Nathan Gunn on 'FLORENCE', Bdwy and the Opera

After conquering the Opera world with his rich baritone voice and matinee-idol looks, Nathan Gunn is continuing his transformation into a classical musical theater star. Last spring, he was a thrilling Lancelot in the New York Philharmonic’s concert of Lerner & Loewe’s Camelot, and last night, he played the lead in a rare performance of Kurt Weill and Ira Gershwin’s The Firebrand of Florence with the Collegiate Chorale.

“The show, like a person, has a wonderful sense of humor,” Gunn says, “and I appreciate that a lot, since many of the shows I’m involved in are a little bit dark.” Gunn likens his characher, Cellini, to a “modern-day rock star,” and has been approaching the swashbuckling role from that angle.

Firebrand played for less than two months on Broadway back in 1945, and despite its pedigree, has rarely been revived. Gunn hopes that this concert will put the show back on the theatre community’s radar. “Hopefully, they’ll add it to their list of wonderful American operettas,” he says, but notes that the show does not quite fit as a traditional operetta. “It bridges the gap between operetta and a Broadway piece,” he muses. “I think they actually called it a Broadway operetta. And that’s something that I feel very strongly about, as a classical American singer: That we, as Americans, sometimes forget that we really do have some wonderful stage music that should be considered as good as all the other great operettas that have come from Europe.”

Growing up, Gunn describes himself as more of an athlete than an artist. While he sang informally, it wasn’t until he was 17 and realized that he could earn some money singing at weddings that he began to truly develop his voice. Studying at Indiana University at South Bend, he was introduced to Mozart’s The Magic Flute, and was awakened to a new world of music. “I’d never heard that music before—I’d never heard a note of it before!” he remembers. “It was the overture that caught me, and I thought, ‘Wow, this is incredibly beautiful.’” He applied to schools with strong music programs for college, got into all of them, and attended the University of Illinois, where he studied with William Miller.

Miller had a profound impact on Gunn’s development as a singer. “[He] made his career when there wasn’t quite such a divide between the classical world and the popular world,” Gunn remembers. “When I was learning to sing, it was very important to him that I was comfortable singing in English, and in lots of different styles.” The training paid off, leaving Gunn able to adapt his voice to whatever each individual piece needs. “Broadway is not really different from what I do onstage in different languages,” he says. While he admits that some new pieces stretch the limits of tonality, “generally speaking, singing Lancelot is really not that different from singing Belcore in The Elixir of Love.” He does allow that Lancelot might be an easier role, “because I know it; it’s our music and I heard it growing up and I loved the tunes—and I love being able to sing pieces to Americans who feel the same way.” During recitals, he adds, whenever he announces that he will be singing a piece from Camelot, the audience always sighs in eager anticipation. “It’s an instant response,” he says. “I like it quite a bit!”

Like his Florence co-stars Victoria Clark and Terrence Mann, Gunn has another life as a teacher—specifically, at his own alma mater, where he and his wife Julie Jordan Gunn both instruct the next generation of singers. “One thing that they had not been told is that in the academic world you’re always trying to be performing in order to be judged by your teacher to get the degree,” Gunn says about his students. “When you prepare a recital for a paying audience, you have to think about who the audience is and what kind of city you’re in.” For example, he says, a singer should not perform the same set in Virginia as in New York. “The point is to make the audience comfortable and to have them enjoy themselves and welcome them into this world of music and world of song.” As an accomplished singer, his advice is welcome by the students. “What I see is a kind of relief on their faces that someone is out there teaching them how to transition from the academic world into the performing world, which is really a very different world. It’s fulfilling. It really is.” Gunn says that he has a great deal of respect for his students, who are choosing a life and career that many would find overwhelming. “If you stand up and sing in front of people, I have to respect you for that, because it can be terrifying,” he says. “Some people say their biggest fear is public speech, and their second-biggest fear is death. So I can imagine that singing, even though it’s something I enjoy, for some, is terrifying.” Another aspect of his Professorship is fundraising and meeting with potential donors, which he also appreciates, saying that patrons of the arts are very important as well. He references an anecdote about Winston Churchill, who, when asked about cutting England’s budget for the arts to save money for the war effort, responded by asking, “What do you think we’re fighting this war for?”

As an in-demand singer, actor and teacher, Gunn says balancing his professional and home life is a challenge. He has two loves, he says, and while family will—and should—come first, he expresses a great desire to communicate through music. “My father always told me, ‘Success has a price, and you can’t get something for nothing, ever. It’s got to be give-and-take.’ And keeping that balanced properly, making sure everyone’s healthy and happy at home and also [my] being healthy and happy as well, is also important.” Now that opera companies are increasing their repertoire and offering longer runs, he adds, he may be able in the future to expand his own repertoire and settle down into a role for a long run.  “Floyd Collins is one that I like quite a bit, and there are pieces like that where if it were at all possible and I was able to make the schedule—if it were a summertime thing—I would probably very much consider it,” he says, and mentions that opera houses are talking about doing Carousel and Show Boat. “In that situation, I’m absolutely there,” he says eagerly.