Word: gran
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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This is Aida? Well, yes -- as staged by a New York-based all-male company called La Gran Scena. This rare -- and rarefied -- troupe recognizes that opera thrives on the tension between the sublime and the silly. After all, when a 200-lb. soprano trips down the castle steps trilling like a 1-lb. canary in the mad scene in Lucia di Lammermoor, should one weep at her character's insanity or howl at the absurdity? La Gran Scena's answer is: both. As they see it, loving opera and laughing at it are one and the same thing...
...spectacle of men getting dressed up as divas and belting out Verdi in falsetto may seem a specialized taste. But the appeal of La Gran Scena goes well beyond that of your usual drag show. As they are currently demonstrating on their seven-city U.S. tour (this week: Sun Desert, California), these divas can convulse mainstream audiences; and they are not only consummate clowns, but they can really sing...
...Gran Scena's brand of burlesque may owe much to Mel Brooks and the Marx Brothers, not to mention the late drag master Charles Ludlam. But it is also clearly an inside job -- the work of connoisseurs who, even in falsetto and falsies, have a keen understanding of the magnificent excess that makes this art form so compelling...
Siff studied to become a tenor in the Italian bel canto style, but detoured into a career as a cabaret performer and teacher of theater voice. He launched La Gran Scena in 1981, gradually building a repertory based on 19th century classics and a company of free-lance singers, most of whom have opera careers elsewhere in their natural voices. Indeed, Siff is one of only two non- conservatory-train ed singers in the troupe...
...Among La Gran Scena's most vociferous fans are some of the most formidable names in opera, including the Met's artistic director, James Levine, and divas Leontyne Price and Joan Sutherland. In recent seasons the troupe has traveled well beyond its initial cult status, playing such venues as Washington's Kennedy Center and the Edinburgh Festival...