30.11.2023 Views

50 years of opera

Create successful ePaper yourself

Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.

La bohème. And for his remarkable

work, Mark Junkert, Opera Idaho

General Director, was presented the

Governor’s Award for Excellence in Arts

Administration.

Then everything stopped. COVID stalked

the streets. Many arts programs ceased

operations or folded. Opera Idaho did

not. Small concerts and recitals for

masked audiences seated in carefully

spaced chairs gave local, loyal opera

goers hope. The joy and beauty of the

performances would return; COVID

would eventually be banished. In the

meantime, some Christmas caroling

and a few fundraisers took place, but

the mainstage theater doors remained

closed.

Then, eighteen months after it began,

the world emerged from isolation.

Theater doors were flung open, and the

2021-2022 Opera Idaho season began

with Cecilia Violetta López performing in

a recital followed by a lilting and lovely

production of The Merry Widow. An

elite choral ensemble, Critical Mass Vocal

Artists, which incorporated into the

Opera Idaho fold back in 2018, reached

new audiences, and the company’s

Operatinis now included vocalists from

the Emerging Artists program.

Opera Idaho and the Boise

Contemporary Theater collaborated to

produce All is Calm: The Christmas Truce

of 1914. This non-traditional production,

based on a true story, focused on a

twenty-four-hour truce that began with

a soldier’s rendition of “Silent Night.”

Then in January, Carmen returned to the

stage. The last show of the season, Dead

Man Walking, took place in the beautiful

Egyptian Theatre, but took the audience

all the way to death row.

It has now been fifty years since

Opera Idaho’s first notes were sung.

Through the years of its fifth decade,

the company clearly matured, grew

polished, and remained vibrant. Its

educational program has reached

thousands of children, and audiences

have expanded. Summer programs

like Opera in the Park and musicals

performed in concert have added

spice and zest to city summers. Boise

has enjoyed fifty years of gorgeous

voices, remarkable performances,

and educational successes. Fifty years

of growth and progress. Change is

inevitable. General Director Mark

Junkert has retired, and another

will take his place. There will be

other new faces, new voices, new

directions, new collaborations, and

new innovations. And the music will

continue as Opera Idaho steps into its

next half century.

Tosca, 2017

L’elisir d’amore, 2017

The Winterreise Project, 2018

A Streetcar Named Desire, 2018

Aïda, 2019

La bohème, 2020

Opera in The Park, 2021

All Is Calm: The Christmas Truce of 1914, 2022

Rusalka, 2023

12

Hooray! Your file is uploaded and ready to be published.

Saved successfully!

Ooh no, something went wrong!