Opera japonica/Tokyo Opera Companies (original) (raw)
TheFujiwara Opera is Japan's leading company performing Italian and French Opera. It is managed by the Japan Opera Foundation together with the Nihon Opera Kyokai, which performs Japanese opera. The Nikikai Opera is Japan's leading company performing Mozart and German opera. None of these companies have permanent venues.
TheNew National Theatre was opened in 1997. It has a fine opera house in Shinjuku with excellent acoustics. It sometimes stages its own productions but it is still heavily dependant on expertise from the Fujiwara and Nikikai Operas with which it has co-productions. So far the New National has not organized a company or a house orchestra, though there is a chorus. The post of artistic director rotates at three year intervals between the Fujiwara and the Nikikai. The present artistic director is Kiyoshi Igarashi, former general director of the Fujiwara. His job there has been left vacant.
Two other special organizations regularly organize opera with professional singers: Tokyo Opera Production (Produce) and the Citizenry of Tokyo Opera Society.
Tokyo's two main opera-playing bands are the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra and Japan Shinsei Symphony Orchestra. (There is a proposal to merge the two in 2002). Kazushi Ono, the brilliant former principal conductor of the Tokyo Philharmonic has a series of semi-staged performances called 'Opera Concertante' that have been amongst the best of Japan's operatic events.
Two halls that are mainly for hire also have their own events: Tokyu Bunkamura Inc., that manages the Bunkamura arts complex in Shibuya, have one big production in the spring of each year. Their Turandot went to the Edinburgh Festival in 1999. [Suntory Hall](venues.htm#Suntory Hall) in Akasaka is Japan's premier concert venue. A series of semi-staged operas called Hall Opera are presented there with well-known foreign artists.
A number of organizations are actively involved in bringing foreign opera companies to Japan. Some of these are sponsors, such as major television companies. Fuji Television, for example, regularly sponsors the Bologna Opera in Japan. Others are promotion agencies working with both sponsors and visitors. Ticket prices for the famous companies from Western Europe and America are the highest in the world: up to 65,000 yen (500 US dollars) a seat. This is roughly double the price of opera-going at the Salzburg Festival!
List of operas (arranged by composer) performed in Japan (1934-99)
by local Japanese and visiting foreign companies
Bartók: Bluebeard's Castle (A kékszakállú herceg vára)
Beethoven: Fidelio
Bellini: I Capuleti e I Montecchi, I Puritani, La Sonnambula, Norma
Berg: Lulu, Wozzeck
Berlioz: La Damnation de Faust
Berte, after Schubert: Das Dreimädelhaus
Bizet: Carmen, Les Pêcheurs de Perles
Britten: Let's Make an Opera, Peter Grimes
Cilea: Adriana Lecouvreur
Cimarosa: Il matrimonio secreto
Clutsam and Berte, after Schubert: Lilac Time
Dallapiccola: Volo di notte
Debussy: Pelléas et Mélisande
Donizetti: Anna Bolena, Don Pasquale, La favorita, L'elisir d'amore, La Favorita, Lucia di Lammermoor, Maria Stuarda
Falla: La vida breve
Galuppi, Baldassare: L'Italiana in Oriente (L'inimico delle donne)
Giordano: Andrea Chénier, Fedora
Gounod: Faust
Hadley, Henry: Bianca
Henze: Elegie fur junge Liebende
Honegger: Jeanne d'Arc au bucher
Humperdinck: Hänsel und Gretel
Janacek: Jenufa
Kalman: Die Csardasfürstin
Lehár: Das Land des Lächelns, Die lustige Witwe
Leoncavallo: I Pagliacci
Mascagni: Cavalleria Rusticana, L'amico Fritz
Massenet: Manon, Thaïs
Menotti: Amelia Goes to the Ball, The Consul, The Medium, The Telephone
Montemezzi, Italo: L'amore dei tre re
Mozart: Cosi fan tutte, Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Die Zauberflöte, Don Giovanni, Idomeneo, Le nozze di Figaro
Mussorgsky: Boris Godunov
Offenbach: Le contes d'Hoffmann
Puccini: Gianni Schicchi, Il Tabarro, Il Trittico, La bohème, La Fanciulla del West, Le Villi , Madama Butterfly, Manon Lescaut , Suor Angelica, Tosca, Turandot
Ravel: L'heure espagnole
Rossini: Il barbiere di Siviglia, La Cenerentola, Otello
Saint-Saëns: Samson et Dalila
Schoenberg: Moses und Aron
Strauss, J II: Die Fledermaus
Strauss, R: Arabella, Ariadne auf Naxos, Der Rosenkavalier, Elektra, Salome
Tchaikovsky: Eugene Onegin
Thomas: Mignon
Verdi: Aida, Don Carlo, Falstaff, Il trovatore, La forza del destino, La traviata, Macbeth, Nabucco, Otello, Rigoletto, Simon Boccanegra , Un ballo in maschera
Wagner: Das Rheingold, Der fliegende Holländer, Der Ring des Nibelungen, Die Meistersinger, Die Walküre, Götterdämmerung, Lohengrin, Siegfried, Tannhäuser, Tristan und Isolde
Weber: Der Freischütz
Weill: Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny
Wolf-Ferrari: I quattro rusteghi, Il Campiello
Japanese works
Akutagawa, Yasushi: Kurai Kagami
Aoshima, Hiroshi: Tasogare wa Oma no Jikan
Bekku, Sadao: Aoinoue, Sannin no Onnatachi no Monogatari, San-nin no Onnatachi no Monogatari
Dan, Ikuma: Takeru , Yokihi (Yang Kwei-fei), Yuzuru (Twilight Crane)
Hara, Kazuko: Father Kibe, Iwai Uta ga Nagareru Yoruni, Shita wo Kamikitta Onna, Sute Hime, Yosakoi Bushi
Hayashi, Hikaru: Amanjaku to Uriko-hime
Hirota, Ryotaro: Nishiura no kami
Ikebe, Shinichiro: Shinigami
Irino, Yoshiro: Aya no Tsutsumi
Ishii, Kan: Kesa to Morito
Ishiketa, Mareo: Mofuku, Sotobakomachi
Kanai, Kikuko: Hiren Karafune
Kanno, Hirokazu: Issoppu no Mori
Katsuki, Osamu: Warashibe Choja
Koyama, Kiyoshige: Konyaku Mondo, Sansho Dayu
Makino, Yutaka: Anju to Zushio , Ayame, Kurozuka, Shishiodori no Hajimari
Miki, Minoru: Ada, An Actor's Revenge, Shunkinsho
Mizuno, Shuko: Bijo to Yaju, Tenshu Monogatari (The Tale of Himeji Castle)
Nakamura, Toru: Kijimuna Toki wo Kakeru
Ogura, Akira: Neta
Oguri, Hiroshi: Akaijinbaori
Sato, Makoto: Tsureppu, Yuki-onna Fudoki
Shiba, Yukyu: Mumyo to Aizen
Shimizu, Osamu: Aozora wo Utsu Otoko , Kitchomu Shoten, Shishiodori no Hajimari, Shunkan, Shuzenji Monogatari, Sumiyaki-hime, Yokobue
Sugano, Hirokazu: Gonbougitsune
Takagi, Toroku: Tojin Okichi
Please note that this list is (inevitably) incomplete.
Oj 21/1/02