Michael Ching

Michael Ching (born September 29, 1958)[1] is an American composer, conductor, and music administrator. A prolific and eclectic composer, he is best known nationally as the composer of innovative operas, including his a cappella adaptation of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream (2011).[2] His other major operas include Buoso's Ghost (1996), Corps of Discovery (2003), Slaying the Dragon (2012), Speed Dating Tonight! (2013), and Alice Ryley (2015).

Early life and education

Michael Ching was born in 1958 in Honolulu, Hawaii. Before he was one year old his family left Honolulu, and he grew up in New Orleans and Saint Paul, Minnesota.[1] His father was an accomplished amateur pianist and a college professor in theater and speech. Ching later recalled, "He played everything from Chopin to Dave Brubeck transcriptions. He wanted to go into music but his family discouraged him."[3]

Ching started piano at the age of six and was quite skilled at it, at one point considering a career as a concert pianist. In addition, he studied flute, violin, and oboe, mostly for the sake of composition. He started composing as a child, and by the time he reached high school he had studied composition at Interlochen and also had private composition instruction.[1][3]

He attended Duke University on a composition scholarship, studying with Robert Ward and Iain Hamilton.[4][5] He graduated in 1980, and his senior project was a one-act opera retelling a vampire story set in New Orleans, which received a small performance at Duke.[3][5]

Career

Ching began his career as a National Opera Institute apprentice 1980–1981 at the Houston Grand Opera Studio, where he was involved in the company's productions and continued his composition studies with composer Carlisle Floyd.[6][7][8] From 1981–1985 he held increasingly responsible positions at the Greater Miami Opera/Florida Grand Opera.[9][10] He subsequently held conductor and executive director positions at venues including Texas Opera Theatre,[11] Chautauqua Opera,[3][12] and Triangle Music Theater.[13]

In 1989 he was appointed Assistant to the General Director of Virginia Opera. He was subsequently the company's Associate Artistic Director from 1991 through mid 1992.[1][14]

In 1992 Ching joined Opera Memphis as Artistic Director, a position he held through 2010. He was the opera's General Director for most of those years as well.[15][16]

He left Opera Memphis for Iowa in the spring of 2010 when his wife Barbara, a university professor and a native Iowan, was named chair of the English department at Iowa State University.[15] He told the Memphis Daily News, "Barbara and I always had a plan that I would be able to stay home and write and she would be the one carrying the economic ball. The time was right and the job came through."[16] In addition to being a freelance composer and conductor, he is currently also Music Director of Nickel City Opera in the Buffalo, New York area,[17] and Chairman of the Douglas Moore Fund for American Opera, which supports emerging opera creators.[18][19]

Major compositions

Ching's Piano Concerto, commissioned by the San Jose Chamber Orchestra, had its well-received premiere in 1997. The San Jose Mercury wrote, "The concerto has the kind of instant appeal to listeners that every composer must dream of.... When it was finished, the crowd rose in a spontaneous ovation."[20] The concerto was later recorded and released on the orchestra’s first commercial CD.[21][22]

The San Jose Chamber Orchestra subsequently also commissioned and premiered his Psyche and Eros, a 45-minute composition for narrator and string orchestra, written in collaboration with storyteller Margaret Wolfson, in 2000.[23] Dan Leeson in San Francisco Classical Voice wrote that "The Ching/Wolfson collaboration is simply marvelous.... Ching is a gifted composer capable of turning out well-crafted music, very romantic when the occasion dictates and frightening when that is called for."[24] Metro Silicon Valley analysed the music in great depth, concluding that "[T]he technique is adroit, fluid and winningly integrated. Ching speaks music so well that he accommodates the text without a stumble.... [T]he music stands remarkably well on its own – rather like a string of pearls.... Ching might well be tempted to craft a concert suite without the transitional material."[23] The work's additional venues have included the Abu Dhabi Music & Art Festival and the Lincoln Center Summer Institute program in West Memphis.[25][26][27]

Operas

1985–1999

Ching is best known for his operas. He provided his own libretti for his first two operas: Levees (1980), a New Orleans vampire story performed at Duke University;[28] and Cocks Must Crow (1985), based on a Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings short story and performed at Greater Miami Opera.[29] His early miniature opera Leo: Opera in One Cat is a jazz-based 15-minute one-act opera, with a libretto by Fernando Fonseca based on Cal Massey's story "Leo Spat". It premiered in June 1985 at Houston Grand Opera's Texas Opera Theater, and subsequent venues included South Street Theater in New York City in October 1985.[30] Texas Monthly called it "a pleasant diversion but such an assured one that the Miami-based composer's talent glitters all over it."[31]

Ching's fourth opera, Cue 67, a one-act 35-minute contemporary murder-mystery ghost-story set in a theater, was commissioned and premiered at Virginia Opera in 1992, paired in a double bill with Gian Carlo Menotti's The Medium.[32][33] It contains an eclectic blend of musical styles from opera to rock 'n' roll, pop music, and Broadway-type tunes, and the libretto is by Sandra Bernhard.[34][35]

Beginning in 1993, Ching wrote two related one-act operas with songwriter Hugh Moffatt. The first, King of the Clouds (1993), deals with alcoholism and broken families,[36] and the second, Out of the Rain (1998), explores contemporary topics such as social pressure, teen suicide, and AIDS.[9][37][38][39] King of the Clouds was commissioned and premiered by Dayton Opera,[40] and Out of the Rain was commissioned jointly by Opera Delaware, the Kansas City Lyric Opera, and Opera Memphis, and premiered by Opera Delaware.[41][42] Both operas, separately and together, have received numerous productions, including high-school productions.[41][43]

Ching's opera Buoso's Ghost is a comedic sequel to Puccini's one-act comic opera Gianni Schicchi. It had its first full staging with the Pittsburgh Opera in 1996,[44][45] and its official premiere at Opera Memphis in 1997.[46][47] Starting where Gianni Schicchi ends, the new opera opens with Schicchi's final chords and carries the plot forward by following the sinister dealings of Buoso Donati's family, who apparently had poisoned Buoso, and the continued machinations of Schicchi, who tries to exploit this growing suspicion on his part.[3] In reviewing the work the Chicago Sun-Times wrote that "Buoso's Ghost soared .... [it] offered highly charged acting atop a deft, tuneful score.... Ching, General/Artistic Director of Opera Memphis, studied with Robert Ward and Carlisle Floyd, and the unashamed flow of natural, singing melody ... reflects the profile of his teachers."[48] And the Chicago Tribune reported that "Composer and librettist Ching ... borrows snatches of Puccini tunes and weaves them into his own conservative-eclectic idiom, tossing in bits of American pop ... for merry measure. The vocal writing is expert, the orchestration light enough to allow the singers to project the text clearly. Buoso is charming and unpretentious ...."[49] Opera News noted that Ching uses "a more modern musical mode, yet avoiding excessive atonality. The score subtly introduces brief tongue-in-cheek quotations from other works, ranging from Mozart to Sondheim, plus one unmistakable interjection of Shostakovich."[50] The work has been performed throughout the U.S. as an ideal pairing with Gianni Schicchi, the most popular of Puccini's three Il trittico one-act operas.[51][52][53][54]

Ching also supplied his own libretto to his one-act opera Faith, based on the short story of the same title by award-winning science-fiction author James Patrick Kelly. The opera follows the story of the titular character, a divorced and depressed woman who meets a man via a personal ad, discovers he talks to plants, and begins to fall in love again.[55] Kelly said of the opera, "You get good reviews, you win an award, but there's no feeling quite so wonderful as having another artist interpret your work supremely well. There are giant chunks of narrative [Ching] just set to music which is different ... for opera ... much more colloquial and approachable. This man transformed my piece into something equally, if not more, wonderful."[56] The opera was commissioned by OperaFest of New Hampshire, and premiered there in April 1999,[56] with subsequent performances in September 1999 at the Vital Theatre in New York City and elsewhere, including Chicago in 2000.[57][58][59]

2000–present

Ching's three-act opera Corps of Discovery, his third collaboration with Hugh Moffatt, was commissioned by the University of Missouri for the bicentennial of the Lewis and Clark Expedition.[10] The principal roles are Lewis; Clark; Sacagawea; interpreter Toussaint Charbonneau; York, a slave and full member of the corps; George Shannon; and John Potts, a German-born older member of the corps.[60][61] Act 1 of the opera was performed in 2002 at Weill Recital Hall in Carnegie Hall and at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.[62] The full work had its world premiere in May 2003.[61][63] In addition to full productions at the University of Missouri, Opera Memphis, Opera America's 2003 convention, Washington State University, University of Idaho, and elsewhere, Ching also toured the piece with Fargo-Moorhead Opera, using a piano and violin as accompaniment, throughout North Dakota, including some of the locations the expedition stopped at.[41][64][65][66] Memphis's Tri-State Defender deemed the work an "epic success"; its review of the "enthusiastically received" work noted that "The years of preparation, study, writing, composing, editing and creating that were required to produce this panoramic and worthy opera is mind-boggling." The review found the score "monumental", "masterful", "magnificent and often haunting".[67]

Ching's next opera, an adaptation of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, is an entirely a cappella work, with the musical accompaniment, including the percussion, sung by a "voicestra" of 15 to 20 voices.[2][68] The inspiration for the work came when he was invited to become the vocal coach for DeltaCappella, a contemporary a cappella group founded in Memphis in 2007.[69] Ching recalls, "Their devotion to detail and their joy of singing was palpable and infectious. There was something jaw-droppingly giddy about the whole enterprise. With no reeds, no mouthpieces, no strings, no sticks, the variety of sounds they were capable of making was virtually unlimited. By the end of my first rehearsal with them I was hooked and eager to apply this new sonic palette to opera."[70] After conducting Marcus Hummon's Shakespeare-filled Surrender Road, he reflected that "with its potential for three sonic worlds inhabited by the Athenians, the fairies, the rude mechanicals, A Midsummer Night’s Dream seemed a perfect vehicle for exploring a colorful prism of a cappella styles."[70] Ching has noted that his eclectic compositional style was influenced by what Gershwin was trying to accomplish in Porgy and Bess: "He was writing something that surfs between pop and opera. Many people love Porgy, but nobody ever tries to write an opera like it. I wanted to write accessible and tuneful music, yet very modern."[71] The opera debuted in 2011 at Playhouse on the Square, in collaboration with Opera Memphis, with roles sung by musical-theater singers and professional opera singers.[2][72][73] It was also performed at OperaHub in Boston in 2012.[74][75]

The Wall Street Journal praised A Midsummer Night's Dream, stating that "Ching's remarkably inventive opera is a celebration of what voices can do and still, with the exception of a few startling vocal percussion effects, sound like voices." The review noted Ching's "seamless changes in tone, ... fine sense of pacing and skill with ensemble writing" and "tonal and tuneful vocal lines ... written for maximum intelligibility". The reviewer found the voicestra's part remarkable in that it "supports the singers on the stage, its overlapping lines and syllables weaving around them, amplifying their characters and conflicts, sometimes echoing their words (or even their thoughts), or supplying atmosphere. The voicestra gives the opera an added human dimension ...."[2] Albany Records released the CD of the opera in 2014.[76][77]

Slaying the Dragon, Ching's fact-based 2012 opera, explores intolerance and redemption, and was inspired by the 1990s true story Not by the Sword by Kathryn Watterson.[78] The two-act opera's libretto is by Ellen Frankel, and it was premiered in June 2012 by Philadelphia's Center City Opera Theater, which commissioned the work.[79] The opera is the story of a Ku Klux Klan Grand Dragon whose life is transformed by the friendship and kindness of a local rabbi and his wife. The man renounces his Klan association and begins to speak out publicly for tolerance; his terminal illness eventually incapacitates him and he moves into the rabbi's home, converting to Judaism before dying.[78][80][81] The score balances the dark themes of bigotry and intolerance with an eclectic variety of ethnic music including Yiddish folk songs, Vietnamese children’s songs, Jewish sacred music, Aryan rock, Broadway scores, gospel music, and country-western tunes.[82]

Speed Dating Tonight!, a comic opera in one act, was commissioned and premiered in 2013 by the Janiec Opera of the Brevard Music Center.[83] Ching supplied his own libretto for the piece, and the opera for up to 30 singers can be adapted for varying numbers of singers, voice types, gender ratios, and length of time, by cutting, re-ordering, or transposing the keys of the vignettes.[12][84][85][86][87] Additional 2013–14 production venues included Amarillo Opera, Southern Utah University, Ithaca College, University of Central Florida, Microsopic Opera (Pittsburgh), Poor Richard's Opera (Philadelphia),[87][88] and elsewhere, and it has been cited as "the most-performed American opera within a year of its premiere".[89]

Ching's 2015 opera is Alice Ryley, a fact-based ghost story based on the title character (also spelled Alice Riley), a woman who was hanged in Savannah, Georgia in the 1730s. The opera was commissioned by the Sherrill Milnes VOICE Programs, via the Savannah VOICE Festival, in October 2014, and premiered on Halloween Eve, October 30, 2015.[90][91][92][93][94]

Selected works

Personal life

Since mid 2010 Ching has lived in Ames, Iowa. His wife Barbara is chair of the English department at Iowa State University.[15][95]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Cuyler, Antonio Christopher. "The Career Paths of Non-European-American Executive Opera Administrators in the United States". Florida State University, 2007. pp. 59–64.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Waleson, Heidi. "A Remarkably Inventive A Cappella Premiere". The Wall Street Journal. January 25, 2011.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 Strauss, Elaine. "Summer Arts Preview". Princeton Info. June 14, 2006.
  4. ↑ Ching, Michael. "Remembering Robert Ward (1917-2013)". New Music Box. April 12, 2013.
  5. 1 2 Mobley, Mark. "Remembering Pulitzer Prize-Winning Composer Robert Ward". NPR. April 3, 2013.
  6. ↑ "Career Guide: Latest Additions & Changes". Central Opera Service Bulletin. Vol. 22, No. 4., Winter/Spring 1981. p. 34.
  7. ↑ Ching, Michael. "Carlisle Floyd". Opera and Beyond. September 28, 2011.
  8. ↑ "Studio Alumni". Houston Grand Opera.
  9. 1 2 Green, Judith. "Country songwriter hooks up with opera director for piece". Cox News Service. July 10, 1999.
  10. 1 2 "Opera America Salon Series: Exploring American Voices. Season Closes With Excerpts From Ching's A Midsummer Night's Dream — An A Cappella Opera". Opera America. August 3, 2009.
  11. ↑ "In the News". Opera. December 1980.
  12. 1 2 "Speed Dating Tonight! Resource Guide". Amarillo Opera. 2014.
  13. ↑ Ridge, M.D. and Josh Jacobs "Classical Notes". Virginia Beach Sun. January 15, 1992.
  14. ↑ "People". Daily Press. January 11, 1992.
  15. 1 2 3 Davis, Chris. "Michael Ching Leaves Opera Memphis". Memphis Flyer. March 12, 2010.
  16. 1 2 Devin, Jonathan. "Mr. Ching's Opus: Opera Memphis seeks to fill director’s shoes". Memphis Daily News. March 30, 2010.
  17. ↑ Nickel City Opera. Opera America.
  18. ↑ Douglas Moore Fund – Board List
  19. ↑ Douglas Moore Fund for American Opera. Razoo.com.
  20. ↑ "S.J. Chamber Season Ends on a High Note". San Jose Mercury News. May 20, 1997.
  21. ↑ "Craig Bohmler, Composer in Residence for Arizona Opera". Arizona Opera.
  22. ↑ Ching, Michael. Piano concerto (CD). 1997. Stanford University Library Holdings.
  23. 1 2 MacClelland, Scott. "'Psyche' Hotline: The San Jose Chamber Orchestra shows off composer Michael Ching's new Psyche and Eros". Metro Silicon Valley. May 25–31, 2000.
  24. ↑ Leeson, Dan. "CHAMBER ORCHESTRA REVIEW: Korngold Rediscovered And A Premiere To Match". San Francisco Classical Voice. May 21, 2000.
  25. ↑ Margaret Wolfson – Performance. MargaretWolfson.com.
  26. ↑ Margaret Wolfson. LinkedIn.
  27. ↑ "Psyche and Eros in West Memphis". Opera and Beyond. July 3, 2011.
  28. ↑ "Tilly In Opera". The Dispatch. July 9, 1980.
  29. ↑ Borroff, Edith and J. Bunker Clark. American Operas: A Checklist. Harmonie Park Press, 1992. p. 56.
  30. ↑ Griffel, Margaret Ross. Operas in English: A Dictionary. Scarecrow Press, 2012. p. 271.
  31. ↑ Taitte, W. L. "Short and Sweet". Texas Monthly. July 1985. p. 152.
  32. ↑ Nicholson, David. "Premiere Set For Virginia Opera". Daily Press. August 3, 1991.
  33. ↑ Zietz, Karyl Lynn. Opera companies and houses of the United States: a comprehensive, illustrated reference. McFarland, 1995. p. 280.
  34. ↑ Nicholson, David. "A 'Cue' From Director". Daily Press. January 19, 1992.
  35. ↑ Griffel, Margaret Ross. Operas in English: A Dictionary. Scarecrow Press, 2012. p. 108.
  36. ↑ King of the Clouds. Opera America.
  37. ↑ Out of the Rain. SheetMusicPlus.com.
  38. ↑ Out of the Rain. Hal Leonard Corporation.
  39. ↑ Peter Burwasser, Peter. "Fall Guide: Best Bets". Philadelphia City Paper. September 17–24, 1998.
  40. ↑ Griffel, Margaret Ross. Operas in English: A Dictionary. Scarecrow Press, 2012. p. 259.
  41. 1 2 3 "Middletown: Buttonwood Tree to host concert by Hugh Moffatt June 20". Middletown Press. May 14, 2014.
  42. ↑ Griffel, Margaret Ross. Operas in English: A Dictionary. Scarecrow Press, 2012. p. 362.
  43. ↑ The Sonneck Society Bulletin, Volumes 19-20. The Sonneck Society, 1993. p. 21.
  44. ↑ Townsend, Shaun. "Buoso's Ghost: Recent Performances". (Summary of article by Candy Williams, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, February 16, 1996).
  45. ↑ Past Seasons. Pittsburgh Opera.
  46. ↑ Griffel, Margaret Ross. Operas in English: A Dictionary. Scarecrow Press, 2012. p. 71.
  47. ↑ Buoso's Ghost. Opera America.
  48. ↑ Delacoma, Wynne. "Gianni Schicchi and Buoso's Ghost". Chicago Sun-Times. March 30, 2000.
  49. ↑ von Rhein, John."Two-timing Puccini". Chicago Tribune. March 31, 2000.
  50. ↑ Marsh, William. "In review: Memphis". Opera News. April 5, 1997.
  51. ↑ Parsons, Charles H. "Opera Around the World: Indianapolis". Opera. July 1999.
  52. ↑ Nilsson, B.A. "A Winning Pair". Metroland. July 17, 2008.
  53. ↑ Newman, Brad. "Opera finale: Two for the show". Amarillo Globe-News. March 21, 2010.
  54. ↑ "Opera Workshop Presents: Speed Dating Tonight!". Ithaca College School of Music. November 21, 2013.
  55. ↑ Faith. Opera America.
  56. 1 2 Whitney, D. Quincy. "Science fiction as opera: Composer, author bring unlikely story to stage". The Boston Globe. April 18, 1999.
  57. ↑ Ehren, Christine. "NY's Vital Theatre Has Operatic Caliban and Faith Sept. 2–19". Playbill. August 30, 1999.
  58. ↑ Griffel, Margaret Ross. Operas in English: A Dictionary. Scarecrow Press, 2012. p. 163.
  59. ↑ Chicon 2000: Dramatic and Musical Presentations. Chicon 2000. August 31 – September 4, 2000.
  60. ↑ CORPS OF DISCOVERY: An Opera in Three Acts. HearingVoices.com.
  61. 1 2 World Premiere: Cast and Action of Corps of Discovery, A Musical Journey. NWPlants.com. April 17, 2003. (Accessed August 30, 2014).
  62. ↑ Alarcon, Evelina. "Musical follows Lewis and Clark". People's World. March 15, 2002.
  63. ↑ Corps of Discovery, A Musical Journey in Three Acts. Opera America.
  64. ↑ Michael Ching. Center City Opera Theater.
  65. ↑ STEPPIN' OUT. ASCAP. March 18, 2003.
  66. ↑ Gunderson, Dan. "An adventurous opera". Minnesota Public Radio. May 18, 2007.
  67. ↑ Eikner, Jim. "Corps of Discovery is epic success". Tri-State Defender. May 26, 2004.
  68. ↑ Ward, Marvin J. "Composer/Conductor Michael Ching's Latest: Shakespeare Re-configured and Opera Re-imagined". Classical Voice of North Carolina (CVNC). December 2, 2014.
  69. ↑ "Opera Memphis sees success with a cappella Shakespeare opera". Memphis Business Journal. February 4, 2011.
  70. 1 2 "Beginnings Of A Dream". A Midsummer Night's Dream – Opera A Cappella.
  71. ↑ Blank, Christopher. "Michael Ching scores a cappella Midsummer adaptation". The Commercial Appeal. GoMemphis.com. January 21, 2011.
  72. ↑ Malkoff, Amy. "A Midsummer Night's Dream: Opera A Cappella Debuts!". Contemporary A Cappella Society. January 16, 2011.
  73. ↑ Devin, Jonathan. "Ching Gives Bard Operatic Twist". The Daily News. January 17, 2011.
  74. ↑ Gantz, Jeffrey. "OperaHub Dream catches on". The Boston Globe. June 29, 2012.
  75. ↑ Weininger, David. "Operahub’s Midsummer Night's Dream marks fifth season". The Boston Globe. June 21, 2012.
  76. ↑ A Midsummer Night's Dream — a cappella opera. Albany Records.
  77. ↑ A Midsummer Night's Dream (Opera a cappella) at AllMusic.
  78. 1 2 "Michael Ching's Slaying the Dragon Musical Reading". Delaware Today. September 2011.
  79. ↑ "Standing Ovation for World Premiere of Slaying The Dragon". Philadelphia Jewish Voice. June 12, 2012.
  80. ↑ Slaying the Dragon Synopsis. Center City Opera Theater.
  81. ↑ Slaying the Dragon. Center City Opera Theater.
  82. ↑ "New Opera Aims to 'Slay' Intolerance". Center City Opera Theater. (reprint: ).
  83. ↑ "UCF Opera Presents: Speed Dating Tonight!". SFGate. April 2014.
  84. ↑ Chandler, Chip. "Opera to change nightly". Amarillo Globe-News. October 23, 2013.
  85. ↑ Speed Dating Tonight: Comic Opera in One Act – About. Facebook.
  86. ↑ "SUU Opera Offers a Double Bill of Scenes and One-Act Comic Opera, Speed Dating Tonight!". KCSG. November 1, 2013.
  87. 1 2 Speed Dating Tonight! by Poor Richard's Opera. MyFringeArts.com. September 2014.
  88. ↑ Speed Dating Production. EncompassArts.com.
  89. ↑ Poor Richard's Opera to Present Speed Dating Tonight! in Manayunk and Center City. Poor Richard's Opera. July 21, 2014.
  90. ↑ Alice Ryley. Opera America. Retrieved July 22, 2016.
  91. ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20150714005934/http://savannahvoicefestival.org/festival/salon-series-new-ghost-opera-alice-ryley-preview/
  92. ↑ "Celebrating the End of National Opera Week at Ford Plantation Club". RichmondHillReflectionsLive.com. October 31, 2014.
  93. ↑ http://www.savannahvoicefestival.org/2015-festival-at-a-glance.html
  94. ↑ "Sherrill Milnes VOICE Programs Singers Offer Operatic Valentines in Two NYC Events February 13 and 14; Snowed-out “Milnes Conversations” at National Opera Center rescheduled to February 25". 21CMediaGroup.com. February 3, 2015.
  95. ↑ Department of English – Administrative Personnel. Iowa State University.
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