Yoko Abe Acheson, Cultural Advisor for MADAMA BUTTERFLY

To launch a piece as complex and vocally difficult as Puccini's Madama Butterfly would seem indeed daunting for any opera company.  But we were so fortunate to find the perfect cast, and the piece is really just an exquisitely intimate account of one young woman's journey through love and loss, so what problems could there be?  Plenty.  We knew we had to go beyond fulfilling music and character to do justice to this great work.  We had to evoke a sense of cultures at odds with one another.  We knew also that we had a responsibility to our Japanese audience to represent Butterfly's Japanese culture as authentically as possible.

Enter Yoko Acheson.  An accomplished violinist who frequently can be found in our pit, Yoko began her work on this project by providing a tiny yet vibrant and attentive violin student to play the role of the 3-year-old Sorrow, Butterfly's little child.  But it soon became apparent that the work would not succeed without her cultural stewardship.  Yoko attended almost every rehearsal.  She taught us the difference between male and female behavior - men bow one way, and women another; men walk and sit first, women after, etc.  She spent hours teaching the entire cast how to wear a kimono:  left over right is only the tip of the ice berg.  Each layer must be wrapped and worn properly or the entire effect goes awry.  We walked across the stage, taking small but elegant steps (no shuffling, no mincing - wrong wrong wrong!), genteelly holding the left side of our kimonos so our legs would never show.  We knelt and rose over and over again, until finally we might convince our Asian friends of our sincerity in representing them.  Yoko even taught Kiyeon, our Korean Cio-Cio San, how to use the ceremonial knife to commit suicide in the proper feminine manner.

Now that we've opened, Yoko arrives backstage hours early to prepare the kimonos and undergarments for wrapping.  Then as the rest of the orchestra tunes and warms up, she applies layer upon layer of cloth and belting to the various women she has "adopted."  Don't worry - she makes it back to her seat in the pit in plenty of time for the final tuning!

It has become a joke at Cinnabar that Yoko's house has moved in.  Bits of furniture, a dozen silk scarves, her own special kimono and all undergarments, belts, mirrors, tea set and more adorn the stage and performers alike, straight from the personal life of this very special person.  She regards her self-imposed duties on the set of Madama Butterfly as "community service."

We are forever grateful that her expertise and generosity have lent an authenticity to the project, which takes it to a level not to be achieved without her.  Thank you, Yoko.  You are a wonderful musician, and have contributed enormously to the success of our opera.