Summer Opera Institute

Here are Michael Megenny as the Fox, Roland Carbajal as a Frog and Roy Mendiola as the Wolf! Keilani Gleave - Costumer Carolina Stevens- Director Liisa Davila - Conductor The Creation Lab - Filmmaker... Thank you to our partners: Top Notch Kennels, The Trans-California Pathway, Blue Sierra Farms, Opera America Innovation Grants generously funded by The Ann & Gordon Getty Foundation, Modesto Subaru, Modesto Irrigation District, Mid Valley Nut Company, Mary Stuart Rogers Foundation, Kids Care Dental & Orthodontics, California Arts Council, Boyett Petroleum Make Dreams Real Endowment Fund, and Beard Land and Investment Company.

Maestra Liisa Davila leads THE RACE!

One of the fantastic storylines in our world premiere youth literacy opera, THE RACE, is the fable of the Bear and the Bees. It presents many challenges for staging in a theater...or in a movie. Our Film Director, Carolina Stevens, came up with a brilliant and very fun solution. She reconceived the bees into "Buzzketeers" (inspired by the Three Musketeers). This has resulted in an absolutely delightful scene where the cute Bear, played by Michael Balerite, attempts to take th...e honey hive, defended by 8 teenage girls with rapiers. They were trained in Erroll Flynn style sword play by Fight Master, J. Tyler Jones, (via Zoom from Washington D.C.!). Our brilliant Costume Designer, Keilani Gleave from Los Angeles helped pull off this great concept. Here are some photos from last weekend's on-location shoot of this scene. Photos by David Schroeder. Thank you to our business partners for making THE RACE possible: Boyett Petroleum-Make Dreams Real Endowment Fund, Mary Stuart Rogers Foundation, California Arts Council, Opera America, The Trans-California Pathway, Modesto Subaru, Beard Land and Investment Company, Kids Care Dental & Orthodontics, Modesto Irrigation District, Top Notch Kennels, and Mid Valley Nut Company. See more

Michael Balerite as the Bear in THE RACE. "Honey...I smell honey!"

THE RACE filming has begun! Thank you to our business partners for making THE RACE possible: Boyett Petroleum-Make Dreams Real Endowment Fund, Mary Stuart Rogers Foundation, California Arts Council, Opera America, The Trans-California Pathway, Modesto Subaru, Beard Land and Investment Company, Kids Care Dental & Orthodontics, Modesto Irrigation District, Top Notch Kennels, Blue Sierra Farms and Mid Valley Nut Company. Photos by David Schroeder.

Filming officially begins on Opera Modesto's movie - THE RACE Saturday, Oct. 24. Two teen cast members are cleaning up under the "orchestra tree" in preparation.... To find out what an "orchestra tree" is, check back often and look for our world premiere movie coming in January 2021. THE RACE is made possible in part due to the support of our partners: Boyett Petroleum-Make Dreams Real Endowment Fund, Mary Stuart Rogers Foundation, California Arts Council, Opera America Innovation Grants generously funded by The Ann & Gordon Getty Foundation, The Trans-California Pathway, Modesto Subaru, Beard Land and Investment Company, Kids Care Dental & Orthodontics, Modesto Irrigation District, Sierra Blue Farms, Top Notch Kennels, and Mid Valley Nut Company. #operamodestotherace, #operamodestotherace

Some photos from last weekend!

Some professional photos by David Schroeder from the weekend of "on-location" rehearsals for THE RACE!

Today is Annalisa Winberg's birthday...and she will be on location helping SOI participants from three years to rehearse THE RACE. Help make her birthday special by contributing to her favorite cause, Opera Modesto!!

The next step in the production of THE RACE, An Aesop's Fables Mash Up, is to bring the actors out from their Zoom rehearsals to try out the outdoors "on location" filming challenges; both in terms of how the staging will work in orchards, vineyards, thickets, by the Tuolumne River, etc...as well as adding the complication of costume elements. To give an idea of the fascinating costume designs dreamed up by our wonderful costume designer, Keilani Gleave (www.keilanigleave.co...m), here is a portion of her design presentation to the cast. Keilani is a recent MFA graduate of UCLA in costume design. In addition to being an imaginative designer, she is a super cutter/fitter and is just embarking on a secret year long job with Disney! Since The Race will also be featured opera for Opera Modesto's "Story Into Song Literacy Initiative" this season, Keilani's ideas for incorporating writing into the costume designs are fascinating! Enjoy! https://youtu.be/rkUU0AdqZ4o

19 young artists that represent the three years of the Summer Opera Institute spent the weekend, excelling, in the recording studio recording the world premiere youth opera, THE RACE! Conductor Liisa Davila, with input and guidance from Composer Dr. Deborah Kavasch and Opera Modesto's Artistic Consultant Annalisa Winberg, did an amazing job. It was an remarkable weekend. The recording will be fantastic. It was such fun to hear Dr. Kavasch's music and Linda Bunney-Sarhad's cle...ver words coming to life with so much beauty and character. Congratulations to all! Recording engineer, Michael Everett, of The Creation Lab, is a master of his craft. Now we begin the preparations for on-location filming in orchards, vineyards, by the Tuolumne River, etc! Now over to you, Director Carolina Stevens!

We are making exciting progress on the movie version of THE RACE, An Aesop's Fables Mash Up! The orchestra has recorded the beautiful orchestration and we are looking forward to having the 19 young artists record their parts. The singers represent a sampling of the three years of the Summer Opera Institute. For the first time ever, Opera Modesto will run an ad in the national Opera American Magazine, fall issue, to let the opera world know about this unique and exciting project, a project that is led by an all female, multi-generational creative and artistic team!

Opera Modesto is now in the initial stages of making a movie of the world premiere youth opera, THE RACE, An Aesop's Fables Mash Up. It was originally commissioned by Opera Modesto from composer Deborah Kavasch (CSU Stanislaus) and librettist Linda Bunney-Sarhad for performance by the 2020 Summer Opera Institute. World events have conspired to make a live performance impossible...so...we will make a high quality movie, to be filmed on location in the beautiful Central Valley; in orchards, vineyards, fields, by the river, and more fun places! THE RACE will feature 19 current and past young artists from the SOI!

One of the many 2020 SOI highlights was an unforgettable visit from Jeremy Stolle (Zoom from New York!), Modesto's Broadway star in PHANTOM OF THE OPERA and amazing international concert tours. Thank you, Jeremy!

The 2020 Summer Opera Institute concludes tomorrow with another day of green screen filming of the exciting final concert!! We can't wait to share with you the amazing performances, adapted to fit the new reality of our performing world. It has been an incredible two weeks, with some days including as many as 70-80 distinct trainings, coachings, lessons, stagings, lectures and classes; from IPA to Shakespeare. We have been honored to have some amazing guest lecturers this ye...ar. Nathan Stark, Metropolitan Opera Bass-Baritone, generously led three different classes...two of them presenting his own joy for opera through videos...overlapping with his love of TACOS! See below. Thank you, Nate, for being such an inspiration...and so very FUN!

SOI 2020 began today with a visit from Hughson & MJC's own Nathan Stark, Metropolitan Opera bass-baritone. Nate is not lacking for personality and everyone enjoyed his tales of how a little boy from Hughson, Football player and student council member at HHS, became an international opera singer! He also shared fun videos of his opera performances and wild looks from roles. The SOI participants had lots of great questions for him as well. BUT, THEN HE ENDED HIS SESSION WITH TH...IS!! (Whoever said that opera singers are stuffy elitists?!) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7pUPkgXtTg