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NEWS photo Paul McGrath

DON WRIGHT joins the chorus in the Vancouver Opera's production of Rigoletto, which runs Oct.
22, 24 and 26 at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre.

er

WV tenor Don Wright plays Borsa in

ON WRIGHT has

gone from the un-

convertible to the
converted’ to the converter.

Asa child, the West Vancouver
tenor would have preferred an
evening of boiled spinach and
chores to a night at the opera.

But he eventually outgrew those
feelings and today finds himself
preaching the glories of Verdi, Of-
fenbacit and-Rossini to the rock
and rap crowd of school-aged

youngsters, --
Wright is a member of the Van-

couver Opera’s Touring Ensemble,
a talented troupe of singers who
take opera out of stuffy theatres

and into schoo! gymnasiums.
For more than 20 years the VOA

ensemble has inspired kids aged
five to. 18 with abridged versions
of opera classics like Cinderella

Evelyn Jacob
SPOTLIGHT FEATURE

section and now sings tenor with
the Indianapolis Opera.

But Wright found more pleasure
in singing folk music. During the
‘60s he teamed up with his wife
Eileen, a folksinger in her own
right, and toured the Vancouver
coffeehouse circuit.

tt wasn't long before he got

turned ontc barbershop quartet,

44 Verdi is probably my
favorite composer. He's a

singer's composer ...99
- Don Wright

and Hansel and Gretel, and
Wright has been opening students’
eyes and ears to opera’s unique
mix of music, drama and spectacle
for the last four.

“Most of the kids like it,’

Wright says of the VOA‘s schoo!
program. ‘‘Except junior high
students. They pretend they don't
like it,”’ he laughs.

“We go in in full costume and
with all the sets, and after the
show we have a 10-minute ques-
tion-and-answer period. It’s a very
successful program. This year’s is
sold out, and they've had! to start a
waiting list.”

An actor and former folksinger,
Wright came to opera sornewhat
late in life.

His father sang light opera regu.
larly tor CBC Radio, and i his
brother joined the VOA's chorus

musical theatre and eventually
light opera, and began taking on
lead roles with the Greater Van-
couver Opera Society and the
North Shore Light Opera.

He joined the VOA in 1976 and,
after making the switch from
baritone to tenor, garnered several
minor roles in VOA productions of
La Traviata, H Trovatore and
Romeo and juliet.

Rather than sing the praises of
opera to school children, Wright
will be singing the operas
themselves this season,

A regular member af the VOA
chorus, Wright is playing the role
of Borsa the courtier in Giuseppe

Verdi's grim melodrama, Rigoletto,

the first work in the VOA's new
season,

Rigoletto, which opened las
Saturday at the Queen Elizabeth

-VOA production of Verdi’s Rigoletto

Theatre, plots the consequences of
a Courtier’s curse on the Duke of
Mantua and the hunchback
Rigoletto.

Even before its release, Rigoletto
faced a wall of censorship. Verdi
based his opera on Victor Hugo's
play which had been banned in
Paris 20 years earlier after only a
single night’s run.

Critics castigated the composer
for, among of er things, portraying
a king as immoral.

Reluctantly, Verdi agreed to
some minor changes, and the
opera opened in Venice in 1851
much to the delight of Verdi and
Hugo, who was envious of the
composer's ability to have four
characters speak simultaneously
and be understood.

After more than 100 years,
Rigoletto's powerful story of
romance and revenge still holds
up, especially for Wright.

“i's a wonderful story. It’s typ-
ical tragic opera. Verdi is probably
my favorite composer. He's a
singer's composer, whereas
someone like Mozart is more of an
orchestra’s composer.”

This year the chorus members
are taking their cues from a new
chorus director, Leslie Uyeda.

Uyeda, wiio joined the VOA in
1988 to assist conductor Martin
Andre in The Cunning Little Vixen,
succeeds veteran director Bev Fyfe
who held the post for more than
30 years.

“Leslie is very musical and a
stickler on Italian. The chorus has
always been strong, but our Italian
and French hasn’‘t always been
great. That will change under
her,” he says.

And with a new music director,
David Agler, and new general
director, Rob Hallam, Wright is
optimistic there will be more work
for local singers (Rigoletto’s feature
performers are outstanding Amer-
ican talent who have curious
southern drawis off-staye).

The new artistic management is
hoping for bigger and bigger au-
diences as the VOA continues to
cash in on the recent successes of
such touring mega-musicals as
Phantom of the Gpera and Les
Miserables. .

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