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Portland Opera To Go

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Each year Portland Opera To Go takes an opera on the road, sharing the power of opera, music, and theater with schools and communities throughout Oregon and SW Washington. It’s not necessarily the easiest thing in the world, as you might imagine. But it’s one of the most rewarding . . . for us and for the thousands upon thousands of students who get to experience live opera, many for the first time.

And this blog will give you a first-hand view from the performers themselves of what it’s like when Opera hits the road!

Here’s a link to more information on the tour and the program.

Portland Opera To Go's Blog

We're Baaaaaaack!

Submitted by Portland Opera To Go on Tue, 01/08/2013 - 16:17

As of Saturday, with the help of our fearless leaders, Alexis Hamilton & Kristine McIntyre, POGO has already completed the staging of The Magic Flute. Everyone is excited to bring this revival to the masses across the State. I, for one, may just bust from excitement before our second week of rehearsals can be completed. Our morning starts have been given a little boost by the close proximity of coffee and chocolate bars, but the ball quickly gets rolling and we’re off to the races for the rest of the day.


^{A few photos from our rehearsals!}

We have lots of great treats to offer this year! Returning POGO members are Ainsley Soutiere as “Pamina,” (that's me!) Dru Rutledge as “Papagena / 2nd Lady,” Stacey Murdock reviving the role of “Papageno,” collaborative pianist David Saffert, and tour manager Samm Hawkins. We are also so excited to have new friends from all over the country join us! Anthony Ballard as “Tamino,” Claudia Chapa as “3rd Lady,” Kevin Bertin as “Sarastro” and Ksenia Popova as “The Queen of the Night / 1st Lady”. These new artists have so much to offer to POGO, the kids, and are fantastic singers to boot! Stay tuned to the blogs, you will love their approach to this experience.

Filed under:

... La Grande, storm-e

Submitted by Portland Opera To Go on Tue, 03/06/2012 - 11:50

Monday, February 20, 2012 - Monday, February 28, 2012

Last year was my first time going to Eastern Oregon University in La Grande, and I remember having such a wonderful time. The second time round did not disappoint!

We departed on Monday the 20th, and headed out, making a brief stop in Pendelton for lunch. Upon arrival we were immediately in rehearsal for the two scenes that we would be performing with the students. It was great to see Jamie and Peter, as well as some familiar and new student faces.

The change in altitude and climate was a bit of a shock to our voices, but the tour must continue and we made our way out to Pine Eagle School, in Halfway (yes, insert witty "Halfway" joke here). We had a memorable classroom time, as we all got to team up to do our classroom time, two to a class. A learning opportunity for us to see what our colleagues are up to! The school fed us a great lunch, and on our way back to prepare for the show, a little snowball fight had ensued. It had been snowing since yesterday, and it was the good sticky stuff, just right for snowmen.

Wednesday and Thursday were packed full of lessons, masterclasses and rehearsals. We only broke for one very special tradition that has begun on the tour... David, our collaborative pianist, last year introduced us to The Room. I talked about this movie on the blog a bit last year, but any description I give of this film could never do it justice, so I will choose to leave my comments in my pocket. We promised that we would wait until Alexis could join us to observe this precious tradition and had a "La Grande" time (HA HA.... oh... just me?...ok) and were happy to see that the newest members of POGO embraced it with open arms.

Friday was exciting as we did last minute preparation for the show that evening. The audience was phenomenal, and we are so thankful for their support by coming out to watch all the work the students have done over the last couple months. There were some excellent scenes that ran the gamut from hilarious to very touching. We here honored to be a part of it.

On Saturday night, we had the joy of being a part of the Elgin Opera House's 100th anniversary and performing a benefit concert for them. It is a beautiful historical opera house. We enjoyed watching and listening to each other, as we got to try out lots of new concert repertoire specially for this concert. We were also happy to finally get to feature David's talents as a pianist and not just a collaborator, twice....... well.... sort of (he was interrupted the first time by a soprano... typical). Another favorite that we enjoy in La Grande is the post-concert Denny's trips. Shout out to Tony, our awesome waiter on both nights of shows.

Sunday was a nice day off to recharge our batteries, and we were back at it again on Monday with a two hour ride to Annex to perform for them. The weather was beautiful and typical of the region, sunny and dry, and big sky that reminded a lot of us of our home towns. The school lunch lady charmed Stacey and Dru with a little tour of the school basement where a bank robber was killed in the 40's trying to hide out with his loot!

For the evening, we crossed state lines into Idaho for a night in Weiser where we popped into Weiser Classic Candy for some of their famous Velvet Mints and ended up chumming with the locals at the Crescent Bar. We sang Happy Birthday to a couple of patrons, and partook in some pool and Rock Band with the local ladies who call themselves 'The Wannabeats'. Sadly, although we work for Portland Opera and have had extensive vocal training, our Rock Band skills left much to be desired.

We took off relatively early for a quick breakfast at the Homstead Cafe, and began our long journey back to Portland. We did make one much needed coffee/tea pit stop at the 10-Speed Coffee in Mosier, a new favorite, I think.

- Ainsley Soutiere, Gretel

The Week of Calm, Before...

Submitted by Portland Opera To Go on Tue, 03/06/2012 - 11:35

Monday, February 13, 2012 - Sunday, February 19, 2012

This week brought us some of my favorite things in POGO:
The PCPA concert, complete with Red Hat Society; a chat and sing with some of the students from Oregon Children's Theatre; coachings with Tom at the Hampton Opera Centre; a McMenamins performance, and 4 awesome schools!

We started our week in the unique and lovely lobby at the PCPA, where it's always a treat to see our names in lights on the Schnitzer Hall marquee. The ever faithful Red Hat Society ladies came, as well as lots of newbies to hear the tale of Hansel and Gretel. That evening we had a nice chat and sing with some eager students at the Oregon Children's Theatre. It's always a pleasure to speak with teens who are preparing to embark on their own journey in the arts. Of course, with the new OCT location being so conveniently close to a Voodoo Doughnut, we simply had to stop on our way home (I am drooling just thinking about a maple bacon bar).

Over the next couple days, we were all treated to a coaching with Tom at the Hampton Opera Center where we got to take a brief break from Hansel and Gretel to work on some other pieces, a nice change as we have all only had Humperdnick on our brains for the last month and a half.

On Valentine's Day we made our way out to Turner, a town which had seen significant flooding not 4 weeks earlier in which people were urged to stay away or leave town, and rescue crews were even deploying boats. The Principal, Mr.Petersen, showed us how close to the school the water had come, covering the play ground, but luckily not reaching the school itself. None the less, the kids, hopped up on Valentine's treats, seem to be back in the groove and water levels had returned to normal by the time we arrived. After the performance, we were invited to dine with the kids, and as we dispersed amongst the lunch room, we were delighted with all the news and gossip that elementary school had to offer (... and we dined on Frito Pie's... a tasty first for me)!

Wednesday found us back in Beaverton at Greenway Elementary. This show was especially tricky with the tight turn around of doing two shows right back to back (12:50pm and 2:00pm!). We can always stand to be reminded of the value of pacing in opera, especially with a high energy show for kids! I had a delectably lucky day, as there were left over Valentine's goodies in the staff room, and when it came time for Gretel to get fattened up by the witch, I enjoyed a mouthful of gooey caramel chocolates.... Hansel does all the singing in that section!

We had a triumphant return to Davis Elementary, after having performed for half the school 2 Thursdays earlier. It is always nice to be there, and we left with arms full of great art, thank you notes, and a very special little poem from the students. That evening we performed at the Kennedy School and were so excited to see some Portland Opera staff, as well as Dan Buchanan, and his wife Abby, who performed with us last year on tour. We had a successful night, and a nice sit down in the Boiler Room afterwards with spouses, partners, siblings, good food and great conversation.

We finished off the week with the Whitman Elementary Bobcats. This show also went off without a hitch, and after a bit of a slow load out, due to school getting out at the same time, we were ready to head home for our two day weekend before our departure for La Grande.

-Ainsley Soutiere, Gretel