Figaro!
In November, the Shepherd School of Music’s opera department and Chamber Orchestra presented Gioachino Rossini’s “The Barber of Seville,” a 19th-century comic opera that took on a 1990s twist. The Shepherd School’s production was set in the town of Seville, Fla. A raucous comedy requiring virtuosic singing of the highest order, this “Barber” came complete with pink flamingos, pool floats and a hurricane warning (the threat of which adds to the confusion in this scene from the finale of Act I).
Rossini’s story tells of a young nobleman, Almaviva, who wins his lover, Rosina, away from her lecherous guardian, Dr. Bartolo — but only with considerable help from Figaro the barber (provider of the rollicking “Largo al factotum,” one of the most ubiquitously quoted arias in all of opera). The production was conducted by Richard Bado, director of Rice’s Opera Studies Program, and staged by guest director Mary Birnbaum.
