ARIA SERIOUS?

Happy holidays! A bit of business: the San Diego Opera offices will be closing today at 1 PM and will remained closed until Tuesday, December 27, 2011. The offices will also be closed on Monday, January 2, 2012. Our website is always open for your opera needs . The Aria Serious crew will be offline until Tuesday, January 3, 2012. We'd like to thank you for making Aria Serious what it is and look forward to sharing our 2012 season with you. We have some wonderful new plans in the works that you'll start to see once the new year rolls around. Happy New Year! - The Aria Serious Crew

We're excited about hosting the West Coast premiere of Moby-Dick when it opens in February. One, we like new opera and two, we like interesting productions. Moby covers both of these for us. It's a very technical production and those that have worked on it before (in Dallas and Australia) liken it to a very large Broadway production. Makes sense, both set designer Robert Brill and director Leonard Foglia have worked on Broadway. A major piece of the set is a large curved wall that is used to create the Pequod, the ocean, and a variety of other locations in the opera. It stands about 30 feet tall, has a steep slope, and singers are constantly climbing up and down it and sometimes even falling off of it as though it is a giant slide. This obviously requires practise so our Scenic Studio is busy at work creating a rehearsal wall. Construction started two days ago and already the wall is taking shape. We've included some photos below that our friends at the San D...

A very cool preview video for OperaSpotlight Moby-Dick that our friends over at UCSD-TV created.

Our video podcast series continues. Up this week, putting DON PASQUALE into historical context. You can watch it below. Enjoy!

Happy Friday. What are you listening to this weekend? The Aria Serious crew will listen to Bellini's Norma . It's been some time since we've heard it and it has been even longer since we've spent time with the excellent Maria Callas recording, which we think might be the best one out there. If you know of one better, please let us know. Share your listening plans in the comment section below and please, have a great weekend.

Our podcast series of putting our four operas in historical context continues with THE BARBER OF SEVILLE. What does this opera have in common with the situational comedies on TV today? Dr. Nic answers all...

Our friends over at KNSD 7/39 and Voice of San Diego's Behind The Scene Arts blog put together this excellent little preview of MOBY-DICK auditions earlier this week. You think those flips and tumbles are impressive - the floor they are on is concrete with just a thin layer of carpet. We get sore just standing on it. You can watch it below: View more videos at: http://nbcsandiego.com/?__source=embedCode .

Earlier this week, MOBY-DICK composer Jake Heggie sat down with Ian Campbell to give a generous conversation about his life, composing opera, and, of course, his newest work MOBY-DICK which we will be presenting in February. UCSD-TV filmed the program which will premiere tonight on tv . But you can also watch it right now online. And you should. It's a wonderful program full of delightful insights.

Our video podcast series of putting our 2012 operas into historical context continues with Moby-Dick . You can watch the podcast below.

Happy Friday. What are you listening to this weekend? Work will dictate our listening plans this weekend as we spend time with The Barber of Seville and Don Pasquale . Seems best if we reacquaint ourselves with them before the season starts up. Then we might spend some time with Youth Lagoon's "The Year of Hibernation" which has been getting lots of airplay at the Aria Serious compound. Share you listening plans in the comment section below and please, make it a good one.