From A Different Perspective

I've had the privilege of working in opera for many years, but my work is done behind the scenes. Truth be told, I rarely go see opera in my free time because it's still work for me, in some ways. It sounds terrible, and it seems like I don't support my art... but if I'm tired of it, I'm tired of it.

Monday night, I had the opportunity to be on the other side of the stage: in the audience. There's a flickr group that I'm a part of called Assignment: Houston. This wasn't our monthly shooting assignment, but one of our members has an affiliation with a group called Opera in the Heights, who does just that: perform opera in the Heights, a local Houston neighborhood.

This group welcomes photographers into their dress rehearsals and gives them virtually free reign (no flash restrictions, can wander during the rehearsal almost anywhere but onstage). I'd missed the last three shows by virtue of participating in my opera gigs outside of Houston, but this one happened to coincide with my time in town.

I had a lot of fun watching an opera with my only worry being "did I get that shot?". I took 2100 photos. No kidding. I got a little excited, and well, the singers were quite active, and since I was playing around with lenses and shutter speed constantly: better safe than sorry, right? And besides, that's the great thing about digital. Low cost once you're past the initial investment and all you need is storage space and sometimes a good editing software.

At any rate, I've narrowed it down to 60 shots. Check them out. A few of my favorites are below:

Madama Butterfly

On the eve of my departure for my next job, I finally sit down and write about my last job, Madama Butterfly. All around, it was a great production.... superb cast, simple but beautiful set and gorgeous, mostly uncomplicated costumes.

The set was unique as in it was raked enough to remind us all that we did indeed have muscles in our legs that we did not use normally. By the time we were well into onstage rehearsals, I had forgotten how extreme the rake was since we'd all gotten our 'rake legs'. The rake grew more and more extreme as it got closer to the curtain. In fact, the lowest platform actually tipped down into the pit. Simple, yet dramatic. Very suiting to the piece, I think.

Here's the view from the balcony, which gives a better idea of the rake:



What you can't see is the 26 stairs leading up to the rear of the mountain. Let's just say that I really got my exercise during tech week.

What was really fun was opening night. Butterfly opened the season, so there was a gala of sorts. We (staff) wore corsages (yes, a la prom)



and ate dessert sushi - which bears an uncanny resemblance to real sushi except its made of fruit, coconut and who knows what else, but it was TASTY!





And lastly, our lobby was adorned with decorated parasols:





Brava tutti! I will certainly miss everyone and look forward to our next show together... wherever it may be.



Still to come: Driving Adventures

Square Peg, Round Hole

Yes, you read that right. I'm having a bad day today, actually, and I submitted this particular photo for round three of the photo competition. As of right now, I'm losing 1 to 9. That's okay, now I don't have to look for more funny pictures, but I'm sad that I don't get to use the one that got me invited into the competition. That'll be posted later in the month.

Apparently, my sense of humor doesn't align with everyone's. So tell me, do you think this is funny?



This is actually a prop piano from "La Traviata" - I'll leave the company anonymous. I remember walking into the rehearsal room, admiring the workmanship and then taking a closer look. I did not let the props crew live this one down for awhile. And those of us in rehearsal that day got a chuckle out of it.

So maybe I'm not alone in my brand of humor after all.