SoBe Arts Presents the World Premiere of Hamlet Soundtheater/Opera
Friday, February 24, through Sunday, March 11, 2012
Little Stage Theater at SoBe Arts
2100 Washington Avenue
Miami Beach, FL
For schedules and ticket information, call 305.674.9220 or go to www.sobearts.org.

Due to technical difficulties, the official opening night of Carson Kievman’s “HAMLET Soundtheater/Opera,” at SoBe Arts’ Little Stage Theater, will be moved to Friday, March 2. Additional performances will take place (as previously scheduled) through March 11, Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00 p.m., and Sundays at 7:30 p.m.

This Friday’s (Feb. 24) performance will, however, remain intact, and ticket holders for this performance will be treated to something special: the pre-performance champagne reception (sponsored by Laurent-Perrier and Sylvano Restaurant) at 6:30 p.m., a one-and-a-half-hour program of the finest excerpts from the opera starting at 8:00 p.m. – featuring the cast’s principal performers. As an extra bonus, there will be a Meet-the-Cast session following the program. Some tickets for this gala evening are still available at $100. Any ticket holder attending Friday’s program will be additionally offered a complimentary ticket for any full performance of the opera between March 2-11.
Director/Composer Kievman says, “HAMLET Soundtheater/Opera” is the single most challenging work ever presented by SoBe Arts. It is a complicated opera with challenging music and demanding staging, even for a semi-staged concert performance. To ensure absolute quality in the production, we want to take the extra time to refine and rehearse the technical dimensions of the work. We have a remarkable cast, and we want the production to reflect their exceptional talents.”
Those who are holding tickets for this weekend’s Saturday and Sunday performances are asked to call SoBe Arts to change their ticket to another performance date.

For further information or ticket reservations, call SoBe Arts at (305) 674-9220 or stop by the office located in the Carl Fisher Clubhouse at 2100 Washington Avenue, Miami Beach, Mon. – Fri., 12 p.m. – 7 p.m. Tickets may also be reserved online, 24/7 at www.sobearts.org/hamlet.html#tickets

Music and Libretto by Carson Kievman
Based on The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark by William Shakespeare

SoBe Institute of the Arts presents the World Premiere of Carson Kievman’s Hamlet Soundtheater/Opera in the Little Stage Theater on Miami Beach. This provocative, sophisticated, and radically re-imagined musical setting of Shakespeare’s masterpiece was the final commission by legendary producer Joseph Papp (“A Chorus Line,” “Hair,” etc.) for the New York Shakespeare Festival / Public Theater. Due to Papp’s tragic passing soon after the work was completed, Hamlet remained unperformed, until now.

“I worked on Hamlet Soundtheater/Opera with Papp for four years, and his intention was to produce it at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park,” Kievman remembers. The loss of Papp affected the composer deeply. A main theme of Hamlet is, painfully and ironically, the death of fathers, and during Kievman’s years of preparing the libretto and working on the score, several other important mentors and father figures in his life passed away, including Florida Philharmonic’s General Director Joseph Leavitt, visionary Luigi Nono and Olivier Messiaen, and Kievman’s own father, Michael. Kievman continues, “…so I placed it in my desk drawer, and there it remained for 21 years, until now.”

Hamlet Soundtheater/Opera is interwoven with spiritual and sexual conflicts, it challenges boundary lines, and is multi-dimensional in its cultural and musical reference points. Pulsing with collective zeitgeist and new shapes, the chilling vocals spiral beyond the confines of language to articulate emotional truths behind literal meaning.

Conducted by celebrated New York opera conductor John Yaffé, lighting by award-winning designer Robert Perry, Hamlet Soundtheater /Opera is being performed by a top-flight cast of 13 singers from Miami and New York including:
• Expressive and critically-acclaimed ly ric baritone Kenneth Mattice as Hamlet
• Unique and versatile Meagan Brus as Ophelia
• Powerful bass Richard Zuch as Claudius and the Ghost of Hamlet’s Father
• Internationally trained Finnish soprano Danielle Krause as Gertrude
• Recording artist and actor Richard Cassell as Polonius
• Rising young tenor Justin John Moniz as Horatio

Also rounding out the dramatis personae are Jeffrey Wienand (Laertes), Enrique Estrada (Rosencrantz), David Schnell (Guildenstern), Jillian Staffiera (the Player Queen), Kunya Rowley (Marcellus), Enrique Coizeau (Cornelius) and John Cabrali (Fortinbras).

Kievman states, “My intention was and is to create a Hamlet with the highest impact to contemporary audiences primarily with actions and gripping music, while maintaining a clear respect for Shakespeare’s genius. This Hamlet takes place as a ‘medieval carnival’ visits Elsinore Castle. The sense of Elsinore being on the border (and shore) of Denmark will hopefu lly evoke the excitement of mystery and instability caused by the constant questioning of what lies just across the border. As Hamlet confronts his fellow characters, a merry-go-round, a house of horrors and a house of mirrors are brought to mind.”

The birth of this compelling new work, the perfect Miami winter weather, the beautiful setting, and excellent acoustics of this intimate South Beach venue, all promise to make this event a once-in-a-lifetime experience.