Field Trip!

It was another sunny day on Granville Island for me and our Vancouver Opera In Schools Manager, Melissa Tsang. This was our third trip in as many weeks to visit Emily Carr University of Art and Design where we had the pleasure of working with illustration students in their Professional Applications class. The students were tasked with creating an illustration for VOIS' 2013-2014 production of The Barber of Barkerville ... and did they ever deliver!

The process was both rewarding and difficult with so many fantastic submissions to choose from. It was a tough choice but in the end we awarded the commission to Danielle Jette for her fresh and fun take on this production. You can see more of her work at www.daniellejette.com

A big thank you to all the students who submitted illustrations and to ECUAD Professors Durwin Talon and Justin Novak for the amazing opportunity to work with these talented emerging artists. 

This is a partnership that I hope continues for a long time. The illustration students at ECUAD are producing some very impressive work - and who doesn't love a field trip?

- Annie Mack, Graphic Designer

20 Questions with Nancy Allen Lundy

Did you know that Nancy Allen Lundy is a fan of Eminem, Muhammed Ali and Milan Kundera? Read on to find out more as we ask her 20 Questions!

Guilty musical pleasure?

The music of Eminem.

Where do you love to sing?

Besides on stage?  All the usual places; stairways, showers, parking garages...

What is your idea of earthly happiness?

A rainy day, a warm blanket, a comfy chair next to the fireplace with a good book, nowhere to be and a glass of montepulciano.

To what faults do you feel most indulgent? 
Sloth and gluttony.

Who are your favourite heroes/heroines of fiction?

Don Draper in Mad Men,  The Old Man (and the Sea), and Cartman.

Who are your favourite characters in history?

Muhammad Ali, JFK, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Elvis.

Who are your favourite heroes/heroines in real life? 
My brother and sister.  My brother for being everything for his wife and children, and my sister for being the best mother I know.

Who is your favourite author? 

At the moment, Milan Kundera.

Your favourite musician?

The most engaging performance I ever experienced was hearing Martin Sexton live, alone with his guitar.  Unbelievable.

Your favourite composer?

A difficult question. One answer would be, the one who's music I'm engaged to sing at the moment.  The other answer is that this question is unquantifiable. As apples are much better at being apples than oranges are, so too is Schubert a better Schubert than Ravel. In each there is greatness and in all there is music.

What quality do you most admire in a person? 
Intelligence, because from that springs humor.

Your favourite virtue? 

Humility.

Your favourite occupation?

Duh!!

What did you want to be as a child?

My big sister.

Your most marked characteristic? 

My desire to make people laugh at my own expense

What do you most value in your friends?

Authenticity.

For what would you like to be remembered?

For not messing up my son too badly.

What natural gift would you most like to possess?

I always wondered what it would be like to breathe underwater.

What is your motto?  
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

What non-opera song do you rock?

Everything Rickie Lee Jones ever wrote and/or sang.

Have you ever tried to drag a piano up a flight of stairs?

We have – twice – and don’t recommend that you do.

Pianos are a pretty valuable asset at Vancouver Opera. In fact, we own and make use of over a dozen on a regular basis. When we moved into the O’Brian Centre two years ago, our collection came along. When our movers and technical crew realized that our new facility was both multi-level and devoid of any sort of lifting mechanism, they were forced to fall back on their creativity.

By “creativity”, we really mean “brute strength and blind luck”. We are fortunate to have both in ample supply at Vancouver Opera. That said, it wasn’t an ideal scenario, and there were a couple of close calls that brought a Monty Python sketch or two to the minds of many.   

Since taking residence in the O’Brian Centre, we’ve maintained a commitment to ensuring that our facility – and the work it supports – is as accessible as possible to audiences both existing and new. This commitment has been realized to date in many ways: open houses, community engagement events, cross-cultural public lectures and other contextual initiatives that bring Vancouver Opera’s artistry and educational programming to the forefront of our new community.  Over the past year, we’ve seen well over one thousand individuals from many backgrounds cross the O’Brian Centre’s threshold in response to these initiatives.

In the midst of all of this activity, even more is happening behind the scenes – such as the continuous up-fitting of

the O’Brian Centre. Now that we’re officially in Phase Three of this project, its focus has shifted to something VO takes very seriously: accessibility.

The work currently being done in the Martha Lou Henley Rehearsal Hall will substantially increase the community’s access to our facility. In large part thanks to significant recent investments from the Canada Cultural Spaces Fund – itself a project arm of the Department of Canadian Heritage, the federal government department responsible for arts and culture in Canada – and the City of Vancouver’s Cultural Infrastructure Grant Program, we are about to install an exterior elevator at the O’Brian Centre. This elevator will have its work cut out for it once it’s up and running: in addition to regularly moving bulky equipment (such as those pianos – as well as other delicate musical instruments), the elevator will ensure that our facility is accessible to individuals of all ages and mobility levels.  As our Ticket Centre happens to be located on the second floor of the O’Brian Centre, this is a big deal!

Construction and installation of this elevator is already underway, and should be completed by late Fall of 2013. VO staffers are working with project leaders, consultants and cultural planners throughout the community so as to ensure that this project is completed on time, on budget and with minimal impact on the company’s day-to-day operations. Taking full residence in the O’Brian Centre has been an intensive and involved process that continues to depend on the commitment of the Opera’s many stakeholders: VO’s staff and Board, our patrons, our supporters and the community at large.

In many ways, our decision to relocate to the O’Brian Centre can be viewed from the same perspective you might take with regard to dragging those two pianos up a flight of stairs: both processes involve a lot of hard work and heavy lifting, and you do run the risk of bruising more than your ego. But, when many hands are doing the lifting, each step of the way, the load becomes that much easier to bear.

Joseph Bardsley
Development Manager, Grants & Proposals  

VO + ECU

Melissa at
Emily Carr University

Today was a beautiful day to head to Granville Island for our first of three partnership sessions with Emily Carr University of Art + Design.  

Annie Mack, VO's Graphic Designer and I are working with illustration students in ECU's Professional Applications class to create an illustration for Vancouver Opera In Schools' 2013-2014 production of The Barber of Barkerville. 

Annie with students
reviewing samples of VOIS materials

For the first class we met with students and presented our VOIS illustration brief. In next week's class we'll review concept sketches and have an in class critique and feedback session. By week three we will have selected an artist from the submitted revised illustrations.

It's a fun and fast process. The illustration will be used right away for The Barber of Barkerville marketing materials, and you'll spy them soon in our house program for our mainstage production of Tea: A Mirror of Soul.

-Melissa Tsang, VOIS Manager