The Reviews Are In!

What an exciting weekend at the Auditorium! Saturday night marked the return of grand opera to our stage - Chicago's original opera house. Then yesterday we held our annual Gala. And this morning, we woke to raves for Margaret Garner.

Read the Tribune's review here, and the Sun-Times here.

Margaret Garner Coverage in the Chicago Sun-Times

The Chicago Sun-Times featured a preview of Margaret Garner on Sunday, October 25. Critic Wynne Delacoma gave readers an idea on how tragic the plot of the opera is by opening her article with "The tale couldn't be more gut wrenching or the underlying issue more compelling."

Read more here.

Margaret Garner will run at the Auditorium Theatre of Roosevelt University November 1-9, 2008.

Tickets are available:
Online: ticketmaster.com
Phone: 312-902-1500
In person: Auditorium box office (located at 50 E. Congress Pkwy, Chicago, IL, open from noon-6 p.m, Monday-Friday)
Groups (10+): 312-431-2357

Photo by John Grigaitis. Denyce Graves.

Margaret Garner Video Preview

The Chicago premiere of Margaret Garner is this Saturday!

"A Little More Time" performed by Denyce Graves, Gregg Baker, Mary Elizabeth Williams and the Michigan Opera Theater Chorus.

The Chicago Defender featured a preview on the opera Margaret Garner - starring Denyce Graves and Tracie Luck.

The engagement is set to run November 1-9, 2008.

Read the Chicago Defender article.

Margaret Garner Media Coverage in Detroit.

"The opera...is even more satisfying the second time around."
- Detroit Free Press

Michigan Opera Theatre re-opened Toni Morrison and Richard Danielpour's Margaret Garner on October 17, 2008, a little over three years after its world premiere in 2005. The critically acclaimed opera starring Denyce Graves (performs on November 1 and 2) and Tracie Luck (performs on November 6, 8 and 9)* will open at the Auditorium November 1-9, 2008.

Read the rest of the Detroit Free Press review.

Click here for more information on Margaret Garner in Chicago.

For tickets, visit ticketmaster.com, call 312-902-1500, or visit the Auditorium box office (open from noon-6 p.m, Monday-Friday) located at 50 East Congress Parkway, Chicago, IL

* Casting schedule subject to change.

A Director’s Perspective: Kenny Leon talks about the differences between directing theatre, film, and opera.

Kenny Leon directed the world premiere of Margaret Garner at Michigan Opera Theatre, Cincinnati Opera and the Opera Company of Philadelphia. Broadway directing credits include Radio Golf (four Tony nominations), Gem of the Ocean (five Tony nominations), and the Tony-award winning A Raisin in the Sun. He recently directed the film version of A Raisin in the Sun, which aired on ABC in February 2008.

Kenny Leon will direct the Chicago premiere of the opera, Margaret Garner, which will grace the Auditorium's stage November 1-9, 2008.

As a Director, I have been blessed to work in many different venues with much varied material. I’ve directed from classic theatre, to drama, to comedy, to musical reviews, to film, and to opera. While they all share some aspects in common, each genre presents new challenges and opportunities to explore the artistic realm. In a film, for instance, the musical score is added at the end of the movie in post-production. In opera, you begin with the music and work to fit the story into the music.

In theatre, the focus is on the storytelling and the acting. In opera, the focus of the production is for the singers to hit the notes and sing to the best of their ability. The challenge that I faced in doing my first opera was that most of the singers had been trained to have the music and vocals be the most important (and really, only) priority of the show. They had a tendency to “park and bark,” if you will.

But the idea behind having more stage directors do opera is to get more of the acting into the singing, which creates a more fluid story. When I did Margaret Garner, I had the privilege of working with Denyce Graves, who is a born actress. She’s a singer, but she’s an actress. So when you see the production, you will experience wonderful singers, but also singers who are acting. My job as a Broadway director is to facilitate telling the story. I ask them to move and interact with the set and props, yet still expect them to hit the notes. It’s trying to integrate those two worlds – of singing and acting. It’s been very exciting for me but also very challenging. Most opera singers I’ve worked with embrace that idea, but they are still concerned about hitting that note. And the audience is paying their money to hear them hit that note. But I’m confident that they can hit that note and do the blocking and do the movement and keep it real. If we succeed, it’s a much more powerful art form than almost any other because music is so universal. With the flow of music, people are willing to forgive a lot, so you can say much more with music than you can say with drama.

I really do love opera, but I still need to balance it with other art forms. In the opera world, everything is exaggerated. To the extent that even on Opening Night, they told me to go out and take a bow after the show finished. And I was like, “What? I’m not taking a bow!” As a Director, I’d never taken a bow before. But after I did…I was like ‘That feels pretty good!”

Opera has also taught me something about being in the moment. In theatre and film, I’m always telling actors to be in the moment. Don’t be ahead of it. Don’t be beside it. Be right there engaged in the person you’re talking to. And if you can’t engage the person you’re talking to, then you can’t engage the audience. With opera, you totally have to be in the moment. When you have the perfect note, with the perfect costume, with the perfect set – then that’s a beautiful moment. Those moments add up to two and a half hours, and that’s an amazing lesson to learn about being in the moment…quality time shared in the communal experience that is live theatre.

Learn more about Margaret Garner.

Hurry - limited seating available! Click here for tickets.

Single Tickets Go On sale

Single tickets for the Kirov Ballet and Margaret Garner will go on sale to the general public June 23, 2008.

You will not want to miss the Kirov Ballet perform Giselle October 2-5, 2008 at the Auditorium. The Kirov's bravura soloists, graceful corps de ballet and stellar orchestra are celebrated by ballet fans worldwide. Prima ballerina, Diana Vishneva will perform as Giselle on October 2 and 5.

The Chicago premiere of the heart-wrenching opera, Margaret Garner, will be November 1-9. You will want to watch both Denyce Graves and Tracie Luck bring the fugitive slave, Margaret Garner, to life. This new American opera is in two acts is based on one of the most significant fugitive slave stories in pre-Civil War America.

Click here to learn more about the upcoming Auditorium season.

Four easy ways to purchase tickets:
Online: ticketmaster.com Phone: 312-902-1500
Groups (10+): 312-431-2357
In person: Auditorium box office, 50 East Congress Parkway, Chicago, IL
60605; open from noon-6 p.m.

Remember, save 20% if you order subscriptions before June 20. Save 10% on subscriptions after June 20. Several subscription packages are available. Call 312-431-2357 and become a subscriber today!

Season Announcements

In addition to all the excitement around last week's Ailey shows, we also announced next year's subscription season last week! You can click here to read about it on our website.

Sid Smith of the Tribune calls it "a tantalizing dance series", and Hedy Weiss of the Sun-Times says, "The adventurous lineup ...suggests [the Auditorium] is feeling confident enough in its audience now to go the extra mile and present two of the most galvanic (if less instantly recognizable) companies now at work on the global scene."

The schedule includes:

• The Kirov Ballet & Orchestra - Giselle: October 2-5
  
• Margaret Garner: November 1-9
  
• Too Hot to Handel: The Jazz-Gospel Messiah: December 12 & 14
  
• Batsheva Dance Company: February 7 & 8
  
• Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater: April 1-5
  
• Eifman Ballet - Eugene Onegin: May 14-17
  
• Nederlands Dans Theater I: June 17-21

Photo: Diana Vishneva as Giselle.

Tribune Article: "How Boeing Revived Jazz in Chicago"

This Sunday's Chicago Tribune featured an article by Howard Reich on Boeing's support of jazz in Chicago. There are several Auditorium mentions - especially the two recent concerts by Orbert Davis's Chicago Jazz Philharmonic.

(Boeing is also the Lead Corporate Sponsor of the opera Margaret Garner, making its Chicago premiere at the Auditorium November 1-9.)