A few weeks after the grand opening concert celebration of Opera Colorado's new home in September 2005, the Ellie Caulkins Opera House in Denver, FanFaire interviewed Jake Heggie about At the Statue of Venus, the 20-minute commissioned piece he wrote for the occasion.

(Streamed here with permission of Mr. Heggie, Ms. Clayton and Opera Colorado.)

What is certain is that Jake Heggie has a magical way of wedding words to music and it never fails to strike a special note with audiences - as it did in Denver and in San Francisco in 2000 where he premiered his first opera Dead Man Walking. The most successful contemporary opera in decades, it transformed Jake Heggie from an unknown song-writer to possibly an opera composer of which legends are made. Only five years from its first performance, Dead Man Walking is securely on its way to becoming a work in the standard repertoire, having seen numerous reincarnations nationwide since its premiere. His second opera, The End of the Affair, which premiered in Houston in 2004 was reprised twice in 2005 in other cities.

Jake Heggie was a prolific song writer (still is!) who had set some 200 poems and literary pieces to music by the time he composed his first opera at age 39. Perhaps it is his passion for and mastery of the vocal line, acquired since he started composing at age 11, that prepared the stage for his phenomenal success in opera. But then that has not historically always been the case - the great 19th century composer Franz Schubert who is also rightly considered the father of the German art song (Lied), did not succeed as an opera composer.


JAKE AND FLICKA / FLICKA AND JAKE

We can thank famed mezzo-soprano Frederica von Stade ("Flicka" to her friends) for "discovering" Jake Heggie and bringing him to the attention of America's opera stars, who now are among his most enthusiastic fans and collaborators. But "Flicka" remains Heggie's most ardent champion. Often in recital together, she sings his songs and has commissioned quite a few of them herself. CLICK HERE to hear a clip ("Paper Wings" - Track 8) from the CD The Faces of Love.

How did this partnership with von Stade come about?

"Oh, gosh! When I first started working at San Francisco Opera, she was doing Dangerous Liaisons, and I was brand new in the PR Department.   She's so generous and kind, you know. She just befriended me - it had nothing to do with music or composition. She had no idea I was a musician because I still hadn't got back into playing. Nobody in San Francisco knew me as a musician then. But I heard her sing in these rehearsals, and I just thought I had to write something for her, just to thank her for being so generous and kind. So I wrote some folk song arrangements and gave them to her. That's when it all started. And we've just become very close friends. She has championed so much of my work. I've been very lucky. I also work really hard, but I've been very lucky."

That was in the early '90s when Heggie, unable to make a living in music as a composer or pianist, partly because of a temporary physical disability, moved to San Francisco, landing a job with San Francisco Opera.

"I went through something terrible in my late twenties. I lost the use of my right hand - it was a thing called focal dystonia. It affected the muscular tissue, and my right hand would clump up into a ball. It was very depressing. And then I went through what is known as re-education therapy and I started being able to play again in '92. That was five years! But yes, I was very lucky."


"I ALWAYS KNEW MUSIC WAS WHAT I WANTED TO DO"

Lucky, indeed. Or simply, destiny. He began taking piano lessons "from the time I was 5 or 6, and then started writing when I was 11. But you know.. I feel very lucky that I always knew music was what I wanted to do. And I think kids are so lucky when they find a passion early on. But during that time I always wanted to be a pianist. First and foremost, that was what wanted to be."

But not much later, he discovered the joy of song-writing: "I guess I knew by the time I was about 14 or 15 - I was really passionate about it by then. There was vocal music all around me as I was growing up. I guess it was a very natural thing for me. I started off writing these big piano pieces. But then in my teens I just found that I had this affinity for setting words. And so I was writing my own words - very Broadway-type songs. And then I started taking lessons with a man named Ernst Bacon, who was a great American song-writer. And he introduced me to Emily Dickinson and the art of poetry. That was in California when I was 16, and from then on I think I was very interested in setting poetry and song-writing."

And he continued to find inspiration in poetry: "Oh, I love it. I love the written word. I found it... Again, it was this teacher Ernst Bacon who awakened that. And then Johana Harris adored poetry. And we just would sit and go through poetry books and share poems. And ever since then I've sort of been ravenous about it. I always have one or two books going and I love to spend time looking through poems and see if something's going to inspire me."


THE ART OF SONG-WRITING: THE HEGGIE WAY

Poulenc once wrote: "The musical setting of a poem should be an act of love. Never a marriage of convenience." Which, given what we now know about Jake Heggie, is perhaps the most apt description of song-writing, the Heggie way, i.e. "Oh, that's absolutely true. No, I can't set a poem if I don't love it. That's why if people commission me I feel I should choose the poem."

And then Heggie, song-writer/poetry-lover immerses himself in the text: "I let it sit there for as long as it needs to. And then suddenly I go back to it and you know, there's a musical response. I can never tell the timing of it - sometimes it happens immediately, sometimes it takes a really long time."

Does it depend on inspiration then? "Yes, but the inspiration also comes from internalizing it and the familiarity with it."

And that to a layman can be a somewhat complex process. "At the start, do you look at the words from a purely musical point of view? Or do you also look at the literary value of the work, the emotional content, etc?" we asked.

"Oh, everything. I'm hoping that right away I hear musical ideas, at least musical textures, and then I let it work. The specific musical moments come to me later. But I have to look at it - first, is it rhyme, is it prose? Are they short sentences or long? Does the person speak with an accent, is it an old person, a young person, what has the person been through? All of that stuff is very important to what the music is going to sound like."

Therefore the text helps to shape the music?

"Yes, the text definitely helps to shape the music because for me it's very important that the words be understandable. And also that you get the essential psychology of the characters by their speaking those words: even if they're not saying what they feel, even if they're saying something contrary to what they feel - that's a key to personality as well. So, all of that sort of starts to help me hear music. But I always have to have the situation and the words."

And when from out of the blue... "I hear a melody or something that goes with a particular text, I feel very lucky if I manage to get it down on paper. Otherwise it will disappear. I've written on envelopes and all kinds of things." Or hummed into a tape recorder? "Oh, yes. I've done that too."  

Then, after he has it all together comes the time for the final score. "Which gets written first - the vocal music or the piano music?" we wondered.

"It's simultaneous. But usually because I write for singers, I hear a vocal line in my head first. But it's always a vocal line that already has sort of harmonic textures."

It is told that Schubert, a phenomenal Lieder composer, could spin out eight songs in a day. So, how many songs does a modern composer like Jake Heggie write - in, say, a month ?

"In a month? I don't know how it averages out in a month because I have other projects. Right now I'm writing a big theater piece. But I'd say now I write them as the projects come. So.. like in April I wrote 8 songs, in June I was really focused on At the Statue of Venus so I didn't write any songs other than Venus. Then just recently, I wrote some songs for Joyce Castle - a set of 5."

Although they are in a very real sense competitors, Heggie does not shun his fellow composers but actually interacts with them quite a bit.

"Oh, yes. I have a lot of good friends who are composers - classical and musical theater composers. Actually, I find them  a very collegial group of people. I think there's that sense of competition. But you know, once you've had a certain amount of success, competition surely goes away. They certainly appreciate each other. And I really feel so in awe of some of the talent that's out there - people who are working so hard to create things. Because it is a lot of work. If you're a composer and you're making a living of it, you are working all of the time."

And being a composer of vocal music, he finds that singers actually influence his work.

"But you know, there are other influences too, like the singers. I mean, the way people will sing will influence the way I write too. Also, I always think of the singer as a collaborator. And so, I like to have the singer working with me and see how it's coming off the page, if it's working or not - will a different high note work there, is it too high - all of those things I can work out with the singer."

Having just done an interview with the tenor Ben Heppner, we asked if perhaps sometime he'd write something for him.

"That's a dream of mine. He's a nice man, a great man!"

And who else among today's singers does he enjoy writing - or would love to write - songs for?

"Oh, gosh! Well, I would write anything for Audra McDonald - I've written one song for Audra, as part of her 'Seven Deadly Sins;' Susan Graham, Flicka, Joyce DiDonato, Nathan Gunn, Paul Groves, Bryn Terfel. I mean - all the great singers. There's a reason they're great, you know. They inhabit those songs. And they have this amazing instrument to convey not just beautiful singing, but character and passion and color and nuance - they're rare people."

At home in the world of computers, Heggie is by no means a technology-averse person. Yet he writes music the old-fashioned way: "I write everything by hand, and then I send it to a copyist. I just like writing with my hand. It's the way I've always done it. And also, I like the sense of making a mess. You know, it's like giving myself permission to make a big mess, and sort of find the truth in the midst of all that chaos. And I like feeling the pencil and the paper. You feel a more personal connection. I often think about it more than when I'm just typing into a computer. And to me it's very important to think about it and process it over and over again."

Heggie has served as composer-in-residence in various places on several occasions, among them with the EOS Orchestra in NY. What exactly does a composer-in-residence do?

"What I did at EOS was work in their education program, as well as write one piece per year. And when I was composer-in-residence at San Francisco Opera, it was basically just to give me a situation where I could focus entirely on writing the opera."

It has been years since he first became known as a song-writer and of course decades since his first composition. How different is early Heggie from today's Heggie?

"Very different. I've stripped away layers. I've become more direct. My earlier stuff was more obscure. And now I'm much clearer with the musical line, and the dramatic line as well. I think what happened when I was writing Dead Man Walking was that I suddenly realized that all along I've been a theater composer. That was for some reason a big discovery for me. I never thought of myself as a theater composer. I had thought of myself as a song-writer. Then it made sense why I was interested in particular texts and particular themes now - because they were theatrical."

DEAD MAN WALKING: What has success done to Jake Heggie?

That comment opened the door wide enough for an update on Dead Man Walking.  
Heggie's and playwright/libretiist Terrence McNally's first opera, it has been produced many times over since it premiered in 2000. In fact there have been about eight different productions of the opera, and there'll be several more in 2006, among them the first European production which will premiere at the Dresden Staatsoper in May -  a phenomenal success as contemporary operas go.  It wouldn't at all be surprising if Dead Man Walking became the most performed American opera after Porgy and Bess, we suggested.  But at this point, Heggie quite modestly was only willing to concede this much:

"Oh, certainly for the past couple of years. In recent years, maybe it's been the most performed. I don't know. Susannah has certainly been performed a lot, you know - Carlisle Floyd's opera?"

But Susannah has been around for a long time - since 1955. Dead Man Walking on the other hand has had so many productions since only 2000. "Who knows.... It has its European debut in May 2006, that's in Dresden and it'a a brand new production that's being shared with Vienna. I know their goal is that other companies in Europe will pick it up."

Heggie agrees that Dead Man Walking has a big emotional impact. It resonates with the audience. Interestingly, the original San Francisco production has only been done once in San Francisco, and then another time in Adelaide, Australia. For some reason, the production that's been the most performed according to Heggie is the second one, which is by Leonard Foglia. "And there'll be three brand new physical productions next year - Calgary Opera's creating a brand new one... Dresden Opera's creating a brand new one, and in Sweden they're creating a new one."

Wow! No one's complaining, but isn't it unusual for an opera that is so new to have so many productions in the same year? It's only been 5 years and there's one production for every year already, and then some! To date, he has made it a point to be at every single production of Dead Man Walking. But 2006 might be difficult because of his heavy workload. "I certainly want to be there in Dresden for the European premiere. Kris Jepson, who covered for Susan Graham in San Francisco, and who has sang the role more than anyone now, is singing Sr. Helen, and the the mother is being sung by Hanna Schwarz - it's great that they have one of their stars in it. The young American baritone Mel Ulrich is in it too. A young conductor named Stefan Anton Reck will be on the podium, but we've not met yet. "

It appears that success has also heightened Heggie's sense of exploration. At the time of this conversation, he had just come back, clearly pleased, from a successful reprisal of his second opera The End of the Affair which is based on the story by the Nobel-prize winning British novelist Graham Greene. "Oh, I'm always exploring. I hope that I'm developing and growing. The worst thing I think an artist can do is start to repeat himself and become stagnant and predictable. I think when art becomes predictable, it dies. It becomes boring, and then you're in a museum. It becomes a thing from the past." And, going back to his commissioned piece for the inauguration of Denver's Ellie Caulkins Opera House (text by Terrence McNally), he continued: "Which is why it was so brilliant what Terrence did - putting her in a museum while contemplating art work and life. He's so smart."

While also about personal redemption in a sense, The End of the Affair, set in post WWII London, is musically a different kind of opera from Dead Man Walking, which is how Heggie meant it to be.

"It's very different. I mean, it still focuses on spiritual crises, and personal issues. It's associated with that. But it's a very different musical style, and a different setting. But that's what I wanted. I didn't want to repeat myself right away, you know; we've just talked about that."

And it requires a much smaller orchestra, like a chamber orchestra perhaps?

"Well, in Houston it was. It was 24 in the pit. But in Madison and Seattle, we doubled the string count, so it was almost 40 people. So, it can work either way. And other companies that have picked it up did because it has a very flexible orchestra size. Obviously I like it with more strings. It's a lusher, more beautiful sound. But it works in that chamber context - it did work in Houston. They had really excellent players."

"Yes, that was at Bucknell University in Pennsylvania. I had done some masterclasses there. And so I called them and said, "I need to workshop this piece and Houston doesn't have a budget for it. Would you put up the money?" And so they did. And it was an invaluable experience. Nicolle Foland and John Packard, and other friends of mine - Robert Orth, Katherine Ciesinski were there. It was really good. And I learned a lot. But where I learned a lot the most was in Houston at the performances. And then I spent 6 months rewriting."

So, do all opera composers conduct a workshop after completing a new piece?

"You know, I'm not sure. But I think workshops are essential. That's when you find out if the piece works or not. Because otherwise, opening night is the only time you get to figure out if it's working. Now in a workshop, you get a sense if the piece has power - people sitting on chairs, singing along with a piano. In a workshop, you sing as much of the piece that exists. You use the best singers you can get, you use the best conductor and the best pianist you can get. And then you have the whole creative team there. And other people whose opinion you trust. You work on the piece for several days, you rehearse, you have a full reading of it in its present form. And it gives you a really good idea of what needs to be redone, or what needs work.

And like Dead Man Walking, will The End of the Affair be on a CD too?

"Oh I hope so. Hopefully one of the productions that gets scheduled in the future we'll be able to record."

What about the future? Is there another opera on the horizon?

"Well, I'm in conversation with several companies about a new opera. Additionally I'm working with Terrence and several others on a musical theater piece that's as long as  At the Statue of Venus. I think that Venus was very much influenced by musical theater, but it also is very operatic. And that's the kind of the direction I've been going in.  The End of the Affair is very much that style too. It's a real cross between those. And it's a piece that Terrence McNally and I have wanted to write for a long time, and there are several partners who are helping us to write it."

Heggie's friendship and professional partnership with Terrence McNally (with whom he's shown at left) has thrived since Dead Man Walking. He talks with great affection for the famed playwright.

"I'm so lucky to work with him. I certainly knew of him. But I first met him in 1996 when Lotfi sent me to NY to talk with him about writing an opera. We didn't even know if we'd be working together because he was so busy. And you know, after we met, he seemed uninterested. And in early 1997 he suddenly called me out of the blue and said, 'I just just heard this concert by Renée Fleming. I'm very excited about this project. Please call me.' We knew we liked each other right away. You know, he's a deeply good person, and very funny. But we really have a very deep friendship, I care about him so."

It's interesting that David Gockley has moved from Houston Grand Opera to assume the General Directorship at San Francisco Opera. These are the two companies that have commisioned his two operas. So, might  there be another commission from San Francisco Opera again sometime in the future?

"You know, I wrote a cello concerto a couple of years ago. I'm thrilled with the piece. But it was absolute agony for me... because I love setting words, and I love singers. So, I figure I want it to be a joyful experience, and for the most part write for the voice. And then I think in an opera or the big theater pieces, I still have the chance to write instrumental music as well. So..."

...a singer's composer is what Jake Heggie is, and perhaps always will be. It is what he does best, and what he loves most to do. And all of us who enjoy song is most certainly the richer for it. THANK YOU, JAKE HEGGIE!

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Photo credits: top - FanFaire; Heggie at work and with Terrence McNally - KKN Enterprises

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