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Hansel & Gretel

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Cherry has performed HANSEL with

Nevada Opera
Chautauqua Opera
Virginia Opera
New Orleans Opera
Maine Grand Opera
Denton Light Opera

(Click on a company name above to jump to information about that production.)

Cherry Duke has performed the role of Hansel in Hansel and Gretel by Engelbert Humperdinck over 250 times.  It was her first operatic role, which she performed at age 20 with the Denton Light Opera and the Denton Community Orchestra while in school at Texas Woman's University in Denton, Texas.  Cherry performed the role two consecutive seasons with two separate casts in Denton. 

Cherry later performed the role on tour with Virginia Opera 's SPECtrum Young Artist Program, singing for elementary school children all over in Norfolk, Richmond, Williamsburg, and many other communities around Virginia.  With Phoebe Yadon Fennell as Gretel and Malin Fritz as the Mother and Witch, Cherry performed H&G an average of 10 times a week for three months.

After her success in Virginia, Cherry was asked to do a similar tour in New Orleans, Louisiana.  With the MetroPelican Opera Company (the Education Department of the New Orleans Opera) she sang for children in the deeply impoverished projects of inner-city New Orleans as well as in a variety of schools and other venues around the metropolitan New Orleans area. Anahid Papakhian (pictured at left) played Gretel and Yael Zamir was the Mother and the Witch.

In the summer of 1999, Cherry resumed the role of Hansel on the mainstage of Chautauqua Opera.  With conductor Stefan Lano of Switzerland and stage director Jay Lesenger, Cherry participated in a landmark presentation of Hansel and Gretel set in the woods near the Chautauqua Institution, just before the time of Chautauqua's founding.  Also starring in this innovative production were Emily Martin as Gretel, Melissa Parks as the Witch and Mother, Scott Hogsed as the Father, Aimee Puentes as the Dew Fairy and Rebecca Garcia as the Sandman.

May of 2002 saw Cherry sing her 6th production of Hansel and Gretel in scenic Camden, Maine, with the Maine Grand Opera. Phoebe Yadon Fennell was again Cherry's Gretel. Janna Hymes-Bianchi conducted and veteran opera expert Beaumont Glass directed.

Cherry returned to this beloved role in February 2008 under the baton of Michael Borowitz of Nevada Opera. The cast included Danielle Talamantes (winner of multiple competitions, including Liederkranz Opera, NATSA, and finalist in several international vocal competitions) as Gretel, Ron Loyd as the father and Courtney Ames as the Witch. Marc Astafan directed.

"Both [Cherry Duke as Hansel and Danielle Talamantes as Gretel] are excellent with clear, crystalline voices that play to the poignancy of Humperdinck's writing without forced theatricality or blurred vocal purity."

—Jack Neal's Music Reviews

"Hansel and Gretel, played respectively by Cherry Duke and Danielle Talamantes, infuse their characters with such playfulness that it's easy to believe they are children. Their voices also blend gloriously, placing their duets among the show's highlights."

"Phoebe Yadon's Gretel and Cherry Duke's Hansel were well portrayed, vocally and theatrically. Their animated expressions and child-like physicality engaged [the audience]."

—Dagney C. Ernest,
The Courier-Gazette

"Ms. Duke tackles probably the most difficult role...with ease and energy, promptly quelling any suspension of disbelief problems that can arise as woman plays man."

—Martha Ray,
Denton Record-Chronicle

       

Chautauqua photos by Jill Snyder.

Other featured roles: Jo March in Mark Adamo's Little Women