VIEWPOINTS – Intimate opera with high stakes impact: THE POST OFFICE gets philosophical (and political) at BAM, Heartbeat Opera’s stylish VANESSA packs a punch

Those of you looking to expand your opera-going experience beyond the Metropolitan Opera should turn your attention to the occasional intimate opera productions occurring across the city. In the past week, I was able to experience two such immediate presentations, both of which have the potential to attract new audiences with their high stakes impact. Read on for my thoughts.

A scene from Heartbeat Opera’s production of “Vanessa” at Baruch Performing Arts Center (photo by Maria Baranova).

VANESSA
Heartbeat Opera at Baruch Performing Arts Center
Through May 31

Closing out Heartbeat Opera’s artistically vibrant season is its single act production of Samuel Barber’s Vanessa (HIGHLY RECOMMENDED) at Baruch Performing Arts Center (you can read my rave review of the company’s magnificent previous mounting of Massenet’s Manon here). Developed in 2025 at the Williamstown Theatre Festival — where the stylish production was touted as the festival’s first foray into opera — Vanessa now premieres in New York, continuing to cast a spell with its striking austerity and piercing drama, and making a strong case for Barber’s rarely-performed opera. In short, the opera is a gothic romantic drama about the titular Vanessa who, along with her niece Erika, await the arrival of a lover from her past. When a mysterious stranger arrives and stirs passion and desire in both women, a series of disturbing events transpire that lead to the opera’s unsettling conclusion. Director R.B. Schlather’s exposing, stripped-down Jamie Lloyd-like approach — featuring only a white wall against which the performers are harshly lit — puts the focus intently on the characters’ fraught psychological states, resulting in a bleakly poetic fever dream that’s both inescapable and inevitable. Dan Schlosberg’s new arrangements for seven musicians is stunning, doing the same thing via resourceful and articulate chamber-scaled instrumentation, which sounds captivating under conductor and music director Jacob Ashworth’s baton. The performances — sung in English, as adapted and truncated by the multi-tasking Ashworth — are notable for their chilling intensity and accomplished musical interpretations. Of particular note are mezzo-soprano Inna Dukach and soprano Kelsey Lauritano as, respectively, Vanessa and Erika. Dukach sings with both maturity and unhinged delusion that’s perfect for the title role, while Lauritano’s bright soprano contrasts jarringly with her character’s deep melancholy. Rounding out the cast are tenor Freddie Ballentine as the seductive stranger, Mary Phillips as the frighteningly stern Baroness, and Joshua Jeremiah as the overly emotive doctor. To see and hear their performances in such close proximity packs a visceral punch that’s almost overwhelming. Indeed, the experience is an altogether different beast than the behemoth productions that can be seen at the cavernous Metropolitan Opera.

A scene from Brooklyn Academy of Music and American Opera Projects’ co-production of “The Post Office” at BAM Fisher (photo by Julieta Cervantes).

THE POST OFFICE
Brooklyn Academy of Music / American Opera Projects
Closed

Next up over at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s BAM Fisher space was the New York premiere of another new opera, The Post Office (RECOMMENDED), a philosophic work that contemplates our nation’s political, socio-economic, and moral divisions. Co-produced by American Opera Projects and BAM and originally debuting at Spruce Peak Arts, composer Laura Kaminsky (As One) and poet/librettist Elaine Sexton’s (Site Specific) surreal new opera chronicles the ideological conflicts — namely as it relates to gay marriage, political party alignment, and free speech — between workers at a post office. As a sort of arbiter of the disagreements, the ghost of Benjamin Franklin (!) — the first US Postmaster General — occasionally pops in to give his two cents. As such, Kaminsky and Sexton establish the post office as a sort of microcosm for our divided country, while at the same time suggesting our democracy’s fizzling relevancy and impending shelf life (e.g., are post offices long for this world?). For a compact one act opera with a running time of less than 90 minutes, the work impressively takes on hefty themes, which it tackles head on, getting right to the point despite the repetitious musings in Sexton’s agenda-driven libretto. Instrumentally accompanied solely by piano, Kaminsky’s score is thoughtful and introspective, a composition that’s at once deeply felt and accessibly conversational. Too boot, the production is never less than fascinating to look at. Creatively staging by Kevin Newbury and designed by the notable architecture firm Diller Scofidio + Renfro (which has worked on high profile projects in New York like The High Line and The Shed), the scenic elements call to mind the ingeniously compartmentalized unit set of Two Strangers (Carry a Cake Across New York) on Broadway. I also applaud the production’s quintet of well-sung performances, which invariably stay within character throughout. At the core of it all is the face-off between the devoutly Christian postmaster and his senior clerk — played with potency and emotional clarity by Markel Reed and Brian Jeffers — over the latter’s right to openly talk about his upcoming gay marriage at the workplace. Judging from the final product, The Post Office feels like a closely-executed collaboration between writers, director, designers, and performers. It seems to be very much of the same fabric,

Categories: Music, Opera, Other Music

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