An Afternoon at the Opera

Sunday afternoon I attended my first opera. Despite having an aunt who is wild about this type of performance, I have never been wild about seeing an opera. As part of my fine arts class, I am required to go to three events: an opera, the art museum, and a play in addition to two on campus events (music and drama). Although the music event in the past has been the symphony, people were apparently getting bored so the fine arts profs decided to have us attend an opera. When I found out that I would be going, I was actually kind of excited to go, just because I had never been to one.

The opera I saw this afternoon was Mozart's "Cosi Fan Tutte," which is about two sisters engage to two young men. The young men have an older friend, Don Alfonso, who makes a bet to see if they can fall in love with someone else. The men then disguise themselves as Albanians, trying to "court" the each other's fiancees.

While the show was 3 hours long (with a 20 minute intermission), my experience was better than my preconceptions as a young teenager that opera was people screaming at the top of their lungs. The beginning of both acts dragged, but the action came more toward the end. I also liked the costumes and sets, as they were very modern and colorful. Although musical theater is my performance of choice, I will say that my experience at the opera was not as bad as I expected.

Sorry for the late reply. This week has been very busy with papers and reading.