Our opera journey started simple enough by attending the opera, Medium Butterfly, in San Francisco nearly 30 years ago. We had great seats and we were not sure what we were expecting but the show’s intensity and poignancy simply took our breath away.
That first opera for us certainly started something.
Over the years, we have kept returning to more operas so we can try again to grab and collect more of those tantalizing moments. Seemingly, you’re there, you’re listening, you grab for it, hold it a bit, slowly open your hand to see if indeed you have it, and it’s gone. What just happened? How did that opera story move so fast again but another seductive moment has come and gone. The candor, the fleeting moment, the music, the singing, the urgency. Everything, all of it, just takes you to your knees!
We were so confused on how operas moved us so much that Sharon and I took an opera class together which led to gradual understanding but in the process we found ourselves viewing even more operas! How diabolical.
Almost all the operas we have seen inevitable end too quickly but everytime the music and singing keeps reverberating inside us as we leave the theater with everyone else. The aftershocks can often last for weeks!
I think it’s the echo of intensity that is so seductive about opera. Think of your own fleeting moments with someone or others in doorways, on trains, at work, in a gallery, or at a party. You might just have enough there for the next great opera!
In our busy lives, the commotion of the marketplace takes a lot of our weekly attention but operas have a clever way of highlighting those most important moments in our lives where we simply declare our true love. After rushed, clumsy introductions, some farce and extra commotion, suddenly declarations out loud of true love, then before we’re ready, those extended, lyrical farewells. Close curtain.
Today, we attended one of our favorites again, La bohème by Giacomo Puccini. This time with the Tacoma Opera’s beautiful performance at a historical Pantages Theater.
Those delicious intimate moments, the tension of offstage vs onstage, the arias, the music, the impending loss. It keeps bringing us to our knees but we love the intensity so much that we keep coming back over and over again.
Bravo, Mr. Puccini, Bravo!
P.S. Backwards Entertainment — Normally, it’s dinner and a show but when attending Sunday matinees it’s show and a dinner. After the opera, we had tasty dinners while in Tacoma at Manuscript, a fun place with typewriter graphics on all the tables!
https://www.manuscripttacoma.com/
Cache of Communiqués 