LITTLE ROCK — There are a lot of operas based on shakier scenarios than a day in the life of a Hot Springs 13-year-old.
The premise takes on a little more depth when you consider that the title character of the short folk opera Billy Blythe grew up to be the 42nd president of the United States.
Roughly half the opera, four scenes, received its world premiere in a workshop performance Friday night in the ballroom of the downtown Junior League of Little Rock Building - no orchestration, just a keyboard (played by Giovanni Antipolo), but more or less fully staged.
Top-notch singing from the seven-member cast (five locals, two imports) went a long way toward selling Bonnie Montgomery’s very accessible, though sometimes melodramatic, melodies and Britt Barber’s libretto. (In his curtain speech, director Jeremy Bishop noted it is written by Arkansans, about Arkansans, for Arkansans, which is why the final product will probably premiere on a stage in New York. That’s showbiz.)
The first two scenes successfully sold themselves. Young Billy (baritone ChrisMcKim) provided a little necessary exposition, followed by a lovely wakingup love duet between his mother Virginia (mezzo-soprano Kelley Ponder) and stepfather Roger (baritone Evan Jones), recalling their early married days in New Orleans.
Ponder did a beautiful job with the poignant “Virginia’s Aria”; the duet she and Billy subsequently sang about the father, William Jefferson Blythe, who died in a car crash before his son was born, whom she still misses and he has never known, was the strongest part of the piece.
Billy’s “High Noon” aria, a sort of soliloquy in which he repents of a lie he’s told his grandfather, and the inspiration he has derived from Gary Cooper in the movie of that name, didn’t really gain much life until the closing measures.
The final scene involving Virginia flushed (and flush) after a big win at the racetrack, and Roger flushed with drink, abusive and subsequently violent, featured some awfully melodramatic chords but strong vocals in supporting roles from sopranos Jaimee Jensen and Mandi Harper, “bari-tenor” Aaron Baker and baritone Ronald McDaniel.
Arkansas, Pages 20 on 11/20/2010