Akhnaten
October 01, 2004
Oakland Opera Theater is just finishing a run of performances of Philip Glass' Akhnaten at the Oakland Metro. This was the West Coast premiere of this work which dates from 1984. Director Ellen Sebastian Chang did not have much to work with, yet she was able to pull it off somehow, setting the opera both in the contemporary and ancient. The singing was pretty good overall, but the music itself sounded like something fit for a movie score.
Cast:
Akhnaten - Paul Flight, countertenor
Nefertiti - Katherine Growdon, mezzo-soprano
Queen Tye - Angela Dean-Baham, soprano
Horemhab - Martin Bell, baritone
Aye - John Minagro, bass
Amon - Alan Cochran, tenor
Amenhotep - Michael Mohammed, baritone