Profile: New music school tenor Thomas Harper

Thomas Harper

The University’s new faculty artist is Thomas Harper, an American-born tenor who has lived and sung professionally in Switzerland and Germany for the last 20 years. He joins the UW music faculty this quarter and will make his campus debut at Meany Theater in a performance with guest artist Elizabeth Moore at 8 p.m. Monday, Oct. 12. They will perform lieder, songs and arias by Mozart, Wolf, Obradors, Tchaikovsky, Cilea, Giordano and Verdi. Although this will be Harper’s first performance as a UW faculty member, he is not new to Seattle audiences. He played Mime in Der Ring des Nibelungen (1991 and 1995) and the witch in Hanzel und Gretel (1993) at the Seattle Opera.

Last month in an e-mail interview from Germany’s Dortmund Opera Theater, where he was a resident artist since 1991, Harper discussed his career with University Week Editor Nedra Floyd Pautler.

UNIVERSITY WEEK: First, would you give us an idea of the span of your career? Have you held positions other than as a professional singer?

HARPER: I came to Europe after college in 1978 and have sung in many opera houses, both as a guest and as a resident singer—in Germany, Switzerland and Italy. I’ve focused my career solely on singing and teaching in my private studio with the exception of a year and a half I spent as a high school music teacher in Switzerland. A few of the opera houses where I have sung include Dortmund, Hamburg, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Nuernberg, Saarbruecken, Essen, Lucerne, Geneva, Torino and Treviso.

UWK: You have performed two roles for the Seattle Opera—Mime in Der Ring des Nibelungen and the witch in Hanzel und Gretel. What are the most challenging aspects of each of these roles? Which is your favorite and why?

H: First of all, Mime is actually two roles—a small but intense role in Rheingold, and then an immense role in Siegfried in which Mime is really a main figure. This role requires both vocal and physical stamina simply to get through the part. The witch is, in certain aspects, similar to Mime; it is a high-profile character part that requires a lot of stamina. The role of the witch is shorter and more compact—the intensity beginning immediately and not letting up until the very end when she is shoved into the oven by the children.

Mime, in Siegrfied is, of course, my favorite of these three roles simply because there are many more colors and shapes of character that are set forth in the text. The possibilities for emotional development are particularly strong with this role, and the extreme variations of depression, anger, fear and wonder are very beautiful. Mime is in this sense a very human Nibelung.

UWK: Before any particular performance how much chance do you have to think about your audience? There is the couple who are out on a date; the person who owns every major recording of the opera or the role you are performing; and the high school or college class attending the opera with their professor.

H: The cultural capacity of any particular audience or of audiences in general is, of course, a favorite topic of performers of all kinds, opera singers included. Any kind of planning for special audiences according to age or cultural exposure should be thought out and arranged well in advance. Immediately prior to a performance, my concentration is not on the audience at all, but on my own text, through which I try to find or remember the feeling or emotion that I would like to convey to the audience.

UWK: What aspects of your career are the most physically demanding, and how do you train for them?

H: The most demanding aspect of a career is how to deal with stress of all kinds. It’s usually a result of learning too much new music in a short time, singing too many different roles at the same time, or travelling too often between destinations for rehearsals and performances. Learning how to really relax mentally and spiritually at opportune times as well as how to concentrate fully on the moment at hand in rehearsals and performances are the keys to overcoming stressful situations when they occur.

UWK: You have been eight years at Dortmund Opera Theater as a resident artist. What have been the high and low points of that experience? Of living abroad?

H: A high point here in Dortmund was being named Artist of the Year in 1993, but other high points were performances of Rodolfo in La Boheme, Canio in I Pagliacci and Eleazar in La Juive; also performing Mime and Loge in Hamburg and Berlin as well as the recording sessions of Italia Opera Arias and Mahler’s Liedvon der Erde, both on Naxos Records. Low points have been missing home and especially nature, perhaps being exposed to too much culture! The most important high point has been the experience of integration into another culture, another language, and other ways of thinking about life.

UWK: Who would you rank as the best all-time tenor living or dead?

H: That’s a loaded question, and one that can have no objective answer. My highest respect goes perhaps to Fritz Wunderlich and Alfredo Kraus, among many other great tenors who had larger or more dramatic voices.

UWK: Is opera being enhanced or diminished by the trend toward stardom for a few and those stars performing independent of opera productions, like The Three Tenors? How is opera changing commercially and how will that impact the likely careers of your UW students?

H: In Europe, opera and theater in general are heading in a more commercial direction. Some state-supported theaters have closed completely, while others have dropped certain branches (ballet, for example). Other theaters have fully or partially combined with nearby theaters, pooling their resources and playing the same productions in both cities. Everywhere there is a trend to save on production costs through a variety of cooperative arrangements. However, the successful careers of the best known opera singers are, of course, not the reason for this trend. Their performances bring increased attention to opera theater, especially among persons who have perhaps not yet thought of attending an opera. Opera is enjoying an increased popularity among young adults.

Realistically, regardless of the commercial or state-supported directions in opera and classical music, the world market for singers and musicians is relatively small. That which truly impacts a future career in opera is the personal conviction and determination underlying one’s own personality and talent.

UWK: How were you introduced to opera? What has kept you attracted to it? Do you come from a musical family? What other types of music do you enjoy?

H: As a child growing up in Oklahoma, I did not know what opera really was. I did not come from a musical family, but I played clarinet, saxophone and flute in high school. I originally majored in woodwinds in college, where I was introduced to vocal music and opera. Initially, the joy of singing captured my interest, and later I was drawn to the drama and intensity of acting when I had profile character parts. As much as I love music, when I am not singing or teaching I often prefer quiet or even silence.

UWK: What are your aspirations as an UW faculty member?

H: My first goal is to integrate myself into the UW School of Music whereby I hope to help plan and organize performing situations that will help our students experience the feeling of performing, and to understand how it enriches our culture. My overall goal, of course, is to offer my own students quality vocal instruction. ¶

Nedra Floyd Pautler