“The Mother of Us All was Susan B. Anthony, the leader of the fight for women’s suffrage in the United States,” writes John Rockwell in Tuesday’s (2/11) Financial Times (U.K.). “She is the centerpiece of Virgil Thomson and Gertrude Stein’s moving feminist paean to her and her crusade. The opera, which many of us regard as America’s finest by far … is getting ample attention in this centenary year of the opening of the vote for women. [Director] Louisa Proske of Heartbeat Opera is evoking it lovingly in the Charles Engelhard Court of the American Wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, [a] cathedral-like hall…. The performance, a production masterminded by Limor Tomer of MetLiveArts, along with the New York Philharmonic (source of the seven instrumentalists) and the Juilliard School, whose Marcus Institute for Vocal Arts provides the quite remarkable singers for the 20 vocal soloists and the 10 chorus members. Felicia Moore, an Institute alumna, is the terrific Susan, with a soprano and presence of Wagnerian authority…. The audience surrounds a central platform with sculptures remaining in their regular places, their ‘marble and gold’ echoing a phrase from Stein’s libretto…. Daniela Candillari conducts, holding everything together over this far-flung space.”
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