United States Aaron Siegel, Rainbird: Soloists, Sugar Vendil (keyboards), Andie Tanning (strings), Jess Tsang (percussion). Experiments in Opera, Mabou Mines, New York, 17.4.2025. (RP)
Production:
Libretto – Mallory Catlett & Aaron Siegel
Director – Mallory Catlett
Production design – Attilio Rigotti
Sets – Peiyi Wong
Costumes – Olivera Gajic
Lighting – Yuki Nakase Link
Films – Andrew Denton
Cast:
Beatrice Rainbird – Gelsey Bell
Godfrey Rainbird – Chris DiMeglio
Lynley Rainbird – Katie Geissinger
Chorus – Shurmi Dhar, Jeff Tobias
Aaron Siegel and co-librettist Mallory Catlett devoted seven years to transforming Janet Frame’s Yellow Flowers in the Antipodean Room into the opera Rainbird. He describes their primary task as creating space for the novel’s major themes to breathe. It took Experiments in Opera to provide the opportunity for them to resonate and penetrate.
Drawn from her remarkable life experiences, the New Zealand author’s novel grapples with the consequences of failure to conform to societal norms. Diagnosed as schizophrenic, Frame was scheduled for a lobotomy while still in her twenties. She was spared that fate when her first published short stories won a major literary prize in 1951, just before the surgery was to occur.
Rainbird is the story of a decent, average man, Godfrey Rainbird, who is married with children, holds down a job and is involved in the community. As emigrés to New Zealand, he and his wife, Beatrice, know the need to fit into the community in which they live. One night, Godfrey is killed while returning home from a Fellowship Society meeting, but he miraculously returns to life.
Godfrey’s sister Lynley flies to New Zealand to both attend her brother’s funeral and to relocate there. She believes New Zealand will offer her the room to breathe, move, grow and love, which she has never had before, although Beatrice cautions otherwise. It is a reality that Lynley eventually grasps, realizing that everything in this small town caters to you if you live like everyone else and embrace the scenery. She opts for an apartment in Auckland.
Beatrice knows instantly that Godfrey’s return to life has changed everything, and she ponders whether it would have been better if he had died. He likewise senses that his notoriety imperils his hard-won place in the town. The indignities quickly begin to mount. Godfrey is dismissed from his job at a travel agency, and the only option is shift work in a hotel. The act of charity, in line with the business’s commitment to help the handicapped, is quickly rejected.
Beatrice returns to work, and Godfrey tends to the house. It is a step too far, with devastating consequences for the family. The neighbors taunt the family, calling Godfrey ‘Ole Cripply Rainbird’ and pelting their home with stones. Their children are taken away from them, but worse is to come.
The tragedy plays out in Peiyi Wong’s minimalist set, which captures the intimacy of family life and the town’s cool reserve. Small structures were arranged to create Godfrey’s hospital bed and the one in his home where he recuperates. With a quick reconfiguration, the town materialized. Short video interludes by New Zealand video artist Andrew Denton depicted the country’s scenic landscape.
Siegel’s score is also minimalist with an endless stream of repetitive notes and rhythms. Duple time conjures an almost mind-numbing conformity, with triplets signaling discord. The vocal line of the officious Mrs Henley, the police matron who interrupts Beatrice’s sleep to bring news of Godfrey’s death, is almost entirely running triplets.
Using a combo of violin, keyboard and percussion instruments, Siegel bathes the drama in musical color. Ukulele and glockenspiel accompany Beatrice’s awkward visit to Godfrey in the hospital, gradually segueing to violin, vibraphone and toy piano as they push the restart button on their lives. Their neighbors’ carping about ‘Ole Cripply Rainbird’ is spoken in rhythm above alternating ostinato patterns of running sixteenth notes and dissonant chords on the vibraphone.
The text is delivered in spoken dialogue and singing. True to the operatic roots, Beatrice and Godfrey’s innermost thoughts are expressed through music. The most moving is Beatrice’s realization that as long as Godfrey lives and works among people, each one will be constantly faced with the fact of their death. Instruments also give voice to pain, and none is more eloquent than the trumpet solo that Godfrey plays after his wife has committed suicide.
Gelsey Bell and Chris DiMeglio were riveting as Beatrice and Godfrey in this mesmerizing, all-absorbing, time-altering musical and visual environment. Bell appeared simply dressed and equally plain spoken as Beatrice, easing her burdens with a glass or two of sherry. DiMeglio’s Godfrey was a noble everyman, helpless to protect himself or his family. They switched seamlessly between speaking and singing, delivering both with sincerity and directness.
As Lynley, Katie Geissinger was at once naive, grating and compassionate. Shurmi Dhar and Jeff Tobias took on multiple roles in the opera, portraying minor characters while singing as the chorus with equally committed and compelling performances.
When Lynley thought that her brother was dead, she wanted him to have a proper burial, unlike their mother who died during a bombing raid in the Second World War. Their mother’s bones were discovered during excavation work, and her final resting place became a tourist site. Lynley intended Godfrey’s final resting place to be refined, private and impenetrable. Beatrice had already found such a site, a family plot in a beautiful cemetery by the sea where she went to find solace unbeknownst to anyone.
Long after Beatrice and Godfrey’s deaths, a tourist office brochure contained their biographies, where fiction was intertwined with fact. It also had directions to the exact location of their graves. It was a beautiful place with yellow and gold flowers in summer, which Beatrice had planted when the graves were empty.
Rick Perdian