Word: ethane
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When Douglas Allanbrook began composing in the '50s after several years with Nadia "a lot of people thought of the necessity of writing American works" that would be accessible and relevant to American audiences. Along these lines, a friend suggested that he write an opera based upon Ethan Frome--Edith Wharton's tragic account of forbidden love set in frigid Starkfield, Mass. Allanbrook wrote the opera in Naples in 1951 on the continuation of a Fulbright scholarship that allowed him to go to the opera at Santo Carlo every weekend. A friend he met at Harvard, John Hart...
...contrast to traditionally "suitable" subjects for opera, like classical mythology, pastoral romance and gothic drama, Ethan Frome cuts a different figure. Edith Wharton's book contains very little dialogue, and when the characters speak, they talk about timber and tobacco pouches, not their passionate and undying love...
...made even more skeptical about Ethan's prospects when the ending is considered. In the novella, Ethan and Mattie attempt suicide by sledding very fast into a tree, how this works into the opera remains the show's biggest mystery. When asked about the suitability of the Ethan Frome for opera, Lee Poulis '02, who will make his Harvard debut in the title role, commented that "all opera is based on love." Despite a certain frigidity, Ethan Frome is a beautifully tragic love story...
According to John Allanbrook, "Edith Wharton communicated verbally that the story might have been better without flashbacks" so there is "a precedent to tell the story in a different way." "People are turned off by Ethan Frome simply by the way it's narrated. Wharton had the story down, then mechanically applied this 19th century device which distances the reader from the characters...
Reducing the prevelance of the flashbacks, the opera tells the story sequentially, with an ending climax where Ethan and Mattie have an aria "reminiscent of Macbeth--a crossing of the paths" which makes use of the Neapolitan scale that followed Allanbrook Sr. home from the Santo Carlo Operas. Egan, who spent the summer working at the Santa Fe Opera with Jonathan Miller, will be stage directing the preformance, and his hand-picked cast promises a great show...