ARIZONA OPERA

ARIZONA OPERA CELEBRATES 50TH SEASON

with Audience Favorites and World Premieres

Arizona Opera (AZO) elevates the transformative power of storytelling through music by presenting not only audience favorites, but world premiere commissions and little-known works that will become traditional masterpieces for generations to come. Arizona Opera, which will begin its 50th Anniversary Season this fall, produces fully-staged operas, concerts, and collaborative programs throughout the state of Arizona each year, and is among only a handful of companies in the U.S. that regularly performs in more than one city. Since its inaugural year in 1971, Arizona Opera has produced more than 200 fully-staged operas and concerts. The company’s artistic history is rich with a blend of traditional repertoire featuring baroque, bel canto, and verismo works, turn-of-the-century masterpieces, operettas, and American operas.

Beyond the stage, Arizona Opera’s Arlyn M. Brewster OperaTunity program brings innovative arts programming to over 40,000 students annually across 120 schools in Arizona, 89% of which are Title I, with limited arts curriculum in place. During the pandemic, Arizona Opera supported our educational partners as they adjusted to the reality of virtual teaching and created engaging programming for their students. As we move back into in-person educational programming, Arizona Opera is committed to bringing our high-quality and enriching learning opportunities back to schools for the 2021/22 academic year.

“We’re committed to engaging, inspiring, and including people of all ages, backgrounds, and races on the stage as well as through our NextGen Initiative training programs, including our Marion Roose Pullin Studio Artist and Production Apprentice programs, K-12 Education Programs, as well as our LOUD! (Living Opera, Understanding Diversity) and UnMic’d digital offerings,” stated Arizona Opera President and General Director, Joseph Specter. “These offerings reflect our commitment to adapting and innovating in new and exciting ways.”

Arizona Opera’s pivot to digital offerings in the 2020/21 Season generated thousands of views across various media platforms, an advantage unbound by the geographic barriers that have defined our audiences in typical seasons. Through traditional works like Carmen, a timeless classic opera, and newer works like The Copper Queen and Riders of the Purple Sage, we’re reaching people of all backgrounds while honoring and expanding the opera art form.

The 2021/22 Season will open with the McDougall RED Series film premiere of The Copper Queen. The production, originally slated to be performed in-theatre, was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic and then reimagined as the company’s first film project. The Copper QueenFilm features Arizona Opera’s first ever all-female director/ conductor/designer team, helmed by Crystal Manich, and is being produced in association with Manley Films. It tells the dramatic story of Julia Lowell, a resident of The Copper Queen Hotel in Bisbee, Arizona in 1910. A century later, Addison Moore—a stranger to Bisbee—visits Room 315, the site of Julia’s tragic death, where her ghost now famously roams. This riveting tale—told across the generations—is one of human bondage, furtive romance, secret connections, and ultimately— redemption.

Both longtime opera devotees and newcomers are invited to attend and explore Arizona Opera with curiosity, beginning this December with our return to in-theatre performances and a new, holidaythemed mariachi opera, El Milagro del Recuerdo (The Miracle of Remembering). A prequel to the sensational mariachi opera Cruzar la Cara de la Luna that was presented by Arizona Opera as part of its 2014/15 Season, El Milagro del Recuerdo brings audiences back to where the story of Cruzar all began: Michoacán, Mexico. Set during Christmas, the opera lovingly explores the themes of traditions and familial bonds while its characters deal with life-changing decisions and dream of something more.

Director and Librettist Leonard Foglia comments: “The piece deals with the basic issues surrounding the choices people have to make in life. It tells universal, human stories. How do we make decisions about what’s important? I hope it resonates with everyone.”

As the new year begins, audiences will be tempted to come to the theatre and become mesmerized by one of the most famous seductresses of all time. The ultimate diva, the gypsy Carmen can ignite men’s desires and fill their hearts with passion at a single glance. When Don José, a naïve soldier fighting in the Spanish Civil War, gets caught in her web, jealousy rages and anarchy reigns supreme. The thrilling score by French composer Georges Bizet includes some of the most popular and recognizable music in all of opera, including The Habanera and The Toreador Song. beloved masterpiece: “Carmen juxtaposes the facade of civilization and the mysterious forces of primitive desires. Carmen glorifies freedom above all else, challenging the norms that govern hearts and minds. I am looking forward to bringing this iconic opera and its disruptive heroine to life.”

Spring brings to Arizona Opera the magic of rebirth, love, and romance in A Little Night Music, presented as part of the Marlu Allan and Scott Stallard Modern Masterworks Series. A Little Night Music is the Tony Award and Drama Deskwinning Best Musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by Hugh Wheeler, with production and costume design by American fashion icon, Isaac Mizrahi.

Inspired by the Ingmar Bergman film, Smiles of a Summer Night, A Little Night Music focuses on a deliciously tangled web of affairs, all ripe with the possibility of new love and second chances. A comedy of manners with rapturous music, it is moving, witty, heartbreaking, and—most of all—a celebration of love.

Arizona Opera’s 50th Anniversary Main Stage Series concludes with an all-new production of Mozart’s Così fan tutte led by director E. Loren Meeker. This playful opera tells the story of two sisters who are falsely led to believe that their fiancés have been called to war. In truth, their lovers were only out to test their fidelity, so they return home—in disguise—to seek the truth. Among the delightful cast of characters in this Mozart classic are Despina, the nosy maid, and Don Alfonso, a philosopher who is actually behind the scenes pulling the strings and making it all happen.

As Arizona Opera returns to the stage after more than a year of pivoting and reinvention, many have not missed a beat. With programming, educational opportunities, and a successful studio series, Arizona Opera continues to not just survive but thrive. Having answered every challenge with a bold and resounding “we will overcome”, the Arizona Opera continues to make great strides going forward with world premiere commissioned operas, thoughtful and deliberate diversity initiatives, as well as newly reimagined classics, immersive educational opportunities for opera lovers of all ages, and an experience equal to none.

For more information, visit azopera.org or call (602) 266-7464.