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ieophyte opera-goer gets soap in her eyes

MY FARLIEST recollections of the opera are as a preteen expe- riencing, at the Centennial Theatre, the pageantry of Gilbert & Sullivan’s The Pirates of Penzance (merely operetta, opera snobs would sniff).

By Layne Christensen Community Reporter

Years Jater, the great tenor Luciano Pavarotti (“Pavarotten” to my unappreciative brother and 1) made his way into my father’s limit- ed record collection, but that was the extent of my opera experience.

Until last Saturday night.

That was when I witnessed my first full-scale classical opera, the Vancouver Opera production of Verdi's classic, Nabucco, at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre.

From the superficial standpoint of a first-time opera-goer, here are my observations on a night at the opera. @ If you like TV soap operas, there’s a@ goed chance you'll enjoy opera.

The libretto (operaspeak for “‘a text written for and set to music in an opera”) for Nabucco reads like a Melrose Place script. Fenena, a young princess (Joe) falls in love with Ismaele, a handsome rebel (ake). Abigaille (Amanda), Fenena’s wicked sister (OK, so Joe and Amanda aren't related on Melrose, but stay with me on this one), is also in love with Ismaecle and conspires to ‘steal him away. The princesses’ father Nabucco, King of Babylon, (Palmer, Amianda’s father) is an evil tyrant who conquers Jerusalem and sacks the Temple of Solomon (Palmer blew up the Pretty Lady, didn’t he?). ® People dress better at the opera than they do at other cultural events. Hordes of opera-goers trundled out the tuxedos and sequins, cocktail dresses and the odd sable stole.

@ A certain amount of imagination is required to reconcile the opera

GIUSEPPE VERDI'S classic opera, Nabucco, has a libretto that

reads like a soap-opera plot,

singers with the characters they rep- resent. The ‘‘young” princess Fenena was rather zaftig and old enough to have borne her paramour Ismaele. From my vantage point in the 23rd row, Nabucco, with his fake beard and long-haired wig, looked like an from the Planet of the Apes. Dong-Jian Gong as Zaccaria, the High Priest of Jerusalem, resembled Martin Sheen. @ Household materials can be artful- ly transformed into opera costumes. Drapery fringe and tassels adorn

Tegal robes, striped bath towels dou-

ble as captives’ costumes, and upturned Grecian urns baskets mas- querade as soldiers’ headgear.

@ You don’t need to be an opera snob to enjoy the opera. The Vancouver Opera brings the decided- ly low-brow Pirates of Penzance to the Q.E. in March.

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Nabucco, in Italian with English surtitles, continues Saturday, Oct. 22

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Elizabeth Theatre. Tickets, from $28.50, are available at Ticketmaster or charge-by-phone at 280-3311. Students’ and seniors’ standby tick- ets, priced from $17.50 to $22.50, go on sale at 7 p.m. performance evenings at the box office.

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Pianist Yefim Bronfman October 22 & 24

He may be the finest classical pianist alive. In fact, Isaac Stern has called him “one of the two or three greatest talents of our times.” And you can hear him live at the Orpheum. Join Vancouver's own Conductor Laureate Kazuyoshi Akiyama and the VSO when they welcome Yefim Bronfman. He'll perform Bartok’s powerful Piano Concerto No. 1. Also featured is Richard Strauss’ apocalyptic tone poem Death and Transfiguration. Performances are 8:00 pm at the Orpheum on both Saturday and Monday nights. Don’t miss this extraordinary performer. Call for tickets today.

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