Thursday, Sept. 4, 2003 | 8:21 a.m.
Twenty years ago dramatic coloratura soprano Luana DeVol dazzled the San Francisco Opera audience when she substituted for an ailing soprano in the role of Ariadne in Richard Strauss' opera "Ariadne auf Naxos."
After a two-decade absence from not only the War Memorial Opera House stage, but also the entire opera scene in the U.S., she is returning to open the 2003-04 season of the San Francisco Opera.
"I began my career in the San Francisco Opera Chorus," she said, "and now I'm returning as an established European star. That's a nice pair of bookends."
On Saturday and for five subsequent performances DeVol, who lives in Henderson, will debut the role of Susan B. Anthony for the San Francisco premiere of "Mother of Us All," the story of women's rights activist Susan B. Anthony.
Virgil Thomson wrote the score; the libretto is by Gertrude Stein. San Francisco Opera is presenting the 1947 work as part of its "Animating Opera" series. (For tickets go to www.sfopera.com)
"I didn't know the opera at all," DeVol said, "but Pamela Rosenberg, the new general director of San Francisco Opera, sent material to me. But even after I got the music, I wasn't sure I was going to do it. It was so different from what I was used to. But my voice teacher, Janet Parlova (of Henderson), encouraged me, so I said, Yes.' I'm really having lots of fun with it."
DeVol described the work as a 20th century opera that is extremely listenable, "a slice of Americana, from a Fourth of July parade to wonderful Stephen Foster folk songs," she said.
"It portrays more than Susan's struggle for women's suffrage," she continued. "It uses her as a focal point for writing about America in the 1800s and deals with an individual woman's struggle, the inner woman, not the stereotype of a placard-carrying bloomer girl."
Susan B. Anthony was not an easy role for DeVol to learn.
"The music and words are very fragmented, like Gertrude Stein's poetry," she explained. "There are no long, arching, flowing musical lines like in a lyrical opera."
Surprisingly, one of the biggest challenges is that the opera is in English.
"Every word must be understandable for an English-speaking audience," DeVol asserted, "so we're really working on our diction."
When it comes to singing opera, English is DeVol's fourth language, after German, Italian and French.
Instead of remaining in the United States to develop her career after her success as Ariadne, DeVol went to Europe on an "audition tour," singing before the great maestros in the major opera houses.
They loved her, and she never looked back across the Atlantic.
Consequently, the European opera world has literally been DeVol's stage since 1983. As the dominant dramatic role diva in Europe, she has starred at legendary opera houses in Milan (La Scala), Vienna, Paris, Stutt- gart, Madrid, Copenhagen, Berlin, Leipzig, Basel, Munich, Mannheim, Helsinki, Strasbourg, Rome, Essen -- the list goes on and on.
A tall, statuesque blond with a rich, powerful, vibrant voice, DeVol is perfectly suited to the German opera roles that have made her famous -- especially those of the two Richards -- Strauss and Wagner.
Her performance in one opera by each -- Elektra (Strauss) in Basel, Switzerland, and Isolde ("Tristan und Isolde," Wagner) in Leipzig, Germany, earned her "Singer of the Year" honors in 1997 from the European opera magazine "Opern Welt" (Opera World).
Three years later she received her second Singer of the Year award for her performance as Brunnhilde, her signature role, in Wagner's "Der Ring des Nibelungen" at Stuttgart. It was also as Brunnhilde that she soared to the pinnacle of Wagnerian fame when she was invited to sing the role in the famous trilogy of The Ring -- "Die Walkure," "Siegfried" and "Gotterdammerung," at the 2001 Bayreuth Festival.
"It was very, very special," she recalled, "because you're invited to sing at Bayreuth by Wolfgang Wagner, the grandson of the composer. I look into the eyes of Wolfgang Wagner, and I see the genes of Richard Wagner looking back at me. It's really amazing."
News of DeVol's success at Bayreuth opened doors for her in the United States.
"I was virtually unknown here until Bayreuth," she said, "and then people were asking, 'who is she?' All of a sudden they were going to my website (www.operdiva.com) and saying, 'Oh, that's Luana.' "
Accolades aside, DeVol keeps scaling new operatic heights. In 2001-02, she added two new roles to her repertoire -- the title role in "Norma" by Bellini and Kundry in "Parsifal" by Wagner. In Madrid in 2002-03, she sang with Placido Domingo for the first time -- she as Brunnhilde, he as Siegmund, in "Die Walkure."
DeVol also debuted the title role in "Agyptische Helena" by Strauss at Essen.
Yet another "first" is on the calendar for 2006 when the hallowed stage of the New York Metropolitan Opera will welcome DeVol for the first time when she sings Ortrude, "the bad girl," in Wagner's "Lohengrin."
Despite the spotlights and applause in the major opera houses of Europe, DeVol maintains that her life is not glamorous.
"My life in Europe is basically travel, study, rehearsals and performances," she said.
"Whenever I have a break in my European schedule, I return to my home at Grand Legacy in Henderson. (She's named the Italianate villa "Casa Diva.") From my terrace, I not only enjoy the free entertainment provided by the golfers," she said, "but also look straight down the third fairway toward the Strip and its fabulous light show at night.
"I swear I'm healthier since moving here in 1995," she commented. "I suspect the European viruses and bacilli can't survive the Vegas summer heat.
"Or perhaps it is because I have grown to love the desert and its subtleties and delicacy. The desert leaves me in awe of nature. There is a wonderful reality check out there. I feel vulnerable. The fact that I sing opera in the great cities of the world is nothing compared to the forces of nature."
However, when DeVol has an engagement in Europe, she's also only 10 minutes from McCarran International Airport.
"It's fabulous to have an international airport close by," she remarked. "I can easily fly to anywhere in the world."
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