Abandon the screen this Halloween and let a pair of spooky operas provide your seasonal thrills. This is the invitation extended by Opera Santa Barbara’s latest production, a double bill offered at the Lobero on Friday, October 29, and Sunday, October 31, featuring two short works from the early decades of the 20th century, Il tabarro by Giacomo Puccini and El amor brujo by Manuel de Falla. El amor brujo tells the story of a beautiful woman who can’t move on from an affair with a man now dead who haunts her in the form of a ghost. The Santa Barbara–raised mezzo-soprano Nina Yoshida Nelsen will sing Candela, the leading role, and dancers from State Street Ballet choreographed by Cecily Stewart MacDougall will perform the work’s ballet sequences, including the work’s famous “fire dance.”
In Il tabarro, Puccini harnesses theatrical elements from the Parisian Grand Guignol to verismo, the fin de siècle operatic tradition of showing characters from everyday life enduring tragic, often violent fates. In the estimation of Opera Santa Barbara general and artistic director Kostis Protopapas, who will conduct both works, Il tabarro is Puccini’s most underrated work. Mature style firmly in place, the composer drives the action forward with a sense of excitement and fatal inevitability that rivals that of the best suspense films.
These works were written in the shadow of an oncoming world war, and the notion of a restless spirit seeking forbidden satisfaction catalyzes both plots. In Brujo, Candela cannot enjoy the attention of her living lover Carmelo until her friend Lucia succeeds in seducing the Specter that haunts her. By taking elements from Roma legend and combining them with Andalusian musical influences, de Falla weaves a vivid portrait of a superstitious gitaneria, or “little village,” where past trauma informs every aspect of life.