The Music Center Opera Looks Up : The Artistry : After three seasons and some successful productions, the fledgling company is making ambitious plans

Peter Hemmings, born in London in 1934, came to his post as executive director of the Music Center Opera five years ago after serving in similar capacities with the London Symphony, the Australian Opera, Scottish Opera and Sadler’s Wells. Times music critic Martin Bernheimer spoke to him on the eve of the fall season, which opens Wednesday with Puccini’s “Tosca.”

Question: When you arrived in Los Angeles, what did you find here? What did you expect to find?

Answer: I had come here two years running to see the New York City Opera. I was amazed that there wasn’t an opera company here.

Q: Many people didn’t understand why.

A: There’s been as much opera in Los Angeles as there has been anywhere else, but not produced by a local company. Except for some three or four years, when there were various attempts. And I think the reason why we’ve been successful is that--rather in the same way as when I went to the Scottish Opera--there was a proven latent demand just waiting to be filled. And it had come at a time when touring companies, American or foreign, no longer really were going to be available.

Q: Wasn’t there also the crucial desire for something that Los Angeles could call its own?

A: That’s the other side of the coin. There was a feeling that it was more sensible to amortize the cost by touring productions around, forgetting that in doing that you lost a great deal, both in artistic quality and in empathy with the audience. I’ve always felt that an opera company is only successful if it has an empathy with the audience. Good or bad, the opera company is felt to be part of the cultural fabric of the city.

Q: You came and you found a hungry city?

A: The good thing is that it was a city which was hungry not just for the pop operas, but was prepared to take a risk on pieces that it didn’t know. I mean pieces like “The Fiery Angel,” “Kat’a Kabanova,” “Porgy and Bess” and “Alcina.” These pieces have not put subscribers off.

Q: Some people have thought that you were perhaps too esoteric.

A: But we had a clean slate to write on. We could do more or less whatever we wanted. And so from the start, I said to our board that I thought we should use that as a big advantage.

Q: Do you use Domingo in “Otello” as a lure to get people to see “Kat’a Kabanova”?

A: I think wherever Domingo performs in anything it’s a lure. And I think Placido’s involvement with us is more important than that. I think it’s that he gave us a sort of imprimatur. People thought, “Well, this must be important if one of the world’s greatest singers is prepared to lend his name to it.”

Q: And next to his name is a title. . . .

A: Artistic consultant.

Q: What exactly does that mean?

A: Just what it says. We consult him on artistic matters. Obviously, the pieces that he’s involved with as a conductor or as a singer. But, I mean, he’s very good about coming and sitting with me and auditioning and choosing young singers.

Q: Five years have passed since you came here from London. That hardly seems possible.

A: Five years? Yes. I was appointed in August of ’84 and then joined in October ’84. That was just after the Olympic Games. And I’ve just agreed to stay for another five years.

Q: The Music Center Opera is growing up, but yours is still the baby company in the Music Center complex.

A: Well, we now take more money in the (Dorothy Chandler) Pavilion than any other company, partly because our performances are much higher priced than any other company. Therefore, we contribute more money to the running costs than anybody else.

Q: Your piece of the Music Center operating pie is a generous one?

A: Absolutely. At the moment our piece is, of course, modest because for many years the opera only got a very small share of what was generally raised. Everybody recognizes that here. Gradually the share is improving. But we have to raise more money from outside sources than we get from the Unified Fund.

Q: What about the problem--if it is a problem--of sharing this house with other organizations?

A: Well, we obviously are going to have to continue to share it until 1994. But in some ways it’s easier to share on a back-to-back basis with a symphony than it is on a back-to-back basis with another opera. It’s easier to change the sets from an opera in one night to a concert the next night than to another opera the next night, because once you’ve changed into the shell, then you’re finished. Whereas, once you’ve struck an opera, you’re going to start with another one.

Q: Is the house well equipped for opera?

A: The great advantage of the house is that it has a very good stage from a storage point of view. It has wide side stages with a big, deep rear stage. The problem as I see it is the proscenium arch isn’t high enough. You can just look at it, I mean, it’s a big letter box. It’s wide and too low, and it also has that rather strange shape at the top of the proscenium. And we’ve had talks with the operating company about eventually improving the shape of the proscenium. It’s a bit dangerous, though, because once you start fiddling with a theater which has good acoustics, you can easily mess them up.

The other thing is, although the Pavilion seats 3,200, you can do intimate pieces in it. I mean like “Cosi.” As long as the designer from the start recognizes the problem and doesn’t try and put it in a tiny little matchbox set in the middle of the stage, then it can work. And the sound from all parts of the house is very good.

Q: Many of your productions--the sets and costumes at least--come from other companies. Does this create a problem?

A: Well, you’ve got to, again, be aware of the problem from the outset. Say a piece is coming into your repertoire in one particular mix of operas. It is made to work with that mix. When you revive it, it will be with different operas. I think the essence of sets in this theater is that they should all be on wheeled trucks, so that you can create a stage quickly.

Q: What about the pit?

A: The pit’s fine. Especially now that it’s in three sections which are automated.

Q: Could you do the “Ring” in this house?

A: Why not?

Q: Are you planning to do the “Ring”?

A: One day. I think that the trouble about doing the “Ring” is that it uses up so much money and artistic resources that you must do it at a time when you understand that and don’t try to do a very heavy season of other operas at the same time.

Q: What exactly will happen when Disney Hall opens, and the Pavilion becomes an opera house?

A: Well, that depends on how strong we are by that stage, both financially and in terms of audience. At the moment we do four performances of each opera plus a preview. We think that with the subscription increasing as it is we can probably in two years’ time go to five performances. But if, by the time that the Disney Hall opens, we can get to six performances of each opera plus, with popular operas, a couple of non-subscription performances, then I reckon we could manage, say, 8 to 10 weeks in the fall and 8 to 10 weeks in the spring. And then we could be doing anything up to 85 performances, with the summer season, as well.

Q: And you think the audience exists here for this much opera?

A: It depends. . . . I was really very pleased, for instance, with the spring season, where we did “Tancredi.” After all, it is not a popular opera. It’s a very rare opera, indeed. I think we did about 90% for “Tancredi.” And we did virtually 100% for two revivals--and relatively recent revivals. The “Otello” and “Salome” had only been seen two seasons before. I think the advantage in spreading it out is that the subscriber doesn’t have to see all his opera in a three-week season, and then have a drought for the rest of the year.

Q: Do you envision this house being an opera house where you and the ballet really hold forth full-time?

A: I don’t envision ever sharing the house on a night-by-night basis with the ballet. I mean, I think that sort of idea is no longer prevalent. It used to be. I don’t think it’s the way to do it. You see, the trouble is that ballet companies are geared, both technically and financially, to performing eight shows a week. But I’m sure that the Music Center is looking to us to take upwards of 20 weeks by 1994. And I think it’s our job to get the establishment and our money and our audiences in place for then. . . .

Q: Want to talk about your disappointments?

A: I think it’s a pity that we haven’t been able to find a smaller theater where we could do, well, “Alcina,” and that sort of thing. The Wiltern is OK for some things, but it’s not really OK for that sort of piece. It would be lovely to have a 1,000-seat theater, but there isn’t one.

Q: What about the other theaters existing, the Ahmanson or the Taper?

A: Well, the Ahmanson is anybody’s guess, once “Phantom” finishes.

Q: When do you think “Phantom” will finish?

A: It’s so far away that we can hardly discuss it. But I mean if the Ahmanson is to be reconstructed inside, which has been discussed, it could be that it would turn out to be OK for smaller-scale opera. But the Taper is hopeless. The Taper won’t do at all. It’s far too dry and there’s less space for an orchestra even than there is in Long Beach. So that’s a disappointment. I mean, obviously, the financial problems that we’ve had the last two years have been a bit of a slog.

Q: More of a slog than anticipated.

A: I suppose so. I mean, naturally we did what we thought were realistic projects, and we were confounded. And this is a very expensive house to run. This is a very expensive city to put on theatrical productions.

Q: Under the circumstances, would it be better to import more, borrow and share more productions or simply to design cheaper productions?

A: I certainly don’t think we should design cheaper productions, and I think the idea of borrowing is OK to a certain extent. I don’t like borrowing. I mean co-productions. I think borrowing something--just going shopping around Europe and saying, “I like that, I’d like that in two years’ time,” is a barren artistic policy.

Q: Was “Macbeth” a borrowed production?

A: No, it was a co-production. I saw it in Toronto. It didn’t turn out as well as I’d hoped.

Q: Any other disappointments?

A: Well, I think we have got to come to terms with the problems of putting on musicals or operetta in a house this big. We’ve got a long way to go in finding the right way of amplifying, because American musicals are traditionally over-amplified. In the (London) Coliseum, they do now use amplification for the dialogue in “Carmen.” And I think that’s a pity, because when I first was at Sadler’s Wells and we did “The Merry Widow” and “Orpheus in the Underworld” and “The Land of Smiles” in the Coliseum, we didn’t amplify.

Q: You amplified “Orpheus” in this house. Anything else?

A: Not in this house.

Q: The “Mikado” at the Wiltern?

A: Yes. And I wish we had amplified “Porgy.” I couldn’t hear the words in “Porgy.” But I’m told, when I mentioned that to American colleagues, they said you never can.

Q: Perhaps this is a matter of a self-fulfilling prophecy. People think that if they have amplification, or supertitles, then they don’t have to be so careful with the words.

A: Supertitles have certainly increased audiences, whether or not they have decreased enjoyment is an interesting question. I mean, all I know is that although I speak adequate German and French and a little Italian, I don’t understand unless I have the supertitles.

Q: Do you find yourself concentrating as you used to on the singer on the stage?

A: I don’t know. All I know is that the performances that I’ve enjoyed most in my lifetime have come from singers singing in their own language without supertitles but with marvelous diction. I’m thinking of Janet Baker, Jon Vickers. . . . With them there was never any problem about understanding what they were singing or catching every word. Supertitles create some problems and solve others. I have mixed feelings. But, I think they’re here to stay, and it’s up to us to perfect the technique.

Q: What makes you most happy about putting on opera here?

A: We’re happy, for instance, that productions like our “Salome” and “Tristan” have become much in demand around the world. We’re happy the recipe that we’ve provided for audiences has proved to be successful. We’ve got a very small staff, you know, only about 20 people on permanent salary throughout the year, which compares with, I think, 70 in San Francisco, and we’ve developed a close-knit group of people who work very hard and seem now to know a great deal about what is required from them.

Q: How far ahead have you planned?

A: ‘93-94. I’ve got one or two artists contracted for ‘93-94.

Q: And you hope they’ll still have voices?

A: That’s a problem.

Q: But if you don’t sign far in advance, you don’t get them.

A: Unless you’re lucky. We can sometimes manage to find somebody who’s either surprisingly available or is prepared to change their arrangements in order to fit into something that they particularly want to do.

Q: It’s a big jigsaw puzzle.

A: Yes. And then, of course, you also know by experience and you may well feel that a piece you were intending to revive shouldn’t be revived, by which time you’ve already got some contracts signed. And what one is always trying to do is to prejudge how a piece should be done and what the audience expects of you.

What I’m pleased about here is the audience. The Los Angeles audience apparently expects to be challenged.