The Art of Casting: Giulio Cesare

Don Marrazzo: Director of Artistic Operations

Each Summer Glimmerglass hosts a series of lectures for the Oneonta Center for Continued Adult Learning to give a behind-the scenes look at the current season. The second of these talks focused on our production of Giulio Cesare in Egitto. As part of the event, Director of Artistic Operations Don Marrazzo spoke about the challenges of casting a baroque opera:

One of the great joys - and challenges - of my job is casting. Often, an audience comes to the theater unaware of the planning that goes into creating just the right balance of voices to make the production a success. With Handel's Giulio Cesare in Egitto, the challenge was a bit greater than usual, as the title role can be sung by various voice types. In Handel's time, castrati portrayed many of the leading roles in baroque opera; for Giulio Cesare in Egitto, the title role was originally sung by a castrato, as were the roles of Tolomeo and Nireno. Obviously, the practice of castrating young male singers is no longer continued today, so, for modern stagings of this work, there are a couple of different approaches to casting the title role (although the roles of Nireno and Tolomeo are still, to this day, always cast with countertenors). The title role can be performed by a countertenor (male singers who perfect the use of their falsetto ranges), a mezzo-soprano, or, less frequently, a baritone.

When casting the role of Giulio Cesare, we briefly considered the idea of casting a baritone, which would very much have been a throwback to the 1967 production featuring Noman Treigle in the title role, Beverly Sills as Cleopatra and Maureen Forrester as Cornelia. As Glimmerglass is known for being a company which is not afraid to take artistic risks, we thought it might be an interesting choice to cast a baritone in the title role. This meant, however, that we needed to identify exactly the right singer, since casting a baritone would draw a good deal to the casting decision. Ultimately, we didn't find a baritone who would justify that choice. After working closely with General & Artistic Director Michael MacLeod, and our conductor (David Stern) and director (Robin Guarino) for the Handel, we ultimately decided to cast a mezzo-soprano. We heard nearly 30 singers in audition for the role, which included trips around the United States and as far away as the United Kingdom. Ultimately, we cast Laura Vlasak Nolen. She is a truly remarkable singer, and her physical presence onstage is quite extraordinary. Joining her is an exceptional cast, including Lyubov Petrova as Cleopatra, Gerald Thompson as Tolomeo, Aurhelia Varak as Sesto, Lucia Cervoni as Cornelia, and Jonathan Lasch as Achilla.

Casting Giulio Cesare in Egitto was an incredibly rewarding experience. In my early years of musical training, I was not a great lover of Baroque music. However, I have grown to appreciate the beauty of this music and the remarkable artistry and technical proficiency required of those singers who master the genre. Today, I would certainly put early music repertoire among my favorite genres of operatic music.

Photo:

1. Don Marrazzo speaking to the Oneonta Center for Continued Adult Learning. photo credit: Michael Manning.