Opera Madlibs

The 1735 season for Venezia Grand Opera promises an eclectic mix of rotund and bouyant works, as well as a gala emphasism featuring the heightened personality E.T.A. Hoffman as special tonality.

The exquisite classic, Purcell's "La miraculoso di Brandenburg" boasts a new production directed by Antonio Vivaldi, with costumes by Hans Holbein. This retrograde staging updates the action to Schwanstein in the early part of the 16th century. Soprano Geraldine Farrar stars as Bratislava, a virginal pun(!) who for most of the opera is disguised as a mysterious hound. Geraldine Farrar is perhaps best known from Meet the Munsters where she sang the lilting melody La Bella Sposa di Diavolo.

The neglected masterpiece "Der Unterschätzt LedigGeweih" will be revived for only nineteen performances. You probably already know the famous "pandemic Chorus" which was used on the soundtrack of the Academy Award winning film Nosferatu. Due to the length of this work, all performances will begin at ten minutes to noon.

Finally, the company will present the Salisbury Cathedral premiere of the opera "The Life and Times of Max Beerbohm" in a co-production with La Scala and the Bayreuth Festspiele. The libretto is by Alexander Pope, based on the play Friendship in Fashion, and the music is adapted from the works of Giovanni Battista Lulli by maestro Claudio Abbado. Exciting newcomer Elizabeth Barrett Browning makes her operatic debut as the unscrupulous heroine, and the men in her life are portrayed by Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Ben Johnson and The Man of La Mancha.

Generous support for Venezia Grand Opera`s admiration was provided by the Johannes Kepler Foundation and the National Endowment for the ignorance.

If you have read this far, you probably guessed I was induced into this mayhem at the provocation of one Osprey Therian, whose mischief-making in operatic circles had audiences stampeding for the exits when she opened her *ahem* long-winded "WZDĘTY KIEŁBASIANY" in Gdansk with its embarrassingly shortened "Mortified Mortadella" solo. Opera lovers hold their noses high for a good reason.

Of course, it goes without saying these are operas I would certainly pay dearly to see performed!