Steve Pisano

Small local opera companies are like delicate exotic flowers: They blossom for a short time under unstable conditions and wither away when the cold winter of economic insecurity and vagaries of artistic endeavor hit them. They come and they go, providing valuable experience for budding young talent and leaving broken dreams and some dreams that came true behind.

Amore Opera was founded in 2009, one of two successors to the venerable Amato Opera which folded in that year after the retirement of its founder Tony Amato. The other successor company, Bleecker Street Opera was run by Tony Amato’s niece and performed from 2010 to 2011, closing when the niece and her husband moved out of Manhattan.

Amore Opera would have wilted and been trodden underfoot like many other operatic broken blossoms when its founder, Nathan Hull, was taken too soon by a heart attack in 2020 in the middle of the pandemic. His partner of 22 years, Ying-Chi Connie I is not a musician, singer, director, or arts administrator but she was/is determined to keep Tony and Nathan’s legacy alive and active. Connie has faced some opposition and frustration to preserve the company so it can continue to provide opportunities for young artists. She revived the company with a few concerts and La bohème in 2023. In February 2024, this critic reviewed for parterre box a very vital and engaging production of Don Giovanni.

Eli Jacobson

Since then, Connie I has been busy fundraising for a production of Madama Butterfly which resulted in two weekends of shows in late March at the Hungarian House on the Upper East Side. The improvements in production values and instrumental playing happily remain evident.

Married opera singers and co-directors Tami Swartz and tenor Adam C J Klein remounted for Amore Opera a production they produced, directed, and starred in at Harrisburg Opera Association twenty years ago. The couple researched the actual historic background of John Luther Long and David Belasco’s source story and play which were adapted by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa for Puccini’s opera.

They corrected inaccuracies and placed Madama Butterfly in a specific historical milieu. In the original novel, 15-year-old Butterfly’s samurai father died in the Satsuma rebellion of 1878 – so the opera was reset in 1885 and 1888 in the Meiji period of Emperor Mutsuhito who adopted a western style military uniform and attempted to modernize Japan by opening it up to European influences. Butterfly in Act II here adopts a western Victorian gown. Accurate Japanese words like “b?zu” for “bonze” are substituted. I was wondering if the scenes between Butterfly and Suzuki would be sung in Japanese translation but that did not happen – the text otherwise was pretty much untouched.

Swartz herself is the daughter of a Japanese mother and American father and brought her own mixed cultural heritage to understanding the fragility of assimilation and cultural understanding from both sides. However, Madama Butterfly is very much an intimate portrait of a young woman, mother and wife – not an analysis of Japanese history or culture. It is focused on the individual and her betrayal. A chamber version of Madama Butterfly works well because it allowed the viewer to be close to the singers and share their emotional lives in an intimate setting. The whole opera takes place in Butterfly’s house and usually there are only a handful of singers onstage – the chorus is only onstage in Act I and is offstage for Acts II and III. There are no big ensembles with large groups of singers onstage. Puccini keeps Cio-Cio San center stage at all times with little respite.

Kathy Deng

This is where Swartz and Klein’s insistence on opera as theater worked its magic – to quote Tami Swartz’s production note: “All our singing actors work in tandem, breathing life and realism into their characters. I have shared my personal experiences with them; they all make strong choices. The best theater is created when those strong choices work with and conflict with each other, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

There was an attention to intimate detail, personal interaction and to listening onstage. Scenes that usually go by in a blur of generalized emotion gained psychological depth and specificity. For example, the language barrier and lack of understanding in Sharpless’ reading of Pinkerton’s letter to Butterfly in Act II: Butterfly does not or cannot absorb that she is being abandoned and the consul frustrated with her interruptions and lack of understanding tries to break it to her bluntly. He is stymied by her crushed and angry reaction and backs down. Each misunderstanding, each miscue from either party, was realized in painstaking detail.

The auditorium at Hungarian House is a high-ceilinged room which holds about 130 people. The production was quite minimal – just a small raised platform upstage, some screens, a plant or two, a few chairs and a table. An American flag and a portrait of Pinkerton are the only decorations. Sara Pearson’s (likely rented) costumes were on the other hand richly detailed and elegantly crafted.

Meanwhile on the orchestral front, conductor Elizabeth Hastings led about 20 musicians in a reduced orchestration. They were unpaid volunteers, some new to playing opera – occasionally harmonies went sour, but this passed quickly. Hastings resisted overt emotionalism while keeping an eagle eye on musical detail and keeping the tempos flowing forward.

Most of the roles were triple cast. I saw two of the casts on Thursday March 27^th and Friday March 28^th. Both the Butterfly sopranos were Asian with voices that might not have sufficient heft or stamina in a large auditorium versus a large room. Similarly, the chamber orchestra gave more than adequate support while sparing them having to project over a full symphony orchestra.

In general, in these small semi-amateur companies the women are better than the men. No one was overtly bad, but Friday night’s cast cohered better and on a higher level than Thursday’s group despite the excellence of both lead sopranos.

Both Jihye Seo (Thursday) and Yeawon Jun (Friday) have delicate, clear voices of striking purity. (Both were Donnas Anna in Don Giovanni in 2024.) Yet each were carefully coached using wide dynamics starting extra soft to modulate to contrasting louder climaxes without straining for vocal volume they weren’t given by nature. Each paced herself successfully, staying within her limitations so that she sounded as fresh at the end of the evening as she did at the beginning. Both included a high D-flat for Butterfly’s entrance and the two high B’s in “Un bel dì” were fearlessly attacked and long held. Also, both were credible when Butterfly tells Sharpless that she is 15 years-old in Act I. The lovely Jihye Seo has a creamier tone used with affecting emotional reserve. Jun was more silvery and pointed in tone with incisive projection of text, phrasing with impact. Both broke your heart.

Tenor Yulin Wang as B.F. Pinkerton won everyone over with a ringing bright tenor with an easy pingy top. As an actor he is finding his way. Baritone Chris Drago Fistonich impressed with a rich, juicy lyric baritone and energetic acting though he looked and acted (and sounded) too young for the character of Sharpless. As Suzuki, mezzo Kimberly Milburn, produced a bright and youthful sound (if short on the bottom) and also read younger onstage. The Thursday cast had supporting singers who either were somewhat past their best or hadn’t found it yet despite some good vocal material. Their vocal limitations were outweighed by their sense of shared artistic mission.

Meanwhile, all the shows were sold out and the audience was both impressed and moved by what they saw. Meanwhile, funds are being raised for a projected production of Mozart’s The Magic Flute that might play in December 2025 for the holiday season.