Guy of the Golden West.(opera singer Rodney Gilfry)(Interview)

Rodney Gilfry grew up in southern California and, after a long European sojourn, returned there to live in 1994. He'd like to spend more time at home, but the world's leading opera companies have ether ideas. This month he returns to the Met as Guglielmo in Cosi Fan Tutte.

Last April, lyric baritone Rodney Gilfry -- all 6'3" of him -- strode onto the stage of Joe's Pub, an intimate corner of the Joseph Papp Public Theater. Gilfry was appearing on "Opera Goes Public," a series arranged and hosted by pianist Brian Zeger. In this informal cabaret setting, a singer may feel compelled to try out songs he would shy away from on the traditional recital stage, and Gilfry's first number certainly caught everyone by surprise. It was "The Boss of the Herd," composed by H. Lynn Tuttle -- Gilfry's grandfather. The lyric is from the perspective of the herd's head bull and requires Gilfry to break into a low, intimidating moo from time to time. At first, the audience was uneasy; the atmosphere in the room was a little like that of a party that isn't going well. But then they started to get into the spirit. Another song by Gramps followed: "Prairie Sun," about a man stranded in the desert, dying, surrounded by animals in the same boat. Actually, it's a nice song it's certainly something different. Gilfry went on to sing some Ravel and "Joey, Joey, Joey" from The Most Happy Fella. But it was probably those Western songs that most people in the audience are going to remember.

By including his grandfather's songs on a high-profile New York recital program, Gilfry was running true to form. In a jet-setting profession, he's uncommonly family-oriented; the quest to maintain his close family ties has informed many of the most important career decisions of his life. Sitting in his dressing room in August 2000, during rehearsals for Los Angeles Opera's La Cenerentola, he tells me more about his grandfather.

"He was a real kind of pioneer guy," says Gilfry. "He had a degree in animal husbandry, loved nature and had a nursery for a long time. He grew up on a homestead. His mother thought education was so important that she would take him in a horse-drawn carriage to school -- a long ride. Composing was something he did as a hobby. He got involved in rights for Native Americans, and he was made honorary chief of the Nez Perce tribe. He had a big headdress that made him look like Sitting Bull. He talked very slow. We'd be going for a drive, and I'd say, `Papa, where are we going?' And he'd say, `Well ... I thought we might ... [breaks into a slow, languid whistle for several seconds] ... I thought we might ... go up to ... Asotin Crick.'

"He used to take us fishing and shooting. One time, I accidentally came close to shooting my sister. This gun had a safety on it, and he kept saying, `You make sure you've got that thing locked.' Well, it had a green dot and a red dot, and the green dot I thought meant go, and the red, stop. I had it on red, and I loaded it on top of the car, and I had my finger stupidly on the trigger, and it discharged and went right past my sister. Her hair was grazed. And she went, `Oh, my God! You almost shot me in the head!' And my grandfather says, `Well ... you ... better be a little ... more careful there, ... Rod."

Gilfry's solid family background has been an anchor for him throughout his life. He grew up in Claremont, a well-to-do community with seven universities, about fifty miles east of L.A. There he had a superb music education, in the days before the state's controversial budget-cutting Proposition 13, passed in 1977, which effectively gutted school funding for years to come. His parents were both teachers; his mother worked with handicapped children, and his father was a band and orchestra leader. The Gilfrys also owned a music store, which they sold to a friend. "He managed it badly," says Gilfry, "and it was going under, and he never paid my parents the money for the purchase of the business. So my father would go to the store and take instruments as partial payment for what he was owed. So we had a garage full of instruments. We had six trumpets and three trombones, woodwinds, strings. So I grew up getting an instrument out of the garage and teaching myself to play it. To this day, I can pick up just about anything but an oboe and get a pretty good sound out of it."

Like most of us, Gilfry must have his irregular edges, but unlike most of us, he keeps them well hidden. He claims to be a perfectionist, and he certainly looks the part when we meet again several months later in the press room of San Francisco Opera, where he's rehearsing L'Elisir d'Amore. He's decked out in a dark shirt and tie, dark blue blazer, shoes immaculately shined, hair perfectly moussed. He's a pleasure to interview. He's not coy, as many singers are. He doesn't shy away from expressing opinions for political reasons, as many singers do. He's relaxed and comfortable, but alert. At forty-one, he seems to possess wells of self-confidence without even a whisper of arrogance.