Kabir Sehgal, Marie Incontrera, & The Leveraged Jazz Orchestra - Angela's Ring: An Opera Revue of the European Debt Crisis (2021) Hi Res

Hmmm…. I bet none of those reading these lines have ever heard anything like it. So far, jazz and opera have been most organically combined by the brilliant George Gershwin in Porgy and Bess. There were experiments by Kurt Weill and Karla Bley. The opera Nixon in China by John Adams and Alice Goodman is probably the closest to the project presented today, which did not become something as amazing in its time as Jesus Christ Superstar. But there Lloyd-Webber and Rice worked with a rock base. Here, musicians from New York, bassist and well-known jazz columnist (and at one time a banker on Wall Street) Kabir Sehgal and pianist Maria Incontera created a jazz opera, taking as their theme ... the European debt crisis of 2010-2015, associated with first of all, with Greece.

More than unusual! And all in all seriousness! The premiere of the classic opera "Ring of Angels" took place in Manhattan in 2015 and did not become an event. Then producer Herschel Garfein advised the authors to work with the material they know best. And now - on March 19, a jazz opera of the same name, completely reworked by the authors, will be released with a portrait of German Chancellor Angela Merkel on the cover with a certain “ring of omnipotence” hanging over her head, suspiciously similar to a halo. The album featured opera stars led by Grammy winner Lucy Schaufer as Merkel. Among the characters are Greek Prime Minister Georgios Papandreou, French President Sarkozy, Italian Prime Minister Berlusconi, IMF Chairman Christine Lagarde. The authors have recruited the speakers who are reading the news - genuine and well-known speakers in the United States. On the jazz side, The Leveraged Jazz Orchestra and such famous musicians as Grace Kelly, Oran Atkin and Edmar Castaneda are involved.

The opera opens with an announcer's voice reading the news of the creation of the European Union, followed by a very nice jazz version of Beethoven's famous ode, which has become the Union's official anthem. Further, in the language of opera, the authors turn directly to the origins and development of the Greek crisis. The text contains enough black humor, and the music contains quotations: now from the Greek dance "Sirtaki", now from the real opera aria of Nessun dorma, now again from "Ode to Joy". The libretto develops in accordance with historical reality. The cruel Merkel refuses a loan to Greece and calls on Papandreou to tighten his belts, and in the final another loan on very tough conditions is still provided by the IMF. The music is really jazz, opera vocalists demonstrate their high art. Schaufer is especially good as Merkel. In general, it worked.

Will real success come to this work? On the one hand, the rapid changes in the world have pretty much erased the memory of these events. It's time to write operas about Brexit, migrants or the COVID pandemic. On the other hand, many great operas did not chase relevance at all, but took their own music. It remains to wish Sehgal, Inconter and the entire project team good luck.