LA BOHEME Will Open Sarasota Opera Winter Festival in February

Love is in the air on Saturday, February 8 at 7pm, when Sarasota Opera opens the 2020 Winter Opera Festival with Puccini's La bohème. The melodious love story follows a group of friends - starving artists and intellectuals - living a bohemian lifestyle in 1830's Paris. They struggle with poverty, but never let hardship bring them down. Along the way, Rodolfo and Mimì fall in love-and it doesn't get much more romantic than young love in Paris in the winter. La bohème will have thirteen performances through March 21, 2020. Tickets start at $19. For more information, visit SarasotaOpera.org, call (941) 328-1300, or visit the box office at 61 N. Pineapple Avenue, Sarasota, FL 34236.

Favorite artists comprise the cast - along with some exciting new faces

Anna Mandina - returning from her acclaimed performance as Liú in last year's Turandot - will make her role debut as Mimì. Her "heartfelt singing and beautifully floated high notes" have drawn critical praise from the international magazine Opera Now. William Davenport, most recently heard as The Duke of Mantua in Rigoletto, will portray Mimì's suitor, Rodolfo the poet. After spending the summer on the roster of major international theaters such as Rome's Teatro dell'Opera and Milan's La Scala, baritone Filippo Fontana returns to Sarasota to play Marcello the painter. Making her company debut is soprano Jessica Sandidge, with "a voice of both power and beauty" (Opera Wire) who will play the coquettish Musetta, Marcello's former girlfriend. Longtime Sarasota audience favorite bass Young Bok Kim will play Colline, the philosopher, who uses his wit to distract the landlord from collecting the rent. "Gifted young baritone" (Opera News) Ricardo Rivera will make his company debut playing Schaunard, the musician. Also making their company debuts will be Grammy award winning bass-baritone Adelmo Guidarelli, playing Benoît the landlord and bass-baritone Joseph Beutel as Alcindoro, Musetta's wealthly admirer. Victor DeRenzi will conduct, with Mark Freiman (The Magic Flute) directing.

La bohème in popular culture

With its melodic story of friendship, love, and loss, La bohème may be the most familiar opera of all time - and has been an inspiration throughout popular culture. Jonathan Larson's Pulitzer Prize-winning Broadway musical Rent is based directly on the opera, transplanting the setting to New York City where a group of poor young artists struggle on the Lower East Side. Director Baz Luhrmann loosely based his Moulin Rouge on elements of the La bohème story, and then brought the opera itself to Broadway in a production described by Variety Magazine as "utterly enchanting." Musical references to the work abound throughout the Academy Award-winning film Moonstruck. Sarasota Opera's La bohème is presented with beautifully traditional sets and costumes and is sung in Italian with real-time English translations above the stage.

Ticket information

Individual tickets start at only $19 and are available at SarasotaOpera.org and in the Sarasota Opera Box Office. For more information on La bohème as well as the rest of the 2020 Winter Opera Festival season-Gounod's Romeo & Juliet (opening February 15), Donizetti's The Elixir of Love (opening February 22), and Catalani's La Wally, (opening March 7)-contact the Sarasota Opera Box Office at (941) 328-1300 or visit in person at 61 N. Pineapple Avenue, Sarasota, FL 34236.

Photo Credit: Rod Millington