Shades of Light and Dark: Conductor Gary Thor Wedow on Seeing Colors in Music, Leading Handel's Atalanta at Juilliard Opera, and Living the Queens Life

<p>Conductor <a href="https://www.fletcherartists.com/gary-wedow"><u>Gary Thor Wedow</u></a> has often found inspiration for his music-making in the visual arts. But a recent visit to an <a href="https://www.metmuseum.org/exhibitions/listings/2022/chroma"><u>exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art</u></a> gave Wedow, a specialist in Baroque opera, an altogether new view of ancient Greek and Roman art — and early music.</p> <p>"We used to think all Classical Greek and Roman statues were all virginally white marble," Wedow says on the latest episode of the <em>Classical Post</em> podcast. "But [historians] have learned that most of them were painted with a bright array of colors, which made me think so much about early music. We used to think of it as something remote, restrained, but now I feel as performers we have to find more colors and more variety."</p> <p>Wedow will soon have ample opportunity to find colors and chiaroscuro — strong contrasts between light and dark — in Handel's seldom-performed opera <em>Atalanta</em>. Beginning on November 9, Wedow leads singers from the Juilliard Opera and the school's period-instrument ensemble, Juilliard415, in <a href="https://www.juilliard.edu/event/156551/juilliard-opera-handels-atalanta?start_date_from=11/09/22&amp;start_date_thru=11/13/22&amp;division=All&amp;tags=All"><u>three performances</u></a> of this delightful but seldom-performed work. A mythological opera written in 1736 to celebrate the wedding of England's Prince of Wales, Wedow likens <em>Atalanta</em>'s plot to that of Hallmark Channel rom-coms, filled with comical misunderstandings, love at first sight — and a whole lot of sunny, exuberant music.</p> <p>In this episode, Wedow talks more about the joy of working with young artists at Juilliard, where he serves on the Vocal Arts faculty, and how he sees the role of a conductor as "bringing the ship safely into harbor through a storm."</p> <p>Plus, he shares a slew of recommendations for exploring the Queens borough of New York City — from his favor