Company Shares Exclusive Interview with Soprano Emily Richter, Who Will Appear in the Title Role
Soprano Emily Richter, who will sing the title role in Pittsburgh Opera’s production of Iphigénie en Tauride beginning this Saturday evening, January 20, took the time recently to give an exclusive interview regarding the production and her career to date to Chris Cox, Director of Marketing and Communications for Pittsburgh Opera. As Ms. Richter has done a great deal of genuinely excellent singing in her time with the company, much interest may be taken in her comments and observations.
Chris Cox: Emily Richter, please tell the audience a little bit about yourself.
Emily Richter: Thank you for having me. I’m a second year Resident Artist here at Pittsburgh Opera. I’m from Arlington, Virginia, but I’m a foreign service kid, so I grew up moving around a lot, mostly overseas.
Chris Cox: Where are some of the places you lived abroad growing up?
Emily Richter: Zimbabwe, Cameroon, Armenia, Geneva, DC, London. And while I was in college, my family was in Tokyo.
Chris Cox: Did you have a favorite place?
Emily Richter: It’s always hard to say, because how do you compare being 8 years old to being 18? But when I was in London, it was a really formative time for me, not just in my life, but also musically. I was really involved with the National Youth Choir, and the London Youth Choir. I sang at the Royal Albert Hall, and with the Royal Philharmonic Chorus. I had really, really amazing musical experiences, and that was where I said to myself, “okay, I want to do this – I want to sing.”
Chris Cox: Is that how you got into opera?
Emily Richter: I grew up playing piano, doing choir, and just loving music, so I knew I wanted to do music as a career from a very young age. Once I got to college I became a Classical Voice major. That’s when I really committed to singing and classical music. When you’re doing a degree in Classical Voice, that means that you are doing operas. I saw that opera was a combination of really interesting, rich music and singing, which I love, and theater, which I love, and languages, and history, and literature, and just all sorts of things that I loved to do.
Chris Cox: Besides your work for Pittsburgh Opera this season, you’ve had other exciting experiences recently and have been in some competitions.
Emily Richter: Yes, it’s been a very exciting season. I got to do my Messiah debut with Seattle Symphony, and [Pittsburgh Opera Music Director] Anthony Walker was the conductor.
And then for competitions, I won the Mildred Miller competition here in Pittsburgh. Unfortunately, Mildred passed away this year. I was able to sing at her funeral and honor her. That competition is such a big part of her legacy, so it was an especially important year to have received that honor.
I also won the Districts at the Met Opera Competition, and qualified for Regionals, which take place the same day as opening night of Iphigénie.
Chris Cox: Goodness gracious. Where are the Regionals?
Emily Richter: They’re here in Pittsburgh, at Kresge Theater at Carnegie Mellon.
Chris Cox: So you don’t have to get in a car and drive from Buffalo and pray there’s no traffic to get to Iphigénie on time.
Emily Richter: Exactly. They’re local, so it’s low maintenance that way, but high maintenance in that it’s a big day of singing.
Chris Cox: I’ll say. Sleep in on Sunday for sure.
Emily Richter: I have lot of people coming into town, so I’ll be getting up for breakfast, but it’ll be worth it.
Chris Cox: That’s exciting. Talking about Iphigénie, you mentioned history and literature are interests of yours, so this production should be right up your alley.
Emily Richter: This is a really cool one because I haven’t dabbled much with Greek mythology. There’s a lot of backstory to this piece before we even meet Iphigénie. What happened to Iphigénie is that her father Agamemnon was getting ready for the Trojan War. His fleet wasn’t getting any wind, so they couldn’t sail off to Troy. This was going on for months, and he was given the counsel that the only way to get the winds to blow would be to sacrifice his daughter to the gods. So Agamemnon tells Iphigénie that she’s going to marry Achilles, and she shows up and he slaughters her over the altar.
But in our story, right before she’s slaughtered, she’s plucked up by the goddess Artemis, or in our case, Diana, and put onto this island, Tauride, to be a priestess.
Chris Cox: So now she’s in Tauride, as a priestess, and she’s tasked with killing people. How does she feel about that, and how do you translate her feelings onto the stage?
Emily Richter: This show, and her character specifically, shows a lot of moral conflict. As you said, she’s placed on that island to perform human sacrifices as high priestess to anybody who enters that island. She’s sort of a political prisoner because she’s not really empowered – she’s very much under the will of King Thoas. But she also is ordained by this goddess who saved her life to complete this task. And from the beginning it’s very clear, it doesn’t feel right to her. She doesn’t enjoy it, but she doesn’t feel like she has free will. And so what we see throughout the show is this moral conflict leading her to exercise her free will. And it’s mostly because she sees this man who is her brother, but she doesn’t know it’s her brother. She’s drawn to him and she doesn’t understand why because she doesn’t know who he is. Her connection to him is the thing that propels her towards free will.
Chris Cox: Musically, what does the audience have in store for them?
Emily Richter: This is such an interesting piece musically. It’s by Gluck, who was composing just before Mozart. He and Mozart were alive at the same time, but this piece came out right before Mozart was really in his prime. What’s interesting about it musically is it feels so far ahead of its time. He looked around and he said, “All these de capo arias, how are they serving the plot?” He really innovated, for lack of a better word, the structure of operas. Everything is through-composed, everything is dramatically driven. He’s so far ahead of his time, you would think that this was an opera composed a hundred years later. But it also has some elements of Baroque style in it. It’s really beautiful and unique and kind of groundbreaking musically. I’m excited for the audience to hear that.
Chris Cox: How are the rehearsals going?
Emily Richter: What’s great here is that have a core ensemble that’s been working together for two years. We all know each other super well. That’s a luxury that you just don’t get very often in opera. You’re usually locked into a place for two weeks and you have to make beautiful art with people that you don’t know as well. But here we really understand how to collaborate together, which makes for a really rewarding process.
Chris Cox: What are you most looking forward to about this production?
Emily Richter: The music pulls things out of you which you would never expect. It’s very spacious, and I really enjoy singing it. You learn something new every time you do. I’m excited to share this music with everyone.
Chris Cox: After this season is over and you’ve completed your Pittsburgh Opera residency, what will you be doing next?
Emily Richter: Directly from my residency in Pittsburgh, I’m moving on to another residency, at the Lyric Opera of Chicago with their Ryan Opera Center Ensemble. I’m super excited and I couldn’t have done it without the launching pad that I’ve had at Pittsburgh Opera.
Chris Cox: But first we have Iphigénie. Why should a potential ticket buyer come and see this show?
Emily Richter: We have human sacrifice, and Greek mythology, and high drama and crazy music, and there’s brotherhood, there’s war, lots of battle scenes. We have this amazing fight choreography team that’s been with us that does amazing work. There’s lots of sword fighting and big epic battles. It is an exciting, thrilling, high drama with a lot packed into it – all set to beautiful music!
TICKETS AND DETAILS
Pittsburgh Opera’s production of Iphigénie en Tauride has performances January 20 – 28, 2024 at the CAPA Theater. For complete production information, tickets, and more, visit Pittsburgh Opera
David Bachman Photography for Pittsburgh Opera
Categories: Show Previews
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