Voir Dire - a courtroom opera
“Darkly brilliant” -Classical Review
”Startlingly immediate” -The Wall Street Journal
”Unrelenting drama” -The Dallas Morning News
design by Michael Peterson, photography by Nine Photography
the critically-acclaimed true-crime opera
winner of the 2011 Vista Award for new opera and 2014 Fort Worth Opera Frontiers Showcase
VOIR DIRE ALBUM MASTER RECORDING - for perusal purposes only
“darkly brilliant”courtroom opera Voir Dire to release as original-cast album
RedHouse Music is proud to announce the long-awaited release of the original-cast album of composer Matthew Peterson and librettist Jason Zencka’s courtroom opera Voir Dire. Featuring the original cast of singers from the critically-acclaimed 2017 world premiere production at Fort Worth Opera, the recording is set to release in the Americas both physically and on all digital streaming services on Friday, August 7 2020 and in the rest of the world on Friday, October 9 2020.
Voir Dire is a courtroom opera adapted from writer Jason Zencka’s experiences as a reporter on the courthouse beat in Stevens Point, Wisconsin in the late 2000s, with music composed in 2008-9 by the award-winning composer Matthew Peterson. From 2010-12 the creative team endured the cancellation of three separate planned productions in Sweden and the US. After winning first prize at the 2014 Fort Worth Frontiers Festival and subsequent workshops at the Seagle Music Colony, a revised version of the opera was produced in 2017 to international critical acclaim at Fort Worth Opera, with stage direction by David Gately and music direction by Viswa Subbaraman.
Voir Dire “drills unsentimentally into the tragedies of ordinary people...Its power lies in how believably it conveys their emotions.” (Opera Now). This unique courtroom opera is “startlingly immediate and journalistic, as gripping as a great feature story. and made memorable by the depth and texture of the music” (Wall Street Journal).
Featuring breathtaking performances by five young opera artists - Anna Laurenzo, Trevor Martin, Nate Mattingly, Christina Pecce and Andrew Surrena - and an ensemble of nine Minnesota musicians conducted by maverick opera-maestro Viswa Subbaraman, the 90-minute opera was recorded over two intense days in June 2018 at Minnesota Public Radio’s Weyerhauser Studio in St Paul, MN. This album is the debut release for independent new music label RedHouse, and was supported by over 100 crowdfunding supporters and the Swedish Arts Council (Kulturrådet).
The score and performance materials for Voir Dire is available from Swedish Music Information Center (Svensk Musik) at https://www.svenskmusik.org/en For more information please contact Matthew Peterson at matthew AT matthew-peterson DOT com.
VOIR DIRE
a courtroom opera
by Matthew Peterson & Jason Zencka
music by Matthew Peterson
libretto by Jason Zencka
type album
genre opera, new classical composition
release date August 7 2020 (Americas), October 9 2020 (World)
label RedHouse
RH001
upc cd 8720205207548
digital upc 8720205207531
featuring
Viswa Subbaraman, conductor
Christina Pecce, soprano
Anna Laurenzo, mezzo
Andrew Surrena, tenor
Trevor Martin, baritone
Nate Mattingly, bass-baritone
Lauren McNee, flutes
Pat O’Keefe, clarinets
Seulgee Lee Nelson, piano
Erik Barsness & Dave Hagedorn, percussion
Emilia Mettenbrink, violin
Matthew Mindeman, viola
Greg Byers, cello
Rolf Erdahl, bass
world premiere production 4/23-5/8/17, Fort Worth Opera
recorded June 13-14, 2018 at Minnesota Public Radio Studios
TRACK LIST
Scene 1 1. Judge’s Chambers
2. A 911 Call
3. Beating Music
Scene 2: A Bond Hearing 4. “Let me take a moment to explain the routine here”
5. “Officers Zenner and Grant were dispatched to 106 Adams Boulevard”
6. “Who’s next?”
7. “I’ve never been so cold before”
8. Pavane for a Dead Infant
Scene 3: The Preliminary Hearing9. The Preliminary Hearing
10. Chasing Music
Scene 4: A Custody Debate 11. “How dare you talk to me like that?”
12. “I give you…your bird.”
Scene 5: The Witness13. Justice
14. The Witness
15. Poison Music
Scene 6: A Plea16. “Guilty!”
17. “Illegal images found on the hard drive of a computer owned by Dr. Henry Milton”
18. “You know, there was a time when I maligned myself”
19. “So this is the child pornographer”
20. “So fucking what?”
21. “You are a pain in my ass”
22. Death Music
Scene 7: The Confession23. The Confession
24. Brutal Music
Scene 8: A Trial25. “You see, I’m not too good with words”
26. A Trial
27. Burning Music
Scene 9: The Voir Dire28. “Four forty-five, almost through another day”
29. “What do I want to offer?”
30. “Jeffrey’s mine”
31. “Speak the truth”
PRESS FOR VOIR DIRE
“Startlingly immediate and journalistic, as gripping as a great feature story, and made memorable by the depth and texture of the music”
-The Wall Street Journal
“Darkly brilliant”
-Classical Review
“Voir Dire drills unsentimentally into the tragedies of ordinary people…its power lies in how believably it conveys their emotions”
-Opera Now
“Nothing short of brilliant - presenting a bitter critique - sometimes darkly humorous, often brutal - of American culture, complete with vividly drawn characters and a hauntingly eclectic score”
-Classical Review
“Unrelenting drama, variously tragic, violent and ineffably sad”
-The Dallas Morning News
“Virtuosic and stunning music”
-The Column Online
“Peterson and Zencka have created a compellingly complex dramatic tapestry”
-Classical Review
“Based on Zencka’s own experience as a court reporter, it’s like channel surfing among crime shows, from tragic to comic to zany absurdity”
-The Dallas Morning News