Production Information
Characters
Maria Callas, Coloratura Soprano
World renowned Greek - American opera singer
Aristotle Onassis, Baritone
Greek shipping magnate, Callas’ lover, later Jackie Kennedy’s husband
Giovanni Battista Meneghini, Tenor
Italian industrialist, Callas’ husband and manager
Tina Onassis, Lyric Soprano
Greek shipping heiress and socialite, Aristotle’s wife
Zeus, Bass Baritone
Greek deity, ruler, and protector of gods and humans
Hera, Mezzo Soprano
Zeus’ wife, goddess of women, marriage, and family
Ensemble of 4 singers, Soprano, Mezzo, Tenor, Bass
Chamber Orchestra
Single winds and brass, Strings and Percussion
Creative Team
Composer
CLINT JOSEPH BORZONI is an award-winning composer of Ecuadorian and Italian descent. “His highly original yet lyrical music [and] natural gift for melody and harmonic structure" (The Huffington Post) and "sweeping melodies and emotional and dramatic range" (Opera News) has resulted in international performances and premieres.
Clint’s collaboration with librettist John de los Santos on the opera “When Adonis Calls” was selected by Fort Worth Opera’s Frontiers Festival and by Opera America’s New Works Forum. The world premiere at the Asheville Lyric Opera was followed by a production in Chicago. Their second collaboration, “The Copper Queen”, won the top prize for Arizona Opera’s commission program, Arizona SPARK. Excerpts were performed at the American Lyric Theater’s Alumni Concert, and a sold-out workshop at Opera America. The opera premiered in 2021 as an award-winning feature film. Their third collaboration, with The American Opera Project, “The Christmas Spider”, was premiered by Opera Louisiane and produced by Ovation West and Marble City Opera. Clint’s other operatic works include “Margot Alone in the Light,” an adaptation of Ray Bradbury’s story “All Summer in a Day” and “Antinous and Hadrian” which won the Queer Urban Orchestra’s composition competition and was performed by the Brooklyn Symphony Orchestra at the Brooklyn Museum. His oratorio, “The Wife of Lot,” was commissioned by the Gavin Dillard Poetry Library & Archive. He recently finished his seventh opera, “In Love Alone”, with librettist Judith G. Wolf.
Mr. Borzoni has composed songs and song cycles for many leading vocalists. He won BARIHUNKS Best New Song, Best New Solo Work for Baritone, operamission’s cabaret song competition, and is a three-time winner at the annual NYC songSLAM. His musical “My Life as a Bald Soprano” received an Off-Broadway run at the Midtown International Theater Festival. Borzoni has also scored three films for the production company JR VISION. His music has been presented by Minnesota Opera, the Merola Opera Program, the Glimmerglass Festival, the Bay View Music Festival, the Wintergreen Festival, the Summer Street Festival, St Martin-in-the-Fields, La MaMA, Symphony Space, Opera Grows in Brooklyn, the New York Youth Symphony, the Jacobs School of Music and many more venues and universities. From 2016-2020, he was the Resident Composer for Musica Marin.
Librettist
Elizabeth Coppinger is a former Media and Technology executive. She planned, developed, and delivered new digital entertainment properties for major corporations. Elizabeth was a member of Seattle Opera’s Technology Advisory Board, and a board member of ArtsFund, a foundation which raises funds to support arts organizations, large and small, in the Pacific Northwest. She is an alumna of the Hedgebrook Writers Residency. Prior to becoming a librettist, she was the Executive Director of TEDxSeattle, one of the largest and longest running TEDx events in the US, selling out Seattle’s opera house, year after year.
Synopsis
The opera begins as two Greek gods, Zeus and Hera, place a wager on whether a man of action or a strong woman can have the greater impact on the world.
Backstage at the Paris Opera after a Maria Callas performance, the gods watch as Maria enters the room filled with her fans alongside her elderly husband, Giovanni Battista Meneghini. She does not care about praise for her, only that her audiences experience the beauty of true art. Aristotle Onassis, the world’s richest man, is there with his young wife, Tina. They speak to Callas about their common Greek heritage, and he invites her to join them on his yacht. After Maria leaves, Ari declares that such a vibrant, beautiful woman should not be with such an old fool. She should be with a strong and virile man, a true Greek hero; she must be with him. Zeus and Hera are delighted that they have found their two worthy mortals.
On the Onassis yacht, a few months later, Maria and Ari have fallen deeply and passionately in love. Maria feels truly alive for the first time in her life. Ari tells her that she must leave Meneghini. Ari would love her the way a woman of such power deserves. They decide to leave their spouses to be together. Zeus and Hera give the couple their greatest gift, true love, and bind them together for life. Callas and Onassis exult in their strength, spirit, and accomplishments as they pledge their eternal love to each other.
Five years later, after a Callas performance, Ari tells her that he wants her to give up performing. Maria is angry that Ari is still philandering and mentions Jackie Kennedy. Ari says that he enjoys the press attention, but he still loves Callas. She is ready to give up her career and fame for marriage and children, but Ari responds that fame is the most important thing. He gives her an ultimatum; she must give up her dream of marriage and children or he will leave her. Callas decides that she will sacrifice everything for love and sings of her sorrow to a child she has dreamed of that will never be born.
Three years later, on the morning of Ari’s’ surprise marriage to Jackie Kennedy, Callas has taken to her bed and asks the gods for help to survive this betrayal. Zeus and Hera are unhappy that Ari has thrown away his most precious gift to feed his ego. To give her strength, Hera allows Maria to see what the future holds for both of them. Callas enters a dream state with Ari. He wants to remain lovers, despite his marriage. Callas declares that his need for fame is his downfall. The gods show them that his future will be full of terrible pain and loss, including the death of his son. She comforts him that they will always love each other; the gods have united them for life. Her vision ends, alone on stage, Callas sings of her future, sustained by art and her own strength. She will be remembered as a great artist with a rich legacy. Zeus congratulates Hera that she has won the wager. Unlike Onassis, Callas changed the world.
My Child
Elizabeth Coppinger Librettist
Clint Borzoni Composer
Felicia Moore, soprano ~ Jeremy Chan, pianist
The aria My Child from the opera La Callas ends the third scene. Maria Callas and Aristotle Onassis have been together for several years years, but he wants her to stop singing because of the amount of time she devotes to preparing and performing. Callas had always dreamt of being a mother, and being in her late thirties, she was willing to give up her career to fulfill that dream. However, Onassis had two teenage children and had no desire to start another family. As the scene ends, Maria Callas realizes that to stay with Ari Onassis, she will have to abandon her dream of being a mother. In this aria she sings of her sorry and grief to her child who can never be. She makes this sacrifice with complete conviction that the love between herself and Onassis is strong and that they will be together all their lives.
My Child had its world premiere on November 16th in New York City at the Greek Orthodox Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in a production of THE 10 FACES OF MARIA CALLAS produced by Teatro Grattacielo in collaboration with The Consulate General of Greece to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the birth of Maria Callas.
Photo Credits: Chris Exantus and Teatro Grattacielo