One of the good guys

by: JAMES D. WATTS JR. World Scene Writer
10/5/2007  

Icelandic tenor makes U.S. debut in hero’s role in ‘Tosca’

It was 10 a.m., rehearsals were underway and the tenor was nowhere to be found.

Officials dug out the list of phone numbers and e-mails for the cast, and placed a frantic phone call. An obviously just-roused singer answered.

“They asked when I was going to be at rehearsal, and I said that it was probably going to be quite some time — because I was in Tulsa,” said Johann Valdimarsson, laughing. “It was the (Icelandic Opera) Company in Reykjavik calling. That meant it was 10 a.m. their time, but 5 a.m. here.”

Valdimarsson originally had been cast to appear in a production of “Ariadne auf Naxos” with the national opera company of his homeland. But when Tulsa Opera offered him the chance to make his U.S. debut in “Tosca,” he obtained a release from the Reykjavik contract.

However, his phone number and e-mail address were still listed on the cast’s call sheet.

“They finally managed to find the guy they were looking for,” Valdimarsson said. “And I haven’t had any more calls like that.”

But getting calls from the opera company in Reykjavik is usually a routine thing for Valdimarsson. “I’m the one they tend to call for all the big Italian roles,” he said.

One of those roles is that of Cavaradossi in Puccini’s operatic thriller “Tosca,” a role Valdimarsson will portray in Tulsa Opera’s season-opening production.

Isabella Mederi has the title role of Tosca, and Peter Lindskoog makes his 15th appearance with the company as Baron Scarpia.

Puccini’s librettists, Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica, adapted a five-act, 23- character play by Victorien Sardou into a three-act opera focusing on a particularly volatile romantic trio: the impetuous, jealousy-prone singer Tosca; her lover, the artist and clandestine revolutionary Cavaradossi; and Scarpia, the chief of police whose obsession with Tosca sets the story on its destructive course.

That compression of event and character, and the comparatively swift pace at which the opera unfolds, prompted some critics to label “Tosca” dismissively as “a shabby little shocker.”

But Puccini’s genius at conveying character and emotion through music, and the fact that the three principal characters are roles that have brought out the best in some of the greatest singers of all time have made “Tosca” one of the most popular operas ever written.

Consider: This production will be the eighth time Tulsa Opera has presented this opera in its 60-year history. Only “La Traviata” has been staged more often in Tulsa, with nine productions.

Valdimarsson said, “It is a pleasure to be singing (Cavaradossi). Not just because his two arias are among the most popular — certainly in the top 10 of big tenor showpieces.

“But it’s also because Cavaradossi is one of the good guys,” he said, smiling. “He is a fighter, he is loyal — he is going to do what he can to help a friend in trouble.”

Valdimarsson laughed, then added, “Of course, like most good guys in opera, he dies at the end. But you cannot have everything.”

Although music was a part of Valdimarsson, as he says, “from the womb — my mother was a violinist with the Icelandic Symphony for 25 years,” it took him quite a while to discover an ability for singing.

“When your mother is a symphony violinist and teacher ... well, I was started on violin at age 4,” he said. “But the violin was not for me, so I studied piano and then started trumpet when I was 12.”

By the time he was 18, Valdimarsson was accomplished enough to be playing with the Icelandic Symphony as a freelance musician. But he was not certain he wanted to attempt a career in music.

“I wanted to be a businessman, like my father, so I went into real estate sales,” he said. “I was also doing some DJ work, at parties and discotheques and things like that.”

Then, for his 25th birthday, he received a disc of arias performed by Luciano Pavarotti.

“Before, I thought of opera as something boring,” Valdimarsson said. “But I started listening to this CD — all these great arias, done by the master. And I started getting interested in this music.”

So much so that Valdimarsson started to sing along with the CD while showering — a practice that drew the attention of a woman living in the apartment above him.

But instead of telling Valdimarsson to be quiet, she insisted that he attend a school of singers to develop his voice.

Valdimarsson did — “it was almost something of joke for me,” he said — but he impressed the faculty to the point that they encouraged him to go to Italy and study. After a few lean years, Valdimarsson began to get more and more roles with companies in Iceland, Italy and Germany.

His U.S. debut is rapidly becoming a family affair. Many of his relatives, including his wife and younger children, are coming to Tulsa for his performances.

“And some are already here,” he said.

“My stepmother’s sister, Gudrun K. Watt, lives here in Tulsa.”

TOSCA

Who: by Giacomo Puccini, presented by Tulsa Opera

When: 7:30 p.m. Saturday and Oct. 12, 2:30 p.m. Oct. 14

Where: Chapman Music Hall, Tulsa Performing Arts Center, Third Street and Cincinnati Avenue

Tickets: $20-$95, available at Tulsa Opera, 587-4811; the PAC Ticket office, 596-7111; and www.tulsaworld.com/mytix

Copyright © 2007, World Publishing Co. All rights reserved