Revolutionary Opera

Van Sciver’s Girondines

Mission Opera
October 29, 2023
Santa Clarita, CA

A few months ago I had the pleasure of reviewing a CD, a new work from composer Sarah van Sciver and librettist Kirsten C. Kunkle. Girondines tells the story of six extraordinary women who took on the Jacobins during the violent chaos of the French Revolution. The most famous of these (perhaps infamous) is Charlotte Corday, whose bathtub assassination of Jacobin leader Marat was portrayed in the well-known painting by David.

The work posits the notion that these women likely met and discussed the intense political issues surrounding them. Though it begins as an elevated tea party, it evolves into something like a trial, with each woman bearing witness to her small slice of these momentous times. It also gives us a chance to find out who gets the guillotine, who escapes, who survives undercover, and becomes an intriguing study of how different people respond to great trauma.

When I learned that the work, which first premiered in Delaware, was receiving its West Coast premiere near Los Angeles, I had to see it. Primarily to answer one particular question: how would such a unique piece, constructed with anything but an ordinary narrative arc, make the journey from concert piece to full-fledged opera?

The answer is, largely through the increasingly popular medium of projections. The composer herself assembled hundreds of images, many of them classic paintings of the Revolution and its participants. It’s a dazzling combination, providing a “big picture” background as the performers contribute their individual perspectives. It also lent an active feel to what might have been a dangerously static piece.

The Renaissance woman label could also be applied to librettist Kunkle, who also sang the role of Corday and choreographed ballet interludes performed by Savanna Gonzalez. At the moment of Corday’s execution, someone in the pit let out a very convincing scream; this turned out to be the composer, seated at the piano (apparently she didn’t have enough to do).

The piece is challenging and tricky, demanding a great deal of commitment from its singers. Kunkle sets the standard with Corday, whose commentaries on the Jacobins’ Reign of Terror are thrilling and a bit lunatic. Kunkle’s soprano is impressively agile, and she displays a great ability to manipulate her vibrato. Her date with the executioner is given the proper degree of impact with a sudden disappearance and the sound of the guillotine’s scrape and thud.

Bits of humor and intrigue are provided by Laurice Simmons Kennel as Elisabeth Vigee Le Brun, Marie Antoinette’s portraitist, and by Kaitlyn Tierney as the playful society figure Madame de Stael. Claire Pegram lends an extra dose of pathos to Madame Roland’s prayer that she be the last of the sisterhood to go to the guillotine. As scientist Marianne Pierrette Paulze Lavoisier, Marisa Robinson conducted a seminar in enunciation and phrasing. Kunkle’s libretto is written in unadorned prose, which van Sciver manipulates in unexpected ways. The combination demands a great degree of focus from its singers.

The great finesse of van Sciver’s score comes through double on the stage, notably the conversational fugue as the tea party increases in fervor and cross-purposes. The orchestra included cello, harp, and David Oleg Manukyan’s expressive work on violin.

The CD of Girondines is available on most music platforms. More info at wilmingtonconcertopera.com or missionopera.com

Michael J. Vaughn is a forty-year opera critic and author of 29 novels. His latest, Punks for the Opera, will be available soon on Amazon.

Photo by Wesley Jow. (Kirsten C. Kunkle as Charlotte Corday.)