Announcing our 2010-11 Season!

Oh boy, are we going to have fun next season! Ready for a musical trip around the world?

It’ll be our 32nd season, if you can believe that. We find it a little hard to believe ourselves sometimes. But you can bet that after 32 years of doing this, we know what works, what’s great, what audiences will love, and what will give both our veteran artists and the new up-and-comers the best possible showcase for their talents on our stage.

(A reminder: all our productions feature our own live orchestra and talented singers, performed at our own Birch North Park Theatre. Why do we always mention that? Because there just simply aren’t all that many musical theatre companies that consistently offer that these days.)

We’re starting the season in Paris, with Lerner & Loewe’s Gigi, based on the classic film musical of the same name. The musical is by the same talented guys that gave us My Fair Lady. Gigi hasn’t been seen live in San Diego in more than 20 years. Our J. Sherwood Montgomery will take the Maurice Chevalier role, singing that famous ditty “Thank Heaven for Little Girls.”

“Figaro, Figaro!” Next it’s off to Seville, Spain, for one of the most popular comic operas of all time - The Barber of Seville. The lovely Emily Douglass, most recently seen here as our Daughter of the Regiment, will be back as Rosina.

Our Venice Beach staging of Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Gondoliers is a real crowd-pleaser, so we’re bringing it back with a fresh new cast. The show is full of tuneful melodies and snappy patter that keep the story moving between the imaginary kingdoms of Venice and Barataria, poking fun of nobility and royalty as only G&S can.

And finally, we wrap up with a trip back in time to Tsarist Russia as our own G.D. Leon Natker reprises one of his signature roles, Tevye in the record-breaking, award-winning Broadway smash Fiddler on the Roof. If you’ve never seen Leon perform this role – here’s your chance. He’ll be joined by Jimmy Ferraro (who was our Sancho in Man of La Mancha) for his first turn as Lazar Wolf. This will be a show not to be missed.

Here’s the bottom line: you can get all four shows for $108 to $188. That’s less than it costs to see just one show at some musical theatre or opera companies. Want to subscribe? www.lyricoperasandiego.org  or (619) 293-8836.