Albert Herring

COLLEGE-CONSERVATORY OF MUSIC, UNIVERSITY OF CINCINNATI  (2006)
National Opera Association Award: 1st Place in Category 5

ALBERT HERRING by Benjamin Britten, based on the short story by Guy de Maupassant
Conductor: Mark Gibson
Cast: Umstead/Tuohy, Hutchinson/Malone, Graham-Smith/Field, Beck, Wieser/Jackson, Pojanowski/Pritchard, Turner/Lake, Fry/Moe, Radbill, Reed/Savoie, Harvey, Lehnen-Sgroi
Production: P. Short (scenery), G. Sarofeen (clothes), K. Furst (lighting), S. Patton (Hair/Make-up)

Production Description: The setting is post WW2 in grimy, poverty-stricken England. Lady Billows lives with her companion, Florence, in a housing project efficiency apartment with just a few treasured relics from her late-Victorian youth. Albert’s green grocer functions as both apartment and place of business. In a desperate attempt to re-capture the glory of a by-gone era, Billows pursues her insane quest.

“A cornucopia of color, both vi­sually and musically, marked the University of Cincinnati College­ Conservatory of Music’s production of Benjamin Britten’s “Albert Herring” on Saturday in the Patricia Corbett The­ater. Guest director Nicholas Muni’s fertile imagination infused the evening with delightfully campy charac­ terizations, punchy sight gags and sassy acting choices. This production featured strong individual characterizations and shimmering vocal solos.”
– Richard Cowan, The Cincinnati Enquirer

“The Benjamin Britten opera about a virtuous young man crowned King of the May in an English village when a virginal girl cannot be found is a comedy, but it takes on darker tones in the updated CCM Opera production by guest director Nicholas Muni. Even the set, designed by CCM’s Paul Shortt to capture the atmosphere of post-World War II England (the original is set circa 1900), is dark, drab and foursquare, consisting of sooty pre-fab housing against a bleak sky.”
– Mary Ellen Hutton, Music in Cincinnati