Mary Lou Fallis

Shows

Currently Offered in the 2010-2011 Season

Fallis & Tiefenbach More or Less Live (stage show)

• Mary Lou Fallis with her partner in crime Peter Tiefenbach presents an evening of serious musical high jinks. Always illuminating but mostly just hilarious, Fallis and Tiefenbach provide definitive performances of familiar vocal classics and invent some classics of their own. Programme includes: Salute to William Shakespeare, Bingo Night in Berlin, What an unfortunate Evening, and a medley from Nebraska as well as Pinkelsee Waltz.

"The fabulousest Canadianest, diva of them all with Peter Tiefenbach, with wit as dry as a vodka martini"
- Toronto Star

Primadonna Choralis (MLF and PT +choir)

• The history of western choral music from the beginning - from the caveman to the present. Historically accurate in very broad strokes-Mary Lou Fallis and PT combine to illuminate the real function of vocal cords, the Oratorio Top Ten, the meaning behind plain chant, a new Handel Anthem (very new) and spiced up Canada Day Material . Also including a Canadian Commission about the Building of the Railway. Commissioned and performed very successfully with a number of community choirs-to date, Chorus Niagara, The Cellar singers, The Orpheus Choir, The Kitchener Philharmonic Choir, The Festival 500 Chorus, the Fanshawe Singers and the Mississauga Festival Chorus.

"A fun musical romp and a whirlwind historical tour."
- Kitchener Waterloo Record

Primadonna Goes Camping

• The Primadonna embarks on a tour of Canadian wilderness sites and National Parks-sponsored by the Ministry of Natural Resources. travelling by canoe to each destination. With her long-suffering accompanist Peter Tiefenbach and her adventurous tech-person David Ambrose, the diva presents a cross between a classical voice recital and a public service announcement: including Cooking in the Wild, A Canoe Medley, Bear Safety lecture, a song about a man who falls in love with a mosquito, and a quick excerpts from the Mountie Musical: Rosemarie. Programme also highlights "Sit Down you're rockin' the Boat" and "Paddle your Own Canoe" Commissioned by "The Forest Festival" in Haliburton and premiered there.

Primadonna Shows

Primadonna

• The original piece that started it all. Primadonna depicts the life of a singer from first hesitant Kiwanis Festival days, through to becoming a professional, and then a mother and finally an hilariously full blooded opera diva. First presented at Stratford Summer Music Festival. This show has toured Canada, United States, United Kingdom, Ireland, Japan, Iceland.

"Right on the mark!" - Globe and Mail

"Beg, borrow or steal a ticket - a delight for opera buffs and other mortals"
- Scotland on Sunday

Primadonna On A Moose

• Based on the CD of the same name. The show is narrated by the Primadonna's Diary as she tours Canada on a long singing tour circa 1915. Unearthing amusing anecdotes and wonderful hits from the Canadian Musical past-she charms her way across the country on a moose! Songs included: "Oh what a difference Since the Hydro Came","Take your Girl Out to the Rink and We Die to Live", as well as "The World is Waiting for the sunrise."

"...Fallis has gathered more than a dozen Canadian Songs from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and she's come up with some real winners, bringing Canada's history to life in a way that's fresh and lively." - The Ottawa Citizen

Primadonna First Farewell Tour

• The Primadonna returns to her hometown to help celebrate the 100th birthday of her beloved singing teacher. Instead of a much-deserved ticker-tape parade for the famous diva, Mary Lou is showered with problems - a quarrelsome agent, an insulting reporter and an annoying concert promoter. And to top it all off, her gown has been shrunk by the cleaners! With only her valiant accompanist to assist her, she must face these setbacks and take the stage in the flamboyant and regal manner befitting the true Primadonna. First commissioned by Music@Sharon and has had runs at National Arts Centre, Citadel Theatre in Edmonton and Canadian Stage's Berkley Street".

"Fallis has musical and comic skills to hit all the right notes in highly successful production."
- The Edmonton Journal

Primadonna Does More With Less

• On being told that she is too fat to audition for her dream role of "Lucia" in Lucia di Lammermoor, the primadonna embarks on a journey of self improvement, which includes miracle diets, yoga, workout classes and very special encouragement from her guardian angel "Maria Calla" who isn't so happy to be assigned to her! We see whether our heroine is able to stay the course and overcome this blow to her self-esteem. Can she again circumvent the difficulties of being a primadonna...over the long haul? Includes; Claire de Lune Bleu, Bingo Night in Berlin, and Swami Marge's Meditation to Bachianas Brasilieras No.5 plus Climb Every Mountain and Blender Song.

Commissioned by the Guelph Spring Festival.

Primadonna Does Shakepeare

• A romp with the Bard to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Stratford Shakespearean Festival... starting with the famous festival fanfare on 2 kazoos and toy drum, Mary Lou Fallis and Peter Tiefenbach explore musically the recesses of the mind of the genius. Commissioned by Stratford Summer Music and written by Mary Lou Fallis, Peter Tiefenbach and Peter Brown. The programme includes: Hey Kooky Hamlet, Oh William Shakepeare, You Wonderful Man, It Was a Lover and His Lass, Sonnet by His Contemporary, Henry Burbage, Hark All Ye Women, and Ophelia's Flowers. Some of this material is available on the New CD "More or Less Live at the Gould."

Historical Shows

The Mrs. Bach Show

• Move over, Oprah, Ellen and Jay. Mrs. Bach has arrived! Mary Lou Fallis as Anna Magdalena Bach (Johann's 2nd wife) hosts Leipzig's top rated morning Talk Show. There is the opening monologue, audience giveaways to skill testing questions about the great man, gossip about his "Passions" and Annaerobics to keep us all fit. Handy household hints for the modern woman of 1747 combined with Bach's best loved works, make this an evening of witty and touching insights into the family life of the greatest musician of all time. Includes, the Coffee Cantata, Jesu Joy of Man's Desiring, Jauchzet Gott in allen Landen, Air on the G String, Fugue in G minor, Bist du Bei Mir, and others. Written for the Edmonton Tri-Bach Festival. Has toured Canada, the US and performed at the Edinborough Festival; has toured Canada, the US, performed at the Edinborough Festival and with Tafel Music.

"Mrs Bach's java jives" - Edmonton Journal

"... from the genuinely moving to the hysterically funny."
- The Globe & Mail

"Fallis clearly has consummate control of her material... she manages with ease a seamless transition from a perfectly serious and beautiful performance of a Buononcini minuet to an utterly inane performance of a Bach cantata aria, with the trumpet obbligato performed on kazoo."
- The Whig-Standard, Kingston

Ms.Mozart

• A portrait of Mozart's often forgotten sister Nannerl. The film 'Amadeus' was over two and a half hours long, and she wasn't even in it! Not content to live in the shadow of her brother's genius, Wolfgang's big sister tells her side of the story in a spirited and revealing exposition. While revealing her own romantic liaisons, and introducing one of her own compositions, of which her brother highly approved, we get to meet a memorable and feisty figure in music history.

Commissioned by the Mozart Festival and premiered with the Aldeburgh Connection, Elgin Theatre, Toronto.

Jenny Lind Town Hall Concert

• A Recreation of Jenny Lind's famous two day visit to Toronto where "the Swedish nightingale" sang recitals at The Saint Lawrence Hall in 1859. Accompanied by her future husband Otto Goldschmitt, and her friend Ole Bull, the famous violinist and others, the repertoire included her famous "party pieces" of the time; The Swedish Echo Song, My Johann, and Come Unto Him from Messiah. Premiered at St. Lawrence Hall for the Citizen's of Toronto 1876, Guest artists included Michael Colvin, Max Christie, Mark Fewer and Peter Tiefenbach

Emma Queen of Song

• A visit with famous Canadian operatic superstar of the 1880's Emma Albani in her apartment in heaven. The first Canadian to sing at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, a friend of Queen Victoria, favourite of Brahms, Dvorack, and Arthur Sullivan, Emma Albani cut a great swath through the music scene in Europe for over 20 years. Her husband Ernest Gye, ran Covent Garden, and she was a leading singer there for most of her career. We like to think her husband's influence had nothing to do with it. When she toured Canada in 1911, 3,000 fans came out to meet her at the train station in Montreal and carried her over their heads to her hotel. This musical play is based on her memoirs - Forty Years of Song.

Commissioned by the Shaw Festival and premiered there and broadcast by CBC/Radio Two.