If it weren't for the picture, you might think the headline would be to an article about Don Young's future with the Justice Department. But that was the title of Saturday evening's Anchorage Opera Dark Night recital, featuring soprano Kate Egan, mezzo-soprono Marlene Bateman and pianist Juliana Osinchuk.It was also a CD launch for the three artists, who have been working for well over a year on this. Their preparation showed in the concert. And then some.
The artists played songs by seven composers. Though the composers - Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Saint-Saens, Faure, Purcell and Britten - are familiar, most of the songs were recital rarities. Which made their incredibly polished performances all the more dear.
At a reception afterward, I got to introduce Juliana Osinchuk to Diane Benson. Both are among the most important of Alaska artists. Both have recently been shaken by family tragedies: Juliana's husband, Mark Dawson, passed away in 2006. And Diane's son was terribly wounded later that year, in Iraq.
Juliana, as usual, is deeply involved in many projects. I'm hoping to work with her again soon.
Diane, has mostly had to set aside her career as actress, writer, director and producer, to challenge Don Young and others for our sole seat in the U.S. Congress.
The evening she was called by the Department of the Army to be notified that her son was injured so badly he wasn't expected to survive, Benson had just returned from a tour of Western Alaska, where she had presented her monodrama about Alaska's Martin Luther King, Elizabeth Peratrovich. When the phone rang she was preparing for an audition the following morning for a new play she had written and was to enact.
The resulting fight to help her son save himself, and what she learned watching our veterans recover from the monstrous crimes of this war, created her next role.
It isn't a play, though.
image of Diane Benson and Juliana Osinchuk