The Cincinnati Opera opens its 2009 season on June 11 with Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro. This season has a "Spanish" theme. Other operas being performed this summer are Verdi's Don Carlo, Carmen and Osvaldo Golijov's stunning recent opera, Ainadamar, based on the love between Federico Garcia Lorca and Margherita Xurgu. Evans Mirageas became Artistic Director of Cincinnati Opera after a long and distinguished career in radio, based at WFMT, Chicago. Listen to Mirageas discuss the 2009 season http://www.wosu.org/audio/classical/2009/mirageas.mp3 I never miss a production in Music Hall. You shouldn't either. Cincinnati Opera, second oldest in the country after the Met, was long a summer festival based in the local zoo. It was called the Cincinnati Zoo Opera. Everybody sang there: Bjoerling, Steber, Stevens, Tucker, Farrell, Merrill, you name it. It was the jewel of the summer circuit until Music Hall was air conditioned in the 1970s. I'm told the Mad Scene from Lucia, in particular, wreaked havoc with the mating giraffes, their contortions visible to the artists on the stage looking out, not to the audience looking at the singer. You had to be there. Enjoy Evans Mirageas and the opera in Cincinnati!
Christopher Purdy is Classical 101's early morning host, 7-10 a.m. weekdays. He is host and producer of Front Row Center – Classical 101’s weekly celebration of Opera and more – as well as Music in Mid-Ohio, Concerts at Ohio State, and the Columbus Symphony broadcast series. He is the regular pre-concert speaker for Columbus Symphony performances in the Ohio Theater.