The Voice of Gertrude Stein

The program will feature a selection of art songs with text by Stein from LGBTQIA+ composers such as Virgil Thomson, Ned Rorem, and Felix Jarrar, as well as Rorem’s opera Three Sisters Who Are Not Sisters.

This program highlights Gertrude Steins legacy as an American LGBTQIA+ icon, prolific artist, and feminist Jewish writer. The program includes Three Sisters Who Are Not Sisters, a One-Act opera by Ned Rorem and Art Songs with texts by Gertrude Stein and music by Ned Rorem, Daron Hagen, Virgil Thomson, Peter Dayton & Felix Jarrar. Three Sisters Who Are Not Sisters is a surrealist, non-linear opera. Three not sisters and two biological brothers suffer from acute boredom, which they choose to alleviate by playing a game of murder, and the lights go out. When the lights come back on, they are as they were at the beginning, and Jenny tells all of them it is time to go to sleep.

There is some controversy related to Stein’s time living in France during World War II, as she became close with Bernard Fay, a powerful Vichy government official who kept her safe during the Holocaust. She considered herself a Nazi proaganda-ist and made pro Third Reich statements. However, she joined her neighbors in rallying behind the French Resistance in 1943. She is a complex artist and we think this is worth discussing before a performance of her libretto with music by Ned Rorem.

Spaeth and Hanauer will sing the roles of Jenny and Helen in Three Sisters Who Are Not Sisters. Filling out the cast are tenor Michael Gonzalez, soprano Sara DeLong, and mezzo-soprano Jade Espina. Mezzo-soprano Julie Rumbold will sing the role of Stein herself in selections from Peter Daytons May She | She May in the programs first half. Expect animal onesies, an accessible opera in English, incredible talent from New England and Great Gatsby-esque 1920s outfits.