, NY — At 1:30 and 3:30pm on Saturday and Sunday, June 23 and 24, On Site Opera presents Dmitri Shostakovich’s The Tale of the Silly Baby Mouse as a part of Animal Tales Extravaganza at the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Bronx Zoo. The fifteen-minute long opera features large-scale puppets, outstanding young singers, and a chamber orchestra together with Shostakovich’s whimsical score. The production is staged by On Site Opera’s Artistic Director, Eric Einhorn, conducted by Jennifer Peterson, with original puppets designed by The Puppet Kitchen. Performed on and around the Bronx Zoo’s charming Asia Plaza Stage, The Tale of the Silly Baby Mouse truly puts the audience in the middle of the adventure.
Based on Samuil Marshak’s famous Russian fairytale, Shostakovich composed The Tale of the Silly Baby Mouse in 1939 as a film score for an animated cartoon. The opera tells the story of the night that Baby Mouse refuses to go to sleep. Mrs. Mouse, along with Auntie Duck, Mrs. Pig, and Mr. Toad, try in vain to sing Baby Mouse to sleep. It is finally Mrs. Cat who is successful…but she has other plans for the sleeping mouse.
On Site Opera is a new company created around the idea that exciting performances can happen outside the walls of a traditional theater. Through site-specific, immersive productions, performers and audiences will experience great music and drama as never before in some of New York’s most intriguing spaces.
About the Cast and Creative Team:
Mrs. Cat: Rebekah Camm, soprano
Mr. Frog/Polkan the Dog: Marc Webster, bass
Auntie Duck: Blythe Gaissert, mezzo-soprano
Mrs. Mouse: Christy Lombardozzi, soprano
Mrs. Pig: Michael Weyandt, baritone
Baby Mouse: Melissa Wimbish, soprano
Eric Einhorn, stage director/On Site Opera Artistic Director:
Award-winning director Eric Einhorn, has been praised by The Austin Chronicle as “a rising star in the opera world” and by Opera News for his “keen eye for detail and character insight” for which “the result was a seamless, gripping flow.” During the 2011-12 season, Mr. Einhorn makes debuts with Utah Opera for Fidelio, Florentine Opera for Turandot, and Fort Worth Opera for Le nozze di Figaro. A Metropolitan Opera staff stage director since 2005, this season he returns to direct the revival of Hänsel und Gretel. Future engagements include his debut with the Lyric Opera of Chicago for Hänsel und Gretel and the Pacific Symphony for Tosca. Mr. Einhorn is also the founding Artistic Director of On Site Opera, a new opera company devoted to site-specific productions.
Last season, Mr. Einhorn directed a successful remount of Dialogues des Carmélites for Pittsburgh Opera, which The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette named as one of the top ten classical music performances of 2011. Mr. Einhorn originally created the production for Austin Lyric Opera in 2009 and was awarded “Best Opera” at the Austin Critics’ Table Awards in addition to garnering him a nomination for “Best Director.”
Eric Einhorn’s notable recent engagements include a new production of Carmen for the Buck Hill-Skytop Music Festival; Carmen, Don Pasquale and Xerxes for Pittsburgh Opera; Alcina and Così fan tutte for Wolf Trap Opera; Orpheus in the Underworld for Glimmerglass Opera; Janáček’s The Diary of One Who Vanished for Gotham Chamber Opera; Hans Krása’s Brundibár for Michigan Opera Theatre; staged concerts of Hindemith’s Sancta Susanna and Weill’s Royal Palace for the Bard Music Festival; Cosi fan tutte for Florida Grand Opera outreach; Douglas Moore’s Gallantry for New York University; as well as Oedipus the King for Klasikos Theater in Pittsburgh.
Mr. Einhorn is past winner of the National Opera Association’s scholarly paper competition and is a frequent contributor of book reviews to the NOA’s Opera Journal. He holds a Bachelor of Music degree in Opera Directing & Voice Performance from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music.
Jennifer Peterson, conductor:
Conductor, pianist and harpsichordist Jennifer Peterson is the director of operamission, a new arts organization which has completed its fourteenth presentation since its founding in February of 2009. operamission is bringing opera, chamber music, art song and cabaret to audiences in the lobby of the Gershwin Hotel in the New York City’s Flatiron in inventive new ways, as in its laboratory-style presentation ‘Così fan tutte: Some Assembly Required,’ a chronological cabaret of Kurt Weill’s vocal music, operatic world premieres, and the ongoing series, ‘HANDEL at the Gershwin, presenting G.F. Handel’s magnificent London operas on historical instruments.
Ms. Peterson has appeared at over fifty opera companies in the United States and internationally, including the New York City Opera, Opera Memphis, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, Des Moines Metro Opera, and the International Vocal Arts Institute in Tel Aviv, Israel. Having received her musical training at the Oberlin College-Conservatory of Music, the Indiana University School of Music, and the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY where she co-founded the Rochester Chamber Opera. Ms. Peterson has also been actively involved in historical performance as a harpsichordist and chamber musician, as well as being an avid purveyor of new opera to new audiences.
Born in Anchorage, Alaska, Jennifer grew up on the west coast and has been residing in Kew Gardens Hills, Queens, since 1997 while maintaining an active vocal coaching studio in midtown Manhattan.
For cast biographies and photos, please visit www.osopera.org
About the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Bronx Zoo:
The Wildlife Conservation Society’s Bronx Zoo is open daily from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. weekdays, 5:30 p.m. weekends from April to October; 10:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m November to March. Adult admission is $16, children (3-12 years old) $12, children under 3 are free, seniors (65+) are $14. Parking is $13 for cars and $16 for buses. The Bronx Zoo is conveniently located off the Bronx River Parkway at Exit 6; by train via the #2 or #5 or by bus via the #9, #12, #19, #22, MetroNorth, or BxM11 Express Bus service (from Manhattan that stops just outside the gate.) To plan your trip, visit bronxzoo.com or call 718-367-1010.
The Wildlife Conservation Society saves wildlife and wild places worldwide. We do so through science, global conservation, education and the management of the world’s largest system of urban wildlife parks, led by the flagship Bronx Zoo. Together these activities change attitudes towards nature and help people imagine wildlife and humans living in harmony. WCS is committed to this mission because it is essential to the integrity of life on Earth.
