We had the incredible good fortune to be able to catch much of today's 19th Annual Opera on the Terrace, with the BMCC Downtown Symphony performing a concert version Verdi's La Forza del Destino, a favorite opera, with Douglas Anderson doing a remarkable job as conductor, and with the participation of our excellent BMCC Downtown Chorus and and BMCC Select Chorus.
It was our last Sunday of the long spring semester, in which we taught seven classes at three schools, and this is finals week at Borough of Manhattan Community College. Finished with one class just before 3 p.m., we got to the Richard Harris Terrace on the second floor in time for the opera to begin
The featured singers, who were wonderful, were John Uehlein, Cynthia Simeone, Lars Woodrul, David Gordon, Andrea Saposnik, Melissa Gerstein, and Mark Victor Smith.
Dr. Eugenia Oi Yan Yau directed the BMCC Downtown Chorus and the BMCC Select Chorus; the latter are outstanding music students from voice and chorus class. Like the BMCC Downtown Chorus, the BMCC Downtown Symphony is made up of students, faculty and staff as well as members of the downtown business and residential communities.
On a cool, grey, drizzly day during which we had to be on campus for nine hours, it was such a treat to listen to Verdi's sublime music and be taken away to another time and place and captivated by the beauty of the music.
Here's the great tenor Richard Tucker, whom we were named after (Tucker knew our uncle, Dave Tarras), singing "La vita รจ inferno" from La Forza del Destino:
We're grateful we got to be at the annual Opera on the Terrace this Sunday.
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