Heggie: It’s a Wonderful Life

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Heggie’s eclectic tonal music is light on lyrical flights and rhythmically overly rigid, but the accomplished orchestral writing satisfyingly conjures up appropriate moos of ardour and longing.... — BBC Music Magazine, January 2018, 4 out of 5 stars More…

Release Date: 29th Sep 2017
Catalogue No: PTC5186631
Label: Pentatone
Series: American Operas
Length: 2 hours 6 minutes

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Heggie: It’s a Wonderful Life

Work length2:06:37

$31.00

$40.25

$54.25

Talise Trevigne (soprano), Patti LuPone (soprano), D'Ana Lombard (vocals), Zoie Reams (vocals), Yongzhao Yu (vocals), Ben Edquist (vocals), William Burden (tenor), Stephen Thomas (vocals), Levi Smith (vocals), C.J. Friend (vocals), Jack Townsend (vocals), Rod Gilfry (vocals), Anthony Dean Griffey (tenor), Frankie Hickman (vocals), Andrea Carroll (vocals), Grace Graper (vocals), Joshua Hopkins (baritone), Heath Martin (vocals), Kate Smith (vocals)
Houston Grand Opera, Houston Grand Opera Chorus
Patrick Summers

Prelude (Live)

Track length2:15

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act I: Clara in the Heavens (Live)

Track length10:36

$3.00

$3.85

$5.25

Act I: George Bailey's Childhood (Live)

Track length8:41

$2.00

$2.60

$3.50

Act I: Bedford Falls's Aladdin (Live)

Track length2:56

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act I: Goodbye Bedford Falls (Live)

Track length5:30

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act I: The High School Dance (Live)

Track length4:05

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act I: I'm Gonna See the World (Live)

Track length6:31

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act I: Wait and Save (Live)

Track length6:26

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act I: Four Years (Live)

Track length3:40

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act I: Harry's Homecoming (Live)

Track length0:28

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act I: A Rainbow at Midnight (Live)

Track length6:10

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act I: I'm Gonna Love You 'Til the Day I Die (Live)

Track length6:26

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act II: George and Mary's Wedding Day (Live)

Track length3:50

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act II: The Bank Run of 1929 (Live)

Track length5:37

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act II: Changes and Blessings (Live)

Track length3:20

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act II: Thank You, Mr. Bailey (Live)

Track length1:11

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act II: I Want to Hire You, George (Live)

Track length5:15

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act II: One Country, One Dream (Live)

Track length4:16

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act II: What a Day! (Live)

Track length1:20

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act II: Uncle Billy Loses the Bank Deposit (Live)

Track length4:20

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act II: Zuzu's Petals (Live)

Track length5:09

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act II: You're Worth More Dead Than Alive (Live)

Track length3:47

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act II: I Wish I'd Never Been Born (Live)

Track length5:06

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act II: The World Without George Bailey (Live)

Track length8:12

$2.00

$2.60

$3.50

Act II: Christmas Morning (Live)

Track length4:39

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act II: A Wonderful Life (Live)

Track length5:23

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Act II: Auld Lang Syne (Live)

Track length1:28

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

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Interview, Jake Heggie on It's A Wonderful Life

16th January 2018

The American composer talks to Katherine about his opera based on Frank Capra's classic 1946 film, released on Pentatone at the end of last year.

Composer Jake Heggie and librettist Gene Scheer knew before they ever wrote a note or a line of It’s a Wonderful Life that there are challenges in adapting a treasured classic for the operatic stage. After all, Heggie and Scheer’s hit 2010 opera Moby-Dick raised the same challenges: how could they remain faithful to the source material and still create something new, which emphasized the story’s innate operatic qualities?

For It’s a Wonderful Life, Heggie and Scheer responded by keeping the basic plot and characters from the beloved Frank Capra film version but changing the perspective. But in a departure from the film, all the action takes place from Clara’s perspective and in her realm. Seventy mirrored doors represent portals in time and space, which Clara uses to piece together the events of George’s life in an effort to understand what has brought him to this moment of despair.

Critics said the “feel good” work (Opera Warhorses) “dispels any notion that you may have about expecting the opera to duplicate the film [and has a] crazy-quilt score that may be Heggie’s most delightful concoction” (Theater Jones). As the Houston Chronicle critic summed up, “George Bailey would be proud.”

Reviews

January 2018

Heggie’s eclectic tonal music is light on lyrical flights and rhythmically overly rigid, but the accomplished orchestral writing satisfyingly conjures up appropriate moos of ardour and longing. William Burden’s lively tenor brings new life to a hero long associated with James Stewart’s drawl…Not a great opera, maybe, but a useful one to have on hand in these dark, divisive times.

November 2017

[Heggie and Scheer] are a perfect fit, and the wonder is that they have caught so faithfully the deep and abiding spirit and American tinta of this small-town allegory…Scheer is such an accomplished librettist in his understanding of how words and music collide in the theatre…[Heggie] is a born melodist, purveyor of the most grateful, ‘singable’ vocal lines and a word-setter of real eloquence…Not a dry eye in the house.

Heggie: It’s a Wonderful Life

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Interview, Jake Heggie on It's A Wonderful Life

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