<\/p>\n
\u201cThey say you have to be crazy to start an opera company,\u2019\u2019 Judy Lisi quipped over lunch. \u201cBut we did it.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n
Crazy or not, Lisi planted the seeds for what would become Opera Tampa, which this week wraps up its 30th season with Giuseppe Verdi\u2019s dramatic tragedy, Macbeth. As founder of the company and former president of the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center \u2014 now the Straz \u2014 Lisi\u2019s gamble from the 1990s paid off.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe center had a big debt in 1992, and I said to the board, \u2018if we resolve the deficit, I\u2019d like to think about starting an opera company,\u2019\u2018\u2019 said Lisi, who came to Tampa in 1992 after running the Shubert Performing Arts Center in New Haven, Conn. \u201cEveryone on the board said, \u2018if you can solve the deficit problem, you can do anything you want.\u2019\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n
It took just two years for her team to triage a $6 million shortage and open an opera-size opportunity: a formal plan to support a 400-year-old artform that unites music, drama, poetry, visual arts and storytelling in a way that has never gone out of fashion. Nearly all the top 50 cities in the United States host a professional opera company, which nurtures their cultural identify and local economy.<\/p>\n
Opera Tampa embraced the implausible with a signature of more than 100 productions and recitals over three decades. Such success has defied the odds and continues to do so amid cuts in state arts funding. Just as important, it engages people through an expressive, constantly changing platform, said Dr. Christopher Combie, assistant vice president of accreditation at the University of South Florida and a patron of the arts.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe deeply in the power of live performance to connect people and elevate the community,\u2019\u2019 he said. \u201cOpera embodies form, function and all the rules of good music. Having a company like Opera Tampa signals that we value artistic excellence, creativity, and cultural depth as part of everyday life.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n
Bonny Heet and her husband Martin, who relocated from Italy to Florida , wanted to keep opera in their lives and were immediately impressed with Opera Tampa\u2019s offerings, both on and off stage: \u201cWhen we were new here, they provided us with a sense of community. It\u2019s led to lifelong friendships with amazing people of differing backgrounds and interests.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n
Following its inaugural season in 1996, the company presented three grand-scale operas in their original languages, with English translations projected above the stage. Augmenting these productions were recitals featuring internationally acclaimed singers such as Jesse Norman, Kiri Te Kanewa, Andrea Bocelli, Kathleen Battle and Jose Carreras. Opera was gaining momentum here, and major artists wanted to be a part of the excitement.<\/p>\n
But any excitement needs to include younger people, who traditionally aren\u2019t part of the patronage. So, the company developed a strategy: Bring in Broadway musicals with operatic narratives, such as RENT and Miss Saigon, which are based on two of Puccini\u2019s most successful works, La Boheme and Madama Butterfly, respectively. By bridging the gap between popular entertainment and an older art form, the Straz box office lit up.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe put operas and musicals together as a package in the same season,\u2019\u2019 Lisi said about the plan. \u201cThe hope was to introduce opera to new audiences, and it worked. More and more young people started coming to our performances.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n
Of course, opera takes money and shortcuts are noticed. A typical Opera Tampa production can top $500,000, with less than 40% covered by ticket sales. That\u2019s why the Straz \u2014 with its $55 million operating budget \u2014 subsidizes its nonprofit resident company by allowing it to function under existing systems, rather than apart from them. Most opera companies have separate administration and marketing departments, but Tampa\u2019s troupe uses what is already in place, so funds go directly to the productions themselves.<\/p>\n
Today, this financial flexibility allows Opera Tampa to take risks, be more adventurous and tackle contemporary issues. The current season, for instance, has been anything but predictable with the world premiere of Love v. Death, a macabre double bill by St. Petersburg composer Tom Sivak. Up next was a 20th-century classic in Benjamin Britten\u2019s gothic The Turn of the Screw, adapted from the Henry James novel and remade in the 2001 film The Others. Following that was a 2016 opera based on Stephen King\u2019s novel The Shining. To satisfy traditional cravings, the company offered Mozart\u2019s fairytale The Magic Flute and the season concludes April 24-26 with Macbeth, Shakespeare\u2019s play about a ruthless and corrupt quest for power that mirrors modern politics.<\/p>\n
Next season tips a hat to convention with Rossini\u2019s Barber of Seville, Verdi\u2019s Falstaff and Puccini\u2019s Tosca. Repeating such beloved works \u2014 along with the new \u2014 builds on what is becoming a tradition and source of pride, said Greg Holland, who in 2022 succeeded Lisi as CEO and president of the Straz.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s made Opera Tampa possible over the last 30 years is simple: persistence, belief, and a community that chose to embrace it,\u2019\u2019 he said. \u201cToday, it\u2019s not just established \u2014 it\u2019s essential. The company has helped shape a more complete and confident cultural identity for Tampa Bay and reflects a community that\u2019s willing to invest in great art and see it thrive.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n
Kurt Loft is a journalist and music critic who has written for various newspapers, magazines and arts groups for more than 40 years. A member of the Music Critics Association of North America, he lives in St. Petersburg.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThey say you have to be crazy to start an opera company,\u2019\u2019 Judy Lisi quipped over lunch. \u201cBut…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":243532,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[107393,37784,19975,5168,135,137,136],"class_list":{"0":"post-243531","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tampa","8":"tag-macbeth","9":"tag-opera","10":"tag-opera-tampa","11":"tag-straz-center","12":"tag-tampa","13":"tag-tampa-headlines","14":"tag-tampa-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243531","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=243531"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/243531\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/243532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=243531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=243531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=243531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}