The School of Music performs a baroque opera in a silent film setting

On May 19, the School of Music in Piteå at Luleå University of Technology stages the 17th-century opera La Calisto. It is the first time the School of Music has produced an entire opera. In the Academy of Music's interpretation, La Calisto is a comedy about love, lust and revenge in the 1920s film industry.

La Calisto, with music by Francesco Cavalli and libretto by Giovanni Faustini, was first performed in Venice in 1651. The opera is a kind of mixture of love triangle and farcical comedy of errors based on the Roman poet Ovid's mythological story about the nymph Kallisto.

In the original version, the gods Jupiter and Mercury descend to earth to restore a forest that Jupiter has destroyed. In the School of Music's production, the gods of Olympus have been moved to a film company in the 1920s. Jupiter is no longer a god but the CEO of a film company and Mercury is his secretary.

Jupiter falls in love with Calisto, who works for his daughter Diana in the family's film company. But Calisto is not at all interested in the pompous Jupiter, she has a job to do and is faithful to Diana at all costs.

Dressing up for her daughter

Mercury, who is the trickster of the story, soon realises the truth behind it all and does everything she can to make Calisto fall for Jupiter against all odds.

“My role, Mercury, is a cunning type who gets bored easily, she likes things going on and likes to create drama. Among other things, she comes up with the brilliant idea that Jupiter should dress up as his daughter Diana and thus seduce Calisto, which finally works”, says Adéle Brander.

The production's director, Märit Bergvall, thinks that baroque opera in particular works unusually well in a modern context. La Calisto may be a lighthearted comedy, but it has a serious undertone.

“The opera is about a dysfunctional family with a financial empire. At the top sits Jupiter, a kind of Harvey Weinstein figure who expects his secretary to provide him with young girls”, says Märit Bergvall.

Märit Bergvall is house director at the Kapellsberg Music Department at Härnösands folkhögskola. The collaboration between Kapellsberg and the School of Music in Piteå has been close over the years. One of the students Kapellsberg takes part in the School of Music´s  production.

“I think it's great  that we can collaborate between the courses in this way. It is important to show what we can do together in northern Sweden. La Calisto is a good story. The music is fantastic! It is not at all difficult to listen to, but it is difficult for the singers to learn.”

Difficult to learn

The singing students at the School of Music have little experience of working with early 17th century music. Gustav Ekmark, who plays Jupiter, admits that he was not very enthusiastic at first.

“I was skeptical when I saw what we were going to set up. The music is not very melodious and quite sparse in general which made it difficult to learn. But it has grown on me and I've learned a lot, including leading and phrasing more clearly.”

Adéle Brander agrees that embracing La Calisto has been a challenge.

“We are so used to singing according to strict note values and tempos. Since the music in La Calisto is based so much on the text, and the rhythms are so free, a great responsibility rests on us singers to take advantage of its possibilities. There is a lot of room to be playful, but that requires that you have a solid grasp of the music and the lyrics.”

The baroque opera is customizable

Historically, the early Baroque music was not so tied to voice types. They simply took the singers that were available and adjusted the pitch to their voices. Consequently, the School of music´s production of La Calisto does not diverge from the original when they have octaved up or down (raised or lowered by eight steps) certain parts or made changes between two keys, so-called modulation, in order to make it singable for the ensemble. On the contrary, such adaptations are completely in line with tradition. Vocally, there are other things that make early baroque opera difficult to sing.

“There is a lot of text to be delivered in a short time, which makes it easy to become chatty and lose focus from the singing voice, but it has been a learning process and I am starting to find a good balance”, says Adéle Brander.

Adéle Brander and Gustav Ekmark wholeheartedly agree that staging an entire opera has been very instructive. By having so much time to immerse themselves in a single work, they have learned things that they can apply to other operas while also gaining insight into the entire apparatus that constitutes an opera performance. Adéle Brander points out that opera is drama set to music.

“It has been fun to get into characters that to some extent match ourselves. Me and Gustav are a bit of a duo even off stage, which we take with us in our portrayals, even if the roles we play are of course fictitious and slightly exaggerated.”

The School of Music's production of La Calisto has been supported by Pitebygdens musikförbund  and Härnösands Folkhögskola.