Music by: Virgil Thomson 

Libretto by: Gertrude Stein 

For one performance only, Chautauqua’s Amphitheater once again rings with the voice of Susan B. Anthony in Virgil Thomson and Gertrude Stein’s joyfully surrealist homage to one of the foremothers of our country and the suffrage movement in America.  This performance bookends Chautauqua Institution’s Week Five programming, themed “The Vote and Democracy.” 

This production of The Mother of Us All has been many years in the making, and its postponement in 2020 was one of the most heartbreaking moments in our company’s history. Tonight I dedicate this performance to all of the individuals—singers, designers, director, production, administration and music staff-- who were originally contracted for the 2020 season and have joined us at Chautauqua this summer to finally bring it to life. Your dedication to this opera and the stories it tells is a continuing inspiration, and it is an honor to have shared the rehearsal room and now the Amphitheater stage with you! 

- Steven Osgood 

 I first started dreaming of this production of The Mother of Us All in the Chautauqua Amphitheater eight years ago when I had become a semi-regular guest conductor with Chautauqua Opera Company. I learned that Susan B. Anthony had spoken in the Amphitheater during the Suffrage movement, and I knew that 2020 would mark the centenary of the 19th Amendment. I had come to know Virgil Thomson and Gertrude Stein’s delightfully quirky, lyrically rich, and ultimately deeply moving opera through conducting a production and recording of the piece at Manhattan School of Music and I was desperate for another chance to conduct it. 

Flash forward a few years and I find myself in my new leadership position at Chautauqua, and able to start putting my money (well, our money) where my mouth was. I was delighted when Keturah Stickann, who had by then directed two of our productions in the Amphitheater, signed on to be my partner in this production which would headline a 2020 season with powerful women at the center of all three operas. My dream was going to come true. 

Well, flash forward another FOUR years to get past the worst of our COVID shutdowns, and here we are at the end of Chautauqua Opera Company’s 2022 Festival Weekend. Mukhtar Mai has inspired Chautauquans in four performances of Thumbprint, and Tosca has murdered Scarpia and still lost Cavaradossi to his villainy three times. We close our 2022 mainstage season tonight with rich poetry and wordplay; hymns, waltzes and marches from the heartland of America; a challenging look at the rights of women and other historically marginalized Americans; and resounding echos from the Suffrage movement which had western New York as one of its central locations. 

The Mother Of Us All is an opera which rewards repeated listening. Every day I find a new favorite phrase in the libretto, and I am touched by a new musical phrase. If this is your first time with the opera, I invite you to let the music and words wash over you, to laugh and cry with the imagery which accompanies our production, and to revisit the opera in recordings. If this is NOT your first time with The Mother Of Us All—welcome back. May this be an exciting dive back into what remains one of the most original and unique works in the American opera canon. Thank you ALL for being here! 

On the first page of the score for The Mother of Us All, it states, The Mother of Us All is a pageant.  Its theme is the winning in the United States of political rights for women.  Its story is the life and career of Susan B. Anthony.”  All of this is true, but the piece is so much more.  Like everything Gertrude Stein wrote, she used this platform as a space for autobiographical thought.  Therefore, this is also a piece about Ms. Stein and how much she felt fame and respect eluded her throughout her life.  Yes, the main theme and story revolves around Susan B. Anthony and her political life, but the panoply of characters from both history and Gertrude Stein’s brain create a landscape that allows us to also explore the ongoing fight for equal rights for all people in this country.

Working on a piece with no linear narrative, made up of the repetitive and absurdist poetry of Stein, is at once frustrating and liberating for a director.  I have a narrative brain, and the more I tried to make sense of the story as having a beginning, middle, and end, the less I could see the shape of the piece itself.  It was when I finally released myself from “story” and wrapped my arms around “emotion” and “cause” that the pieces of this extraordinary opera started to tumble into place.  Here are a few things I learned along the way:

One, the characters are varied because voters are varied.  The character list is extensive and has people such as John Quincy Adams and Thaddeus Stevens, who existed in the 1850’s and 1860’s, as well as made-up characters such as Jo The Loiterer (based on a real person) and his paramour, Indiana Elliot (based on a conglomerate), whom I’ve placed in the 1960’s, another tumultuous time in our history.  The varied characters, who all interact and exist in the same plane, are there to show us our differences as well as our similarities.  We are all strange and lonely and desirous of love and respect.  We are all worthy of having the vote; of having a say over our futures.

Two, Gertude Stein and Virgil Thomson are characters in their own opera, and that meta quality allows Gertrude the chance to interact with Susan B, with whom she felt great affinity.  I’ve taken this even farther and given Gertrude and Virgil the opportunity to comment on their work even as it’s being presented in today’s world.  I felt that if Gertrude wanted to be there, then she should be there.

Three, I was surprised at how funny the opera is.  I think, because of the subject matter, we have a tendency to walk into this piece thinking we need to take everything very seriously.  In actuality, the fact that we get to laugh uproariously makes the moving moments (and there are some incredibly moving moments) hit that much harder.

Four, and this is the most important, Gertrude Stein’s poetry is not meant to always be taken literally.  Give yourself permission (as I did) to let her use of language wash over you.  Let her odd turns of phrase make you laugh, let her repetitions enter you like a heartbeat.  Sometimes Stein is quite cogent, and sometimes her words are there to express a deep emotional state.

This is a perfect time to be presenting The Mother of Us All, as the tumult our country is experiencing right now makes the opera more thematically important and relevant than ever.  Watching Susan B. question herself forces all of us to question what we believe and why, and Gertrude Stein’s evocative language, coupled with Virgil Thomson’s patriotically laced music, offers us a window into the absurdity of America’s political landscape.

Cast:

Susan B. Anthony: Wendy Bryn Harmer
Gertrude S.: Olivia Johnson  
Anne: Talin Nalbandian
Virgil T.: Bernardo Medeiros 
Daniel Webster: Alan Held 
Jo the Loiterer: Chauncey Packer
Chris the Citizen: Jake Skipworth
Indiana Elliot: Hilary Grace Taylor
Angel More: Emily Michiko Jensen
Henrietta M.: Nicole Heinen 
Henry B.: Luke Harnish
Anthony Comstock: James Eder 
John Adams: John Kun Park 
Thaddeus Stevens: Felix Aguilar Tomlinson 
Constance Fletcher: Samina Aslam 
Isabel Wentworth: Meredith Smietana 
Gloster Heming: John Potvin 
Anna Hope: Stephanie Perez 
Lillian Russell: Nicola Santoro
Jenny Reefer: Max Potter 
Ulysses S. Grant: Phillip Lopez 
Herman Atlan: Troy Sleeman 
Donald Gallup: Bernardo Medeiros 
Andrew Johnson: Eric Botto 
Brother of Indiana Elliot: Rolfe Dauz

Ensemble: 

Natalie Adame 
Megan Fleischmann 
Marcus Jefferson 
Evan Katsefes
Scott LaMarca 
Marquita Richardson 

Creative:

Stage Director: Keturah Stickann 
Conductor: Steven Osgood
Assistant Conductor: Kristin Roach 
Chorus Master: Carol Rausch 
Lighting & Video Designer: Michael Baumgarten 
Costume Designer: B.G. FitzGerald 
Wig & Makeup Designer: Martha Ruskai
Musical Preparation:
Miriam Charney
Emily Jarrell Urbanek
Allison Voth
Assistant Directors:
Cassandra Lovering
Diane Machin
Supertitles: Allison Voth 
Principal Coach/Rehearsal Pianist: Miriam Charney
Assistant Coach: Emily Jarrell Urbanek
Artistic Assistant: Kerwin Young 

Chautauqua Opera Orchestra:

Violin 1:
Vahn Armstrong - Concertmaster
Ming Gao - Assistant
Amanda Gates
Adrienne Finet
Anton Shelepov
Liana Koteva Kirvan
Leslie Anderegg
Irina Sheleopv

Technical Director: John P. Woodey 
Production Stage Manager:  
Valerie Wheeler 
Assistant Stage Managers: 
Hanna Atkinson 
Hailey Delaney 
Julie Welch 
Props Director: Wendy Ann
Production Aid: Jaaven Middleton

General and Artistic Director: Steven Osgood 
Music Administrator: Carol Rausch 
Managing Director: Daniel Grambow 

Director of Production: Michael Baumgarten
Arts Marketing Specialist: Makayla Santiago-Froebel 
Company Scheduler: Rick Hoffenberg
Company Managers: 
Claudia Torres 
Austin Terris 
Music Staff:
Miriam Charney
Rick Hoffenberg
Dottie Randall
Carol Rausch
Kristin Roach
Emily Jarrell Urbanek
Allison Voth
Arts Marketing Associate: Jessica Mack 

The Chautauqua Institution and the Chautauqua Opera Company would like to acknowledge the continuing generosity of the Norton and Richards families through the Ralph and Elizabeth Norton Philanthropic Trust, and the following major donors who have created endowment funds for opera, and support the opera program through annual giving, and through major capital gifts: 

The Peggy and Andy Anderson Family Fund for Opera 

John E. Anderson Opera Endowment 

A Chace & Josephine B Anderson Opera Endow Fund 

The Cynthia Auerbach Fund for Opera 

Bemus Endowment for Opera 

Anne and John Burden Opera Fund 

The Ralph E. Miller and Paul E. Cawein Fund for Opera 

Chautauqua Opera Endowment Fund 

The Chautauqua Opera Guild Endowment 

Thomas and Kathleen Clingan Fund for Opera 

The Connolly Family Fund For Opera 

The John A. and Emily McKnight Corry Opera Fund 

The Barbara Baldwin DeFrees Opera Fund 

Eleanor C. Eisenmenger 

The Walter F. Ferchen Opera Fund 

The Eleanor B. Franks Fund for the Opera 

Dr. and Mrs. Donald J. Furman 

The James and Elisabeth Groninger Fund for Opera 

The Jane A. Gross Opera Endowment 

The Kay Frantz Israel Fund for Opera 

The Mildred Lesenger Fund for Opera 

The Kay H. Logan Opera Fund 

The Annette Pickens Malvin Memorial Fund for Opera 

The Christopher and Susan Martin Opera Fund 

The Margaret Clark Mercer Fund for Opera 

The Steve Z. and Mary G. Mitchell Family Fund 

The Reverend Lloyd V. Moffett Opera Endowment Fund 

New York State Council on the Arts 

The Robert G. and Lillian Vitanza Ney Family Opera Fund 

Northern Chautauqua Community Foundation 

Hale and Judy Oliver 

The Joseph A. and Anne T. Prezio Opera Endowment Fund 

The Richards Family Opera Fund 

Mrs. Bartlett Richards 

The Molly Rinehart Fund for Opera 

The Wadsworth Fund 

Charles and Lois Weaver Fund for Opera 

Dr. Fred R. Whaley and Helen A. Whaley Fund for Opera 

The Robert and Virginia Young Opera Fund 

Zemsky Endowment For Opera 

Renowned throughout the United States, Chautauqua Opera Company's Young Artist program is among the most respected training opportunities available for developing singers who are on the threshold of full-time professional careers. This year, General and Artistic Director Steven Osgood and Music Administrator Carol Rausch selected 17 Young Artists from over 900 applications. The singers on this select roster receive intensive training in all facets of performing, including diction, movement, stage combat, career management, and musical and dramatic coaching. Young Artists make up the core of the company and perform in all mainstage Chautauqua Opera productions, in concert with the Chautauqua Symphony, in “Afternoon of Song” recitals in the Athenaeum Parlor and the Opera Invasion series. Chautauqua Opera Company's Young Artist program is proud to have been a training ground for many alumni who have become leading artists with opera companies throughout the United States, Canada and Europe. 

The Chautauqua Opera Guild serves as the advocacy group in support of the Chautauqua Opera Company. Memberships support our Young Artists, the Children’s Opera Education Program, and grant access to events all summer long. 

Join today! 

Opera Guild Members as of July 26, 2022:

Edith Benson

Jack Connolly and Peg Barrett

Virginia H. Cox

Paula Gierszal and Lisa Ann Gierszal

Cheryl Gorelick and Jake Zeigler

Nancy Langston

Jay Lesenger

Beth Madison

Chris and Sue Martin

Mary and Steve Mitchell

Hale and Judy Oliver

Rev. Richard and Mrs. Joreta Speck

Drs. Jane Stirniman and Jeanne Wiebenga

Linda Steckley and Pete Weitzel

Toni and Joe Goldfarb

Arlene Gottlieb and Chaz Miller

Arlene Hajinlian

Brad and Deanna Johnson

Patricia King

Jane and Jerry Lahey

Lynn Moschel

Rich Osborne

Kimberly Perry

Belinda and Matt Rogers

Rachel and Philip Rogers

Adele M. Thomas Charitable Foundation, Inc.

Kay Karslake White

Shirley Adams

Philip Allen

Richard and Marty Davis

Ted and Deborah First

Susan J. Grelick and John V. Heffron

Michael E. Hill and Peter M. Korns

Sallie L. Holder

Carol and Bob Hopper

Dr. F. Palmer Lindblom

Cynthia Norton

Mary and Bob Pickens

John P. Pless

Robin and Mark Robbins

Carol Schaal

Nancy Seel

Jana V. Stone and Raymond J. Galligan

Sue Tebor

Steve and Pat Telkins

Brenda and Larry Thompson

Angela Twist

Chris Anderson

Loretta Bower

John Burden

Judith Claire

Drs. Gilbert and Rona Eisner

Elliot and Judith Goldman

Judy and Al Goldman

Terrie Vaile Hauck

John and Jill Hopkins

Robert Ivers

Nancy M. Leininger

Mike and Nancy Lott

Narwhals and Georgina Mating

Mary Lou McFate

Judith D. Musser

Sanford and Margery Nobel

Melissa Orlov

Steve Peters

Sue Ann and John Power

Katy Smith

Rabbi Samuel and Lynn Stahl

Jenny and Tim Stitely

Margaret Viehe

Nancy Waasdorp

Elizabeth A. Welch and Stephen E. Glinick

Mary Louise Williamson

Mark Altschuler

William and Renee Andrews

Anna Antemann

Joyce and Scott Brasted

Carolyn Byham

Sally Craig and Mike McAvey

Christopher and Roslyn Dahlie

Roger Doebke

Jean and Sigo Falk

Marwin L. Feldman

Christopher Gibbs

Anonymous

Carole E. Gladstone

Samantha F. and Daniel Grambow

Don and Kathleen Greenhouse

Jane A. Gross

Carol and John Hardenburg

Ellen Harmon

Catherine Jarjisian

Erwin H. Johnson Memorial Fund

Phil and Livia Kades

Len and Judy Katz

Douglas Kreider and Dale Kennedy

Gary Landrus

Susan Laubach

Colleen Law and David Borden

Peter and Kate Letarte

Sharon and Dick Levick

Karin and Rich Lewis

Susan Rowan Masters

Casey and Marilyn Neuman

Michael Nolan

John and Esther Northman

Barbara Rait

Rodney Schlaffman and Lawrence Greenberg

Joan and Bob Spirtas

Margo Stuart

Matthew Swanson

Suzanne Taub

Sandi and Burt Zucker

 Scenery constructed by Local #266 I.A.T.S.E.  

Lighting provided by Advanced Production Group