FIRE ISLAND - Cherry Grove's annual classical concert "Ocean Aires," brainchild of Isaac Steven Vaughan, is celebrating its 10th year, under the auspices of the Arts Project of Cherry Grove (APCG), and this year's edition, on June 14 at the Community House, was therefore billed as, "Rated X!" Performers and audience alike were encouraged to wear lingerie, pajamas or otherwise enticing attire and, between musical numbers, MC Philomena, in chic nightgown, discoursed pithily on fetishes, familiar and obscure. Philomena also announced the themes for two forthcoming APCG events. On July 19 and 20, anticipate the "Olympic Casino" and, for the climax of the season, on September 27 at the Ice Palace, the "Fanta-sea Ball."
In the absence of current Homecoming Queen Margo, we hailed HQ 2006 Coco, as pianists Eric Martin and Isaac played "God Save the Queen," to kick off the proceedings. Lyric baritone George McGarvey, in tuxedo, assisted by pianist Christopher Vassiliades, led about in studded collar and black leather harness, offered a graceful "Where'er You Walk," Jupiter's aria from George Frideric Handel's secular oratorio "Semele."
Following Philomena's lecture about necrophilia, pianist John Nieman, in tiger-striped lounging pj's, played his own elegiac and virtuosic arrangement of Frédéric Chopin's Valse Opus 64, #2, and Prélude Opus 28, #10. Introduced by Philomena's talk concerning leather, Clarence "Kye" Perry, in black leather chaps, jock and sleeveless shirt, was on hand for a pair of contrasting Sergei Rachmaninoff piano preludes, a restrained G-sharp minor, Opus 32, #12, and a rhapsodic D Major, Opus 23, #4. John as the elegant Jacqueline Jonée, Kye, and Isaac, inspiring our hostess to speak of the ménage à trois, returned for a caressing, then soaring Rachmaninoff Romance, Opus 11, #5, as a leather, lingerie and champagne, piano six-hands effort.
Engendering Philomena's history of the chastity belt, soprano Marlena de la Mora, assisted by Eric, limned Vincenzo Bellini's lovely legato cavatina "Casta Diva," the moonlit invocation to the 'chaste goddess,' from the opera "Norma," with precise coloratura and in full command of the long-breathed line, and for an encore, gave us a forceful "Entweihte Götter," Ortrud's curse from Richard Wagner's "Lohengrin." Soprano Sherri Rase joined Marlena and Eric for a dulcet and mellifluous Flower Duet, "Dôme épais le jasmin," from Léo Delibes' "Lakmé," with Sherri portraying Lakmé and Marlena playing Mallika.
Contralto Rosemary Palladino, assisted by Isaac, sporting his Mr. Fire Island Leather 2008 sash and leather kilt, relished the variety of musical styles that "A Wand'ring Minstrel I," tenor Nanki-Poo's entrance air from Gilbert and Sullivan operetta "The Mikado," encompasses. Eric encored his solo from the first "Ocean Aires," Claude Debussy's at once diaphanous and bouncy "L'île joyeuse," in tribute, Philomena said, to "our own island of joy," Fire Island. Eric's past performance of the piece had been drowned out by the thump of disco music issuing from what was then called Kiss and is now Sunsets.
A string trio of "Ocean Aires" 'virgins,' violinist Arun Bordoloi, violist Katherine McHale and cellist Valerie Kuehne, proffered a sweet-sounding fourth movement theme-and-variations and vigorous fifth movement rondo finale from Ernst von Dohnányi's Serenade in C Major, Opus 10. For a whimsical instrumental version of "La donna è mobile," the Duke of Mantua's aria from Giuseppe Verdi's "Rigoletto," Kye accompanied Arun, playing the tenor's line in the first verse, and Isaac, playing the part on accordion in the second verse, with a collaborative third verse following, and finding Philomena entering with a rose between her teeth.
Eric and Isaac, in exotic Eastern robes, wrapped up the evening by making an exceedingly intimate experience of Maurice Ravel's sinuous, sensuous, and insistently pulsating "Boléro," in a piano four-hands arrangement.
Stay tuned for next year's "Ocean Aires 11, Classical Music in Hollywood Movies."
