Grand-scale plans for Lyric Opera’s 2017-2018 season

As Lyric Opera of Chicago announced its 2017-2018 season on Tuesday, its triumverate of guiding lights — general director Anthony Freud, music director Sir Andrew Davis and creative consultant Renee Fleming gathered to answer this daunting question: As the producer of what might well be the most expensive of art forms — and in the current business environment that, as Freud described it, “is increasingly volatile and difficult, and requires that we maximize all our resources” -— how do you balance the choice of productions (new, borrowed and reconstructed), with the demands of the box office and bottom line, while also making every effort to move both the art and the audience into the 21st century?

To be sure, it requires what Freud describes as “a delicate, complex and subtle juggling act [and] a great deal of lateral thinking,” so that there is a breadth of repertoire and musical styles on stage, and a slew of initiatives (driven by recent extensive research) designed to reach new audiences. The upcoming season reflects many of those goals, with a long-term push for greater technological capabilities planned along with the goal of raising $16 million to do the job.

Meanwhile, next season will see three new mainstage opera productions: Gluck’s “Orphee et Eurydice,” marking the Lyric’s first collaboration with the Joffrey Ballet, to be directed, choreographed and designed by Hamburg Ballet’s John Neumeier, in a co-production with the Los Angeles Opera and Staatsoper Hamburg; Wagner’s “Walkure,” the second installment in the Lyric’s Ring Cycle, directed by David Poutney; and Gounod’s “Faust,” directed by Kevin Newbury.

In addition, there will be three “new-to-Chicago” productions: Verdi’s “Rigoletto,” Bizet’s “The Pearl Fishers,” and Puccini’s “Turandot.”

For its grand-scale musical (which has been shown to be a big help in generating new opera-goers) it will produce Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Jesus Christ Superstar.” A new-to-Chicago chamber opera production (“Fellow Travelers,” set against the McCarthy era of the 1950s) will be performed “off-site,” at the more intimate Athenaeum Theatre at 2936 N. Southport.

“The ‘young audience’ is interesting,” said Fleming, still riding high from Saturday night’s Chicago Voices concert that brought together a slew of musical styles, from opera to jazz and rap. “We’ve learned — and my own daughters are proof of this -— that they see the experience of going to the opera as a date night and they want to see traditional works like ‘La Boheme’.” (Fleming, by the way, will be the “voice” of actress Julianne Moore in the film version of “Bel Canto,” based on Anne Patchett novel of the same name. Fleming helped commission an opera version of the novel which had its world premiere by the Lyric Opera in 2015.)

As part of the worldwide celebration in 2018 of the 100th anniversary of the birth of conductor, composer, teacher Leonard Bernstein, a concert featuring the Lyric Opera Orchestra, conducted by David Chase, will be performed March 10, 2018. The acclaimed young Polish tenor, Piotr Beczala, will be heard in recital on Feb. 25, 2018.

Subscriptions for the Lyric season go on sale today, with a variety of fixed-date packages or variable-date “Create Your Own” packages.

Call (312) 827-5600 visit www.lyricopera.org. Current subscribers will receive their renewal packages in the mail in early February.