an entertaining trifle

so tonight our friend John and I went to the Sarasota Opera to hear them sing The Italian Girl in Algiers (Rossini)- It is a light-weight comedic piece with a feisty heroine and a loyal fiance who escape the clutches of the "evil" Bey who has enslaved the fiance and wants to take the heroine as a replacement wife for the one he disdains (because she loves him)

here is the blurb from the season preview materials-
Lindoro’s attempts to escape Mustafà, the Bey of Algiers, have all been in vain. To top it off, he is now faced with a hand-me-down bride instead of his missing beloved, Isabella. But a unique turn of events brings Isabella right where she needs to be to save her lost fiancé. And she knows exactly how to get them out of this bind.

we aren't talking rocket science here- this was an entertaining evening - nothing deep or amazing - just fun at the opera... costumes- exotic locales all the things that made opera the entertainment of the masses in its heyday.... and he was VERY popular-

handsome devil isn't he? LOL - must be related to the Hapsburgs!

the Orchestra was extremely good - and it was a lovely score despite the fact that the story is kind of light-weight...

the lovers were both excellent and the Bey (Mustafa) was also very good-

This guy did very well in a thankless role- the wanna be boyfriend...

the secondary roles were sung by these folks- all very capable artists-

before the opera we had dinner at Lila - from our friends at Pomona - a place that would be horrendously noisy if we hadn't been eating extremely early- LOL

 we shared a very nice Greek Salad-

John had the veggie burger

I had zucchini linguine-

we shared a dessert of vanilla flavored ricotta with berries and pistachios and biscotti

The opera house is an historic building which I have posted about in the past - and here is the link to copy for that post if you have interest in the background of the building-

http://blog.semifreelife.com/2016/11/an-upbeat-evening.html

have to run- busy day tomorrow - culminating with the theater to see Born Yesterday-

and our week is one of lots of culture as we head to the symphony for Mozart's Requiem on Friday and Sunday the ballet is hosting the Paul Taylor Dance Company--- so lots of fun coming up! Stay tuned!