CITY OPERA BALLET

PRESS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: July 19, 2015

Press Contact: Mary Ellen Hundley, 425.455.1345  info@cityoperaballet.org

“Downton Meets Mozart!” OPERA RETURNS TO BELLEVUE

The Marriage of Figaro

set in 1910

Performances:    7:30 PM Friday August 21 2:00 PM Sunday August 23

Location:    Bellevue’s new Resonance at SOMA Towers 288 106th Avenue NE, Suite 203, Bellevue 98004

BELLEVUE – City Opera Ballet brings opera back to Bellevue with The Marriage of Figaro August 21st and 23rd in the city’s new performance hall, Resonance at SOMA Towers in the very heart of downtown. The setting for1910 Mozart’s “miracle” of invention was chosen by guest director, Robert Neu. Music Director, Philip Tschopp, conducts the company’s own Orchestra

Bellevue. Le Nozze di Figaro will be sung in Italian with recitatives and supertitles in English. Following the performances, viewers are invited to stay for a 30-minute post-show discussion featuring members of the creative team, artists and conductor.

Inspired by the Paris Opera Ballet model, Bellevue’s new CITY OPERA BALLET features not only Bellevue City Opera (the company’s new opera division) but also Ballet Bellevue and its orchestra (now taking the name of Orchestra Bellevue). As the inaugural opera, what could be more perfect than Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro, perhaps the most perfect opera ever written?

CITY OPERA BALLET is proud to present a production filled with regional talent as well as one notable international star. Local favorites Ryan Bede (Count Almaviva), Jennifer Bromagen (Countess Almaviva), Tess Altiveros (Susanna), and Laurel Semerdjian (Cherubino) combine with our Figaro, Gabriel Preisser (Minnesota Opera, Cincinnati Opera, Philadelphia Opera), to create an ideal and charming cast. Mr. Preisser, making his regional debut with this production, was a district winner of the 2010 Metropolitan Opera National Council Competition and won the American finals of the International Lirico Concorso Competition in 2011. Mr. Preisser has been praised by Opera News for his “handsome voice, charismatic energy, and timbral allure.” Supporting this talented cast will be Orchestra Bellevue, whose players are selected from the finest of the region’s instrumentalists (members of the Pacific Northwest Ballet Orchestra, Seattle Symphony, and Auburn Symphony), under the sure hand of long-time Ballet Bellevue conductor, Philip Tschopp.

Heralded by composer Johannes Brahms as a “miracle” of invention, Marriage of Figaro was the first of three collaborations between Mozart and Da Ponte; their later collaborations were

Don Giovanni and Cosi Fan Tutte. With its clever combination of farce and pathos, class and sexual intrigue, Figaro is the perfect comic opera of love, desire and forgiveness.

The 1910 setting proves to be especially charming and relevant – instead of the typical 17th century treatment, this Figaro is set in the early 20th century, where its themes brilliantly come to life.

“I chose to set our Figaro in roughly 1910 England. The concept of the class system is integral to this piece, of course, and there was certainly a distinct class system at that time/place. Yes, this will be a kind of ‘Downton meets Mozart’ and should resonate immediately and easily with modern audiences, yet still retain its classic sensibility,” said Opera Director, Robert Neu (Minnesota Orchestra, Colorado Symphony, Lyric Opera of the North, Skylark Opera).

Open just in time for this production, Resonance at SOMA Towers is an intimate state-of-the art new performance space allowing an up-close experience for the audience to see and hear in surround where the wall between performer and audience disappears entirely. This is a not-to- be-missed Friday evening and Sunday matinee of delight, whimsy, and pathos, wrapped in some of the most beautiful music ever to grace the stage!

Tickets for Marriage of Figaro are available at the door and online at

http://www.eventbrite.com/e/le-nozze-di-figaro-tickets-17628008849?aff=es2 For more information, please see www.cityoperaballet.org

Marriage of Figaro presented by CITY OPERA BALLET

Music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte in Italian, recitatives in English, English captions

Resonance at SOMA Towers 288 106th Ave NE Suite 203 Bellevue, WA 98004

Performances: August 21 at 7:30pm and August 23 at 2pm, 2015

Approximate Running Time: 3 hours

Bellevue City Opera is the opera division of Bellevue’s new CITY OPERA BALLET, a non-profit arts organization based in downtown Bellevue, dedicated to bringing the finest professional arts to the region through performances of opera and ballet with live orchestra.

CITY OPERA BALLET produces classical works, contemporary masterpieces and new works by Northwest artists with a passion for excellence, the celebration of outstanding regional talent and a commitment to fully live musical presentation. Recent projects include Giselle (2014), Stravinsky’s Firebird (2014), Nutcracker (2014), and Opera + Ballet (2015). Future projects include Handel’s Messiah: Ballet/Oratorio (November 2015),
Opera + Ballet 2 (March 2016), Prokofiev’s Romeo et Juliette (April 2016), Opera TBA (August 2016), and reprise of Firebird (October 2016).