Mezzo-soprano and composer Lisa Neher (left), pianist Jodi Goble (center), and soprano Maggie Burr (right) rehearse music from the forthcoming opera murder mystery Kitchen/Wedding/Murder at the Mindekirken in Minneapolis, MN. The church sanctuary features an altarpiece by August Klagstad in the background.

In October 2022, the Norwegian Lutheran Memorial Church in Minneapolis played host to Queen Sonja of Norway. Last week, it played host to a different sort of spectacle – a 2-day exploration of new operas under development.

The Mindekirken, as it is colloquially known, first formed as a congregation in 1922. Three years later, its congregants took part in the Norse-American Centennial Celebration in St. Paul. In 1930, they dedicated the sanctuary of what is now a thriving church complex in Minneapolis’ Ventura Village neighborhood. A lot of art has been created, presented, hung, and sung in its halls since then, on matters both sacred and secular. Operas about man-eating sirens and wedding murder mysteries, though? Probably a first.

Unusual subjects in opera are no stranger to Minneapolis-based Really Spicy Opera. The company, which set up shop in the Mindekirken for two days of musical readings and recording sessions before Thanksgiving, runs the Aria Institute for Composers and Librettists training program for new opera creators. Aria Institute alums have created more than 150 new pieces of music, as well as commissioned works for the Kennedy Center, Sydney Opera, and more, on an astounding variety of subjects.

“Every art form begins with innovation,” said Artistic Director Basil Considine. “In order to persist, every art form must also reinvent itself. Sometimes that’s the type of story, sometimes it’s retelling the story in a different way. Sometimes, it’s in who is featured in the story, and how they shape their destiny.”

“From the very beginning, opera creators have worked to push the boundaries of storytelling,” Considine said. “The original inventors of opera, the Florentine Camerata, were trying to recreate a visceral, ecstatic experience of theatre that they read about in Greek histories, but found lacking in their contemporary entertainments. Since then, every generation has tried to push the envelope in its own ways – with new methods, different types of stories, musical devices, forms, and more.”

Not that creators always agree, or move in the same direction. The newspapers of the 19th century are filled with public debates about rival composers and the aesthetics of opera – Bellini vs. Meyerbeer, Donizetti vs. Rossini, and (of course) the arch-rivalry between Giuseppe Verdi and Richard Wagner, to name a few.

It’s easy to forget that their famous operas were innovating not just in music, but also in how they wove complex psychodramas. Think the finale of Il Trovatore, where a woman lets her adoptive son be killed by his own unsuspecting father, to avenge a killing a generation ago. The kaleidoscope of conflicting perspectives and motivations in Rigoletto‘s famous quartet. A disempowered woman seizing control by knife’s point when the titular character of Tosca stabs Scarpia. Operatic moments that confused and delighted audiences with their novelty as well as their craft, and have persisted in part because of how the characters’ feelings are painted so vividly to enjoy.

And so, on those cool fall days before Thanksgiving, a team of musical artists was digging into musical scores and libretti, pulling at the dramatic and musical threads that thrill performers and snare audiences. And, in the case of these works-in-progress, cast things in a differently light. Sirens vs. Amazons, for example, features man-eating sirens from Greek mythology. In the opera’s opening scene, two siren sisters (played by Victoria Erickson and Yvonne Freese) devour a shipful of male heroes – much to the dismay of their younger sister (played by Maggie Burr), who fell in love with one of them. (He didn’t make it.) And like that, the starting pearl of classic mythology with unfolds into a sibling drama.

Most classic operas have large male casts, and just a handful of female roles. Most collegiate opera programs are the opposite, often with female:male ratios of 9:1 or greater. (Puccini’s La Fanciulla del West takes this to an extreme, with 17 named male roles and 2 named female roles.) This is both an educational opera and industry opera casting challenge – one that award-winning composer Jodi Goble, a professor at Iowa State University and the composer for Sirens vs. Amazons knows well.

“As a composer who also doubles as a vocal coach and opera director,” Goble said. “I am committed to creating new works that reflect the vocal and casting needs of chamber opera companies and conservatory programs, center the lived experiences of women, and explore and celebrate all the relationships and connections that bring us together as human beings. This scene from the dramedy Sirens vs. Amazons upends the classic tropes of forbidden love and familial pressure to give us – underneath the surface mayhem – a surprisingly sweet moment of identity and sisterly connection.”

That use of mythology to explore something both contemporary and timeless, upending stereotypes, resonates with performers. “I’m really excited to sing with such talented women,” said singer-actor Yvonne Freese, recently seen as the man-eating plant Audrey II in the Guthrie Theater’s Little Shop of Horrors. “In a field where a majority of roles are held by men, it is exciting to sing in a women-centric cast and singing work composed by women for women.”

Soprano Victoria Erickson offered similar sentiments. “Rarely is there a trio for women in the standard repertoire,” she said. “And Sirens vs. Amazons offers the chance for three sopranos/mezzos to indulge in the lush lines and soaring harmonies usually reserved for romantic scenes between a soprano and a tenor.”

And then, like that, the cast pivoted to murder. And baking – in a separate opera entitled, appropriately enough, Kitchen/Wedding/Murder, with music by Portland, OR-based composer Lisa Neher and a libretto by Basil Considine. In this piece, a late-breaking request to bake a wedding cake for an ex turns into a murder mystery when the groom drops dead, right before saying “I do”.

“It’s thrilling as a composer to hear the music come to life with such a skilled and expressive group of musicians,” said Neher, who flew in for the workshop readings and to sing the lead mezzo-soprano role in her own opera-in-progress. “It was particularly helpful to hear a comedic aria sung by Maggie Burr. Comedy is all about timing and pacing, so being able to see Maggie’s facial expressions and body language, and hearing her sing the aria gave me confidence that the piece is on the right track!”

And then there was music and murder.

“I love singing new opera,” said Maggie Burr. “There’s more room for levity and to have fun – and it’s fascinating to hear about the process from the composers and librettist!”

Mezzo-soprano Bridgett Ann Johnston, a co-founder of Pittsburgh-based Thousand Bridges Opera, expressed similar sentiments. “I always love getting to record excerpts of new stuff,” she said. “Singing part of Kitchen/Wedding/Murder was especially fun because the plot has so much scandal that would be juicy to a modern audience. I also love that the recording session was for operas composed by living women! I think more companies should do things like this.

Coming, soon, to a murder mystery near you.

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Amy Donahue

Amy Donahue is a staff reviewer at the Twin Cities Arts Reader. She interned with the magazine during the summer of 2017, served as a guest contributor while studying abroad in Europe that fall, and has moved up to regular old reviewing. She served as interim Editor-in-Chief in 2023.

She admits to being at least 50% terrified of contemporary German opera.

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