Blog

The Voice of Opera Colorado

Sep5

Q & A with Mezzo-Soprano Kira Dills-DeSurra

By: Jennifer Colgan Opera Colorado’s 40th Anniversary Season kicks off with a spectacular semi-staged production of Cavalleria rusticana.  If you are a longtime Opera Colorado attendee, you will recognize several faces on stage, including mezzo-soprano Kira Dills-DeSurra as Lola....

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Aug31

Q & A with Director David Lefkowich

By: Suzanne Whitney Our 40th Anniversary Season marks the third in a row director David Lefkowich has created something masterful for Opera Colorado. During the 2019-20 Season, his beautiful Pagliacci was the final production staged by Opera Colorado before...

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Aug23

Cavalleria rusticana 101—Musical Style

By: Betsy Schwarm In 1888, Pietro Mascagni (1863 – 1945) heard of a competition for one-act operas. With four complete operas to his name, the Italian composer was on the verge of submitting one excerpted act of his historical...

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Aug18

An Opera Fit for Hollywood

By: Jennifer Colgan The one-act opera Cavalleria rusticana was an instant success for a young Pietro Mascagni. Audiences loved the intense drama and sweeping melodies, demanding no less than sixty curtain calls after its 1890 premiere. 100 years later,...

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Aug4

Cavalleria rusticana 101 – Characters and Plot

By: Suzanne Whitney & Betsy Schwarm As the American composer Paul Moravec says, “opera is about three things: love, death, and power,” and that could not be more true for Mascagni’s Cavalleria rusticana. This one-act opera may only be seventy-five...

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