{"id":37239,"date":"2026-04-24T18:32:57","date_gmt":"2026-04-25T01:32:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bostonartsdiary.com\/wordpress\/?p=37239"},"modified":"2026-05-02T10:19:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-02T17:19:12","slug":"daughter-of-the-regiment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bostonartsdiary.com\/wordpress\/2026\/04\/daughter-of-the-regiment\/","title":{"rendered":"Daughter of the Regiment"},"content":{"rendered":"

Opera (1840)
\nMusic by Gaetano Donizetti
\nLibretto by Jules-Henri Vernoy de Saint-Georges, Jean-Fran\u00e7ois Bayard
\nPerformed in English based on the G. Schirmer, Inc. translation by Ruth and Thomas Martin
\nRevised for this production by John de los Santos
\nNew English Dialogue by Kirsten Greenidge
\nDirected by John de los Santos
\nConducted by Kelly Kuo
\nBoston Lyric Opera<\/a>
\nEmerson Colonial Theatre
\nTheater District, Boston
\nApril 24 – May 3, 2026<\/strong><\/p>\n

Set Designer: Liliana Duque Pi\u00f1eiro; Costume Designer: Oana Botez; Lighting Designer: Reza Behjat; Wig & Makeup Designer: Earon Chew Nealey<\/strong><\/p>\n

With Brenda Rae (Marie), Spencer Britten (Tonio), Kenneth Kellogg (Colonel Sulpice), Sandra Piques Eddy (Widow Birkenfeld), Angela Yam (Hortensia), Neal Ferreira (The Duchess Crakenthorpe), Devon Russo (Corporal)<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"<\/a>
Brenda Rae as Marie
Sandra Piques Eddy as Widow Birkenfeld
in “Daughter of the Regiment”
Photo: Nile Hawver\/Nile Scott Studios
Courtesy of Boston Lyric Opera<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
A truly delightful and witty rendition, reset from the original to Revolutionary era Boston, with some terrific coloratura singing.<\/div>\n

Marie (Brenda Rae), a young and dashing woman, having been abandoned as a baby to the hands of the regimental leader of an American Revolutionary army regiment, Colonel Sulpice (Kenneth Kellogg), has grown up in the regiment and is beloved by its members. It is 1775 in Boston and revolutionary ferment is well underway. Marie has fallen in love with Tonio (Spencer Britten), a Frenchman who is held suspect by the regiment until, as a way of showing his devotion to Marie, he joins up with it. As a new member of the regiment, Tonio finally gains the confidence of his new comrades. <\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the so-called Widow Birkenfeld (Sandra Piques Eddy) has shown up declaring herself as Marie’s long lost aunt, claiming the right to take her away and marry her off in a way the Widow deems appropriate. Marie is hesitant, and the Colonel, the regiment and Tonio are all heartbroken at Marie’s departure, but there is nothing to be done. <\/p>\n

It turns out that the Widow Birkenfeld wants to line Marie up via Duchess Crankenthorpe (Neal Ferreira), supposedly a very influential lady, but something is amiss. In the end, Widow Birkenfeld comes clean, the Duchess shows her true colors, and all, as one might expect, turns out well. (See spoilers section for details.)<\/p>\n

This delightful production is truly comic, full of lively action and movement, and has an English libretto entertainingly tuned for a Boston audience. Playwright Kirsten Greenidge has added supplemental dialogue, which works very well in bringing to fruition the Boston-tailored libretto. <\/p>\n

The staging is lively and delightful throughout. The choreography is nicely conceived and highly entertaining, the costumes are decorative and distinctive and the set, though simple, is clever, eloquent and efficiently suited to a short run. It’s amazing how well the team at BLO puts together these productions which are almost always tight, well-designed and exceedingly well architected for the typical six or so performances over the course of a couple of weeks; it’s quite an accomplishment.<\/p>\n

As the Colonel, Kenneth Kellogg offers, from the outset, a robust and convincing basso, notable and penetrating. Though it took Spencer Britten a little time to fill out the textures of his voice, he certainly did so in short order, giving his Tonio a warm and charming appeal. Sandra Piques Eddy is very funny as Widow Birkenfeld, but, as the Duchess, Neal Ferreira really takes the comic cake. He is hilarious. As Birkenfeld’s sidekick, Hortensia, Angela Yam also makes good comic time.<\/p>\n

As Marie, Brenda Rae started, as well, with a little vocal thinness, but soon rose to the occasion with full force, delivering, in spades, a stunning coloratura virtuosity. She delivered a lively, funny, and compelling funny performance with exceptional vocal refinement, and a genuine pleasure to hear and to see her perform.<\/p>\n

Kelly Kuo leads the wonderful BLO orchestra for this outing, taking over from the frequent director David Angus, and he does a terrific job. The orchestra played exceptionally well – and one always has to remember that this is an orchestra that gathers only periodically for these BLO productions, not almost every night as does a resident opera company. They consistently do a wonderful job, as they did for this performance, with some spot on snare drums, a nice cello solo, and some lovely French Horns notable among all the excellent playing.<\/p>\n

<\/span>Extra info: contains spoilers<\/div>
The Widow Birkenfeld turns out not to be Marie’s long lost aunt but her long lost mother. Duchess Crankenthorpe turns out to me a man in disguise and a phony. In the end, Marie winds up happily with Tonio and the Widow Birkenfeld lines up with Marie’s adoptive father, Colonel Sulpice.<\/div><\/div>\n

Overall: very lively and fun, and the refashioned Boston setting works very well, with good comic acting, excellent singing, and a terrific starring coloratura.<\/p>\n

– BADMan (aka Charles Munitz)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Opera (1840)
\nMusic by Gaetano Donizetti
\nNew English Dialogue by Kirsten Greenidge
\nBoston Lyric Opera<\/a>
\nEmerson Colonial Theatre
\nTheater District, Boston
\nApril 24 – May 3, 2026<\/strong>
\nA truly delightful and witty rendition, reset from the original to Revolutionary era Boston, with some terrific coloratura singing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37258,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-37239","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-operas","8":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bostonartsdiary.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37239","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bostonartsdiary.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bostonartsdiary.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bostonartsdiary.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bostonartsdiary.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37239"}],"version-history":[{"count":26,"href":"https:\/\/bostonartsdiary.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37239\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37290,"href":"https:\/\/bostonartsdiary.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37239\/revisions\/37290"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bostonartsdiary.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37258"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bostonartsdiary.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37239"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bostonartsdiary.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37239"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bostonartsdiary.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37239"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}