Effervescent South African soprano Angela Gilbert is about to chow down on Downtown Johnny Brown’s mahi-mahi platter. She eats and answers questions with equal relish, her dark eyes flashing, her speech sprinkled with coloratura laughter. As regards her meteoric career, she utters an uproarious and salty phrase, the meaning of which is construed as the South African equivalent of “falling into the honey pot.”
Gilbert makes her San Diego Opera (SDO) debut in the title role of Gaetano Donizetti’s “Lucia di Lammermoor,” which includes the Mad Scene to end all mad scenes plus the stratospheric Sextet. She’s just rehearsed a scene with German bass Reinhard Hagen, who portrays Raimondo, Lucia’s tutor. Raimondo urges Lucia to comply with her brother’s edict that she marry the wealthy Arturo to rescue the family’s precarious finances. Lucia, however, loves Edgardo, sung by Metropolitan Opera tenor Richard Leech, who is beloved for numerous leading roles at San Diego Opera.
Lucia goes quite mad on her wedding night, emerging from the nuptial chamber covered with blood.
“I didn’t want to present her as some sunny, radiant person that goes crazy,” Gilbert said. She and director Andrew Sinclair agree. “There’s something a little ‘off’ about her the second we meet her. She’s walking the precipice every day. It’s not a sweet, fairylike insanity. She murders someone in quite some violent way. She runs the knife through him many times.”
Gilbert attended the South African College of Music in Cape Town following the end of apartheid. The new government squashed funding for the arts. As a result she was in the right place at the right time. The opera house was forced to fire all their regular soloists because they couldn’t afford them. Gilbert’s opera professor at the university was also director of the opera. “He said to me, ‘Well, have I got a job for you,’ and I just walked right into the opera house,” she said. “I sang lead roles because I was stupid and cheap.”
She made her international debut as Morgana in “Alcina” in Germany’s Handel Festival, then was hired by Eve Queler’s Opera Orchestra of New York to cover Adelia, the title role in an early, rarely performed work by Donizetti. In 2000-2001 she participated in the Metropolitan Opera’s Lindemann Young Artist Development Program.
SDO General Director Ian Campbell heard from friends that Gilbert sang well at the Cardiff Singer of the World Competition, though she did not win.
“I watched a videotape of her performance and thought she was terrific,” he said.
He was looking for a Lucia. She could be the one. Subsequent to a rigorous audition in New York, Campbell told Gilbert he was pairing her with Maestro Richard Bonynge in San Diego. “She nearly fainted with excitement,” he said.
Bonynge’s wife, Dame Joan Sutherland, is Gilbert’s heroine. She describes the first day of “Lucia” rehearsals: “I was kind of catatonic. I don’t think I’ve ever been that nervous in my life.”
Now that things have settled down, Bonynge apparently sings her praises. She said, “This has been one of the best rehearsal processes in my life, so far.”
What are her aspirations?
“Of course I want a family,” Gilbert said. “I’d love that. I’d love to have my own home. I know what I want as a singer. I’d love to get a shot at all the bel canto roles that I could sing. I aspire to be a great recitalist, to give people vegetables with their dessert.”
By vegetables she means things like Samuel Barber’s “Hermit Songs,” which she programs as often as possible.
“Beyond that, if someone described me as a good singing actress I’d be thrilled,” she said.
Campbell confides he’s already issued a contract for her return in “Maria Stuarda” in 2008.
“Lucia di Lammermoor” is performed at 7 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 18 and Tuesday, Feb. 21; at 8 p.m. Friday, Feb. 24 and 2 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 26 at the Civic Theatre, 202 C St., San Diego.
Tickets range from $27 to $142 and may be purchased by visiting www.sdopera.com or calling (619) 533-7000.