Lakes Area Music Festival bringing ‘Passion’ to its new season – Brainerd Dispatch

BRAINERD — The Lakes Area Music Festival season begins July 31 and will feature Grammy-winning vocalist Julia Bullock’s “Carmen” debut, performances from American Ballet Theater dancers and a tribute to 250 years of American independence.

Julia Bullock’s voice rang through the windowed halls of The Gichi-Ziibi Center for the Arts Monday, July 20, during an afternoon rehearsal session. Bullock said usual rehearsal periods for summer festival productions of operas like George Bizet’s “Carmen,” in which she’ll sing the title role, extend for about six to seven weeks, while the Lakes Area Music Festival provides three. She said she took extra preparation to get into “high gear” for the role in about half the time she’d usually receive, and added that this production utilizes context that respects the show’s heavy subject matter, which includes femicide.

“Carmen is probably one of the most famous women in the canon of opera,” Bullock said. “And you know Bizet, like many opera composers, wanted to put forth an effort to center individuals who are usually dismissed or even attempted to be discarded by certain parts of society. So this is a woman who’s a working woman in a factory who is in some ways really struggling.”

“It’s a pleasure, It’s my first time working with Lisenka (Heijboer Castañon),” Bullock said of the stage director. “But we’ve been friends for over 10 years, and we’ve seen each other’s work for a long time, and we wanted to work together for a long time. So even just talking about the concept of this and building it in a room together, it’s just, it’s so, that part of it feels also like a great arrival place for me.”

Bullock, Paul Appleby, who plays Don José, and Evan Hughes, who will play Escamillo, have a professional history dating back to their first opera production in France’s Aix-en-Provence. This year’s season, titled “Passion,” will present works that explore different interpretations and expressions of the word.

Festival Conductor Christian Reif shares a Grammy with Bullock for their album “Walking in the Dark.” The two have been married since 2018.

Contributed

“Since the whole season is called ‘Passion,’ I mean, we are all very very passionate in in what we do, and we believe in the in the in the power of music but we also believe in the accessibility of music and so we’re very passionate to bring that music that we love to every community and so to ignite the enthusiasm and the passion of the audience,” Reif said.

This is just one of the works that will be performed at the festival during the festival lineup, which begins on July 31 with a “Pas de Deux” performance from American Ballet Theater’s SunMi Park alongside Brady Farrar — who also appeared in the eighth season of “Dance Moms.”

Artistic Director and co-founder Taylor Ward said this year’s season kickoff is unique.

“I would say our gala is going to be really exceptional, and it’s going to be something we’ve never done before,” Ward said. “It’s going to have our full orchestra and two dancers from American Ballet Theater in New York City. I think that’s going to be something really different, and I would encourage people to check it out because I know there’s a huge dance community here, like in terms of ballet and competition dance, and to see those top top level professionals is going to be exceptional.”

Contributed / Lakes Area Music Festival

The season will finish with dance performances as well, including Carlos Simon’s “Four Black American Dances,” from Aug. 22-23. Bullock will make her debut in “Carmen” from Aug. 14-16, and a “Celebrating 250” extravaganza performance Aug. 8 will bring American music past and present via full orchestra to a family-friendly audience complete with beer tents, face paint and bouncy houses at the Lyman P. White amphitheater. The six remaining performances, including a Flamenco dance performance are scheduled to fill out the month-long schedule.

Ward said he wrote his doctoral dissertation at Yale on a form of early American music called shape-note music, and said what he admires most about it is how it tends to create high art from folk roots, “unapologetically.”

“The thing about American music to me, and this extends from like the colonial era in the late 18th century all the way today, is the wide open spaces and expanse of the American landscape,” Ward said. “Just how big it is, I think you can hear in the music the way that intervals and chords and melodies come, I think you hear some of the American landscape in American music or identifiably American music, and then the other thing is just every classical composer almost is influenced in some way by folk music.”

Bullock was a classmate of Ward’s, as is Lakes Area Music Festival founder, executive director and co-artistic director Scott Lykins. Lykins graduated Brainerd High School in 2004, and said he always credits the Brainerd Public Schools for his star.

“There’s a bit of a reunion vibe to it, and over that time, I think we’ve built a reputation nationwide among the music community as being a place where not only is the musical product excellent, but it’s also just a really good hang,” Ward said.

Lykins said although “Carmen” has been presented at this festival in 2017, this production is just as, if not more worthy of attendance.

“We did it at our old venue where there wasn’t very much room for actors to move on the stage because the orchestra was on the stage,” Lykins said. “Also, we had a very small budget for sets and costumes and all of those elements. So, we’re really excited to bring it now when we have this beautiful, huge performing arts center with all the technical capabilities to showcase it now in a kind of new light.”

Lykins also said there’s a reason it’s reoccurred, as the Brainerd audience is different, citing that during their first opera performance in 2012, 60% of the audience hadn’t seen one previously.

“‘Carmen’ is also the opera with the most familiar music,” Lykins said. “Putting it on our program with our audience in mind, we’re going to have people coming because they’ve heard the theme — the overture — in a commercial before, and latch on to that. We’re going to have people come because they just have never seen an opera and want to. But we also have people who are going to fly to Minnesota to see this production because it includes this all-star cast of internationally acclaimed singers. So, ‘Carmen’ as a title does all of those things, which made it a good choice for the summer.”

Nathan Herfindahl will perform as Zuniga in “Carmen.” He currently serves as the choir director for Brainerd High School, a position he took after a career singing for the Metropolitan Opera, and on tours across Europe in Asia. Herfindahl is a Duluth native who began at Brainerd in 2011.

“Literally everything is worth coming to,” Herfindahl said.”So I think any date that anybody has flexibility in their schedule to come and see something that is worth coming to. We’ve got an amazing group of artists here, and there’s more to come. So Carmen’s going to be great. I have no doubt about that. But I think any of the other performances throughout are going to be excellent as well. We just had our cabaret last night and Saturday, and those were great. So, yeah, I think anything that anybody can get to, I would encourage people to attend.”