MOBY-DICK By Jake Heggie, Libretto by Gene Scheer

Sung in English with English supertitles. Run time approximately 3 hrs.

Join The Dallas Opera for a tremendous seafaring and spiritual adventure that will carry audiences from the bustling ports of New England—in the days of the great sailing ships—to equatorial waters and the distant South Seas.

A new work by Jake Heggie, the acclaimed composer of Dead Man Walking, and librettist Gene Scheer (Thérčse Raquin and An American Tragedy); Moby-Dick explores the lethal power of obsession and the need for human connection and understanding in an increasingly multicultural world. Based on Herman Melville’s sprawling 19th century literary masterpiece, Moby-Dick is filled with mysterious encounters, exotic characters and one man’s quest for a white whale that leaves death and destruction in its wake.

Starring operatic superstar Ben Heppner, one of the world’s leading heldentenors, as the vengeful Captain Ahab; baritone Morgan Smith as Starbuck; tenor Stephen Costello as Greenhorn; bass-baritone Jonathan Lemalu as Queequeg; soprano Talise Trevigne as Pip; tenor Allan Glassman as Flask and baritone Robert Orth as Stubb. This all-star ensemble cast will be conducted by Patrick Summers and staged by Leonard Foglia. This new co-production will be designed by two-time Tony Award-nominee Robert Brill and award-winning Broadway veterans Jane Greenwood and Donald Holder.

A Dallas Opera world premiere!

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Although we are always happy to support the careers of local artists, The Dallas Opera attracts international casts from as far away as Russia and China in order to bring North Texas audiences the very best the world has to offer. This is the place where opera legend Plácido Domingo made his U.S. debut. Opera’s greatest stars are always shining at The Dallas Opera!

			Captain Ahab: Ben Heppner*
			Greenhorn: Stephen Costello
			Starbuck: Morgan Smith*
			Queequeg: Jonathan Lemalu*
Conductor: Patrick Summers
	Flask: Allan Glassman		Stubb: Robert Orth*
	Pip: Talise Trevigne*		Captain Gardiner: Jonathan Beyer*
	Stage Director: Leonard Foglia		Costume Designer: Jane Greenwood*
	Lighting Designer: Donald Holder*		Choreographer & Assistant Director: Keturah M. Stickann
	Chorus Master: Alexander Rom

*Dallas Opera Debut
**American Debut

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Jake Heggie

Jake Heggie is the composer of the acclaimed operas Dead Man Walking (libretto: McNally), Three Decembers (libretto: Scheer), The End of the Affair (libretto: McDonald), the lyric drama To Hell and Back (libretto: Scheer), and the musical scene At the Statue of Venus (libretto: McNally). The recipient of a 2005/06 Guggenheim Fellowship, he has also composed more than 200 songs, as well as concerti, orchestral works and chamber music. His songs, song cycles and operas are championed internationally by singers including Frederica von Stade, Susan Graham, Audra McDonald, Kiri Te Kanawa, Patti LuPone, Isabel Bayrakdarian, Kristin Clayton, Kristine Jepson, Joyce DiDonato, Joyce Castle, Zheng Cao, and Bryn Terfel. He has collaborated extensively with conductors Patrick Summers, Nicholas McGegan, John DeMain, Michael Morgan, and director Leonard Foglia.

Heggie is currently at work on an epic opera based on Melville’s Moby-Dick with librettist Gene Scheer, commissioned by Dallas Opera for its inaugural season in the Winspear Opera House. Scheduled to open on April 30, 2010, Moby-Dick will star the great Canadian tenor Ben Heppner as Ahab; Patrick Summers conducts and Leonard Foglia directs. The opera has been co-commissioned by San Francisco Opera, San Diego Opera, Calgary Opera, and State Opera of South Australia. Heggie has also been asked to develop an opera project with playwright Richard Greenberg for the Metropolitan Opera and Lincoln Center Theatre.

Dead Man Walking has been performed more than 100 times since its San Francisco premiere in 2000, making it one of the most performed of new American operas. In 2007 alone, the opera was performed more than 50 times internationally, including new productions in Sweden, Ireland and Australia. Heggie’s operas have been performed all over the world, including productions at San Francisco Opera, New York City Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Seattle Opera, Opera Pacific, Cincinnati Opera, Calgary Opera, Austin Lyric Opera, Madison Opera, Pittsburgh Opera, Michigan Opera Theatre, Kansas City Opera, State Opera of South Australia, Malmö Opera, Dresden SemperOper, Theater an der Wien, Theater Hagen, and Opera Ireland. Dead Man Walking recently received its first university productions at the University of Colorado in Boulder, and the University of Nebraska in Lincoln.

He has been resident composer for the San Francisco Opera, EOS Orchestra, Vail Valley Music Festival, and the Orcas Island Chamber Music Festival, and has given lectures and master classes for singers and composers at universities and conservatories that include the Cincinnati Conservatory, NYU, Bucknell University, DePauw University, and UCLA, to name a few. He has also been a guest artist at SongFest in Malibu, the Steans Institute at the Ravinia Festival, and the Grandin Festival in Cincinnati.

As a pianist, Heggie often accompanies Frederica von Stade in recital and has also performed with sopranos Anna Netrebko, Dawn Upshaw, Kristin Clayton, Nicolle Foland, Melody Moore, Emily Albrink, Marnie Breckenridge, Laura Anne Ayres, Ann Moss and Leah Partridge; mezzos Susan Graham, Joyce DiDonato, Lorraine Hunt-Lieberson, Jennifer Larmore, Margaret Lattimore, Mary Phillips, Catherine Cook, Zheng Cao and Elise Quagliata; tenors Paul Groves, Nicholas Phan and Thomas Glenn; countertenor Brian Asawa; baritones Thomas Hampson, Keith Phares, Kyle Ferrill and Bo Skovhus; and bass Samuel Ramey. Recordings of his work include For a Look or a Touch (Naxos), Flesh and Stone (Americus/Classical Action), The Deepest Desire: Joyce DiDonato (Eloquentia), Dead Man Walking (Erato), The Faces of Love (RCA), My Native Land (Teldec), and Holy the Firm: Essay for Cello and Orchestra (Oakland East Bay Symphony with cellist Emil Miland). Heggie also contributed a song ("The Other Other Woman") to the musical Songs From An Unmade Bed, lyrics by Mark Campbell (Ghostlight).

Among the composer’s numerous commissions are works for the San Francisco Opera, Houston Grand Opera (co-commissioned by Madison Opera and Opera Pacific), Metropolitan Opera with Lincoln Center Theater, Opera Colorado, Ravinia Festival, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, Carnegie Hall, Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Oakland East Bay Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Louisville Orchestra, New Century Chamber Orchestra, Chanticleer, Harmida Trio, Camerata Pacifica, San Francisco Girls Chorus, Choral Arts Society of Philadelphia, University of Kansas at Lawrence, University of Connecticut at Storrs, Music of Remembrance, Pacifica Chorale, Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival, Music Accord ad individual commissions from singers Frederica von Stade, Jennifer Larmore, Brian Asawa, Bryn Terfel and Robert Orth.

Jake Heggie was born in West Palm Beach, FL, in 1961. From the age of two he was raised in Ohio and California. His first composition teacher was the late Ernst Bacon, with whom he studied in Orinda, CA from 1977 to 1979. After two years of study in Paris, he went to UCLA where he studied piano with the late Johana Harris and composition with Roger Bourland, Paul DesMarais and the late David Raksin. He has made his home in San Francisco since 1993.

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Insider's Guide Facts

CONVERSATION STARTER:
Although his break-through opera, Dead Man Walking, is one of the most frequently performed contemporary operas, worldwide; Heggie says the music in Moby-Dick will be much more expansive. He told D magazine: “In the book, things happen in the middle ground…above in the heavens and below, in the sea. Heggie says the score tries to make present the unseen forces that hang over the novel’s action.”

DID YOU KNOW?
This composer Jake Heggie’s third collaboration with librettist Gene Scheer. Together, they have created the opera Three Decembers and the lyric drama To Hell and Back.

RECOMMENDED LISTENING:
Artistic Director Jonathan Pell: “Since The Dallas Opera will be presenting the world premiere of this latest work by acclaimed composer Jake Heggie, there is no recording of the opera to recommend. I can suggest, however, that curious listeners explore some of Mr. Heggie’s previous work. There is a wonderful collection of his songs on RCA, #63484, The Faces of Love, recorded by some of the great singers of the day, including Renée Fleming, Carol Vaness and Frederica von Stade, accompanied by Mr. Heggie at the piano.

His most recent opera, a chamber piece entitled Three Decembers, is available on Albany Records, #1073/74, which stars Frederica von Stade and is conducted by Patrick Summers, who will also be conducting MOBY-DICK in Dallas. Mr. Heggie’s first opera, Dead Man Walking, produced by the San Francisco Opera and also conducted by Mr. Summers, is available on Erato, #86238, and which stars Susan Graham.”

RECOMMENDED READING:
Well, the obvious, of course. Beyond that, we can recommend Nathaniel Philbrick’s “In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex,” “Melville: His World and Work” by Andrew Delbanco and “American Opera (Music in American Life)” by Elise K. Kirk.

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