Ad
Featured
Going 'Beyond': Concert a musical homage to the Sephardic roots of Carmen
Andrés Vadin and Audrey Babcock will perform “Beyond Carmen.”
Published
Modified
Carmen’s image is synonymous with the ultimate femme fatale.
Mezzo-soprano Audrey Babcock and her musical partner Andrés Vadin will perform a musical homage that explores the famous character’s Sephardic roots. The concerts will take place at Santa Fe’s Center for Contemporary Arts, and the National Hispanic Cultural Center on Saturday, April 13, and Sunday, April 14.
Musical scholars say that Prosper Mérimée, the author of the novella the opera “Carmen” is based on, was inspired to create the character based on a real-life Sephardic Jew, but made the character a gypsy as a more daring choice when it was written in the 1800s.
“With ‘Carmen,’ we will explore her Sephardic roots, singing in Ladino or ‘Judeo Spanish,’ similar to ancient Castilian Spanish,” Babcock said. “We will play the rhythms, textures and accents of the marginalized people of the Diaspora, and most of all, we will sing and cry out for the misunderstood experience of being fiercely female in a time that sees a woman’s strength as something dangerous, dark and destined for annihilation.”
Babcock’s engagements for the 2023-2024 season include her role debut as Amneris in “Aida” and Mrs. Gibbs in Ned Rorem’s “Our Town” with the Utah Festival, Flora in Opera Omaha’s “La Traviata” and her debut as Santuzza in “Cavalleria rusticana.” Recording under the name Aviva, she has released an album of Ladino pieces called “Songs for Carmen,” a collection of works sung in Ladino and Arabic, inspired by the character Carmen.
“Carmen” is one of the most popular operas of our time. Opera Southwest will produce the opera in May in a rarely-seen Spanish version.
