John Franceschina
Commissioned by the Dutch Ensemble Opus Two in 2017, Scenes from the Jungle, a multi-media romantic opera in two acts, was loosely based on Edgar Rice Burroughs’s 1912 novel, Tarzan of the Apes, in the Dutch translation by W.J.A. Ronaldus, Jr. The work was scored for three singers playing eight different roles, an orchestra of eleven accordions and three percussionists performing on xylophone, timpani, djembe, bass drum, timbales, snare drum, bongo drums, cymbals, gongs, claves, and rattles. Of historical importance is the fact that Scenes from the Jungle is the first opera composed and orchestrated especially for an accordion orchestra. An accordion orchestra was chosen, rather than a more traditional ensemble to give the audience a sense of alienation with this sound; the same feeling that the characters experience in a strange environment. As the opera progresses, the sound of accordions becomes familiar to the audience, just as the characters become more familiar with their surroundings. The music of the opera is very eclectic to create a sense of familiarity and surprise. Musical styles range from easily accessible silent film music to contemporary atonality, African rhythms, jazz, and evocations of Puccini, Korngold, and Bernstein.The opera employs multimedia through the projection of sequences from the 1918 silent film Tarzan of the Apes, as well as images of modern metaphorical jungles (big cities such as New York City) and fear-accentuating effects to evoke the lions and apes from the film. In order to maintain a cinematic illusion throughout the opera, written silent-film-like narration is projected, as well as images of the various physical environments suggested in the opera. Scenes from the Jungle began touring the Netherlands in the spring of 2019 with Anouk Antonissen, soprano, Luke Mitchell, tenor, and Fernando Linares-Correa, baritone. The production was conducted by Hans Barten and directed by Malou Cranes. A proposed tour of the eastern United States to follow was abandoned due to the emergence of Covid-19.John Franceschina, composer, has created scores for the National Shakespeare Company and the Provincetown Playhouse in New York City, the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles, the Coconut Grove Playhouse in Miami, Baltimore’s Center Stage, Washington’s Ford’s Theatre and the Arena Stage, the Pittsburgh Public Theatre, Cleveland Playhouse, Florida Studio Theatre, Geva Theatre, Syracuse Stage, Papermill Playhouse, Music Theatre Works, and the Moscow Art Theatre, in addition to the Asolo State Theatre in Sarasota, Florida, where he acted as composer-in-residence from 1976 to 1993. His Fanfare for the Fiftieth was commissioned by Philippe Entremont for the fiftieth anniversary of the New Orleans Symphony Orchestra in 1985; his secular oratorio, Houtebeen, for male chorus, string orchestra and accordion ensemble, toured the Netherlands in 2014, and his cantata, Joppenszoon, toured the Netherlands in 2024-2025.
