Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Sesame Opera

Today’s Trivia Tuesday revisits a familiar subject; we’d talked about the rivalry between Leoncavallo and Puccini as both worked to bring Bohème to life on the opera house stage. But whatever happened to Leoncavallo’s version? Well, he finished the opera – he wrote the music AND the libretto! – and it premiered a little after Puccini’s version.

Unlike Puccini’s version, Leoncavallo highlights the darker, grittier aspects of the original novel. Mimì’s death is less a moment of love reunited and more the reality of poverty in 19th-century Paris.

Interestingly, when Leoncavallo’s version premiered, it was more well-known and popular than its counterpart for about ten years, when Puccini’s work rushed ahead to be “the” Bohème.

As for our Bohème, there are almost NO tickets left for the Saturday and Sunday performances and we're close to running out for Friday, too - best available tickets are for the Tuesday, November 9 and Tuesday, November 16 performances.

Ciao for now!
AriaGirl

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