The Gold Rush Returns to the Met Stage with 'La Fanciulla del West'

POTSDAM, NY (12/30/2010)(readMedia)-- The Met: Live in HD invites you to experience an American opera tradition by watching a live performance of "La Fanciulla del West" a century after it first debuted on the Metropolitan Opera stage.

Giacomo Puccini's Wild West opera stars American diva Deborah Voigt in the title role as "the girl of the West," and is conducted by Nicola Luisotti. The performances mark the 100th anniversary of the opera's 1910 world premiere at the Met.

"La Fanciulla del West" has not been heard at the Met since 1993. Deborah Voigt and Marcello Giordani make their company role debuts as Minnie and Dick Johnson, while Lucio Gallo takes the role of the Sheriff Jack Rance.

The performance will screen live at Potsdam's Roxy Theater at 1 p.m. on Saturday, Jan. 8, 2011, with an encore showing at 1 p.m. on Sunday, Jan. 30. The running time is approximately three hours and 10 minutes, with two intermissions.

Set in California's Sierra Madre Mountains during the Gold Rush of 1849 and 1850, the opera follows Minnie, the beautiful bartender and keeper of the Polka Saloon, who falls in love with newcomer Dick Johnson and must save him from a posse by winning a game of poker. The opera is based on a play entitled "The Girl of the Golden West" by David Belasco, and is performed in Italian.

In a recent New York Times review, Anthony Tommasini said: "The soprano Deborah Voigt, in a role that suits her big, bright voice and hearty character, sings the plucky, gun-toting, good-hearted saloon owner Minnie, a surrogate sister to a roughneck crew of forty-niners who break into fistfights over her attentions. The tenor Marcello Giordani brings his beefy, ardent Italianate voice to the role of Ramerrez, alias Dick Johnson, a mysterious bandit and a troubled soul, who sees the sweet, fearless Minnie as his means to redemption. … This was a distinguished performance."

In the North Country, SUNY Potsdam's Crane School of Music and J.S. Cinemas sponsor the 2010-11 season of The Met: Live in HD. Music-lovers and novices alike can watch the staging live from the Metropolitan stage in New York City, where high-definition cameras capture the action and the dramatic music is presented in surround sound, with English subtitles, through The Met: Live in HD.

The Metropolitan Opera's The Met: Live in HD series has won both Peabody and Emmy Awards, and sold more than 2.2 million tickets worldwide during the 2009-10 season. For the upcoming fifth season, The Met: Live in HD will expand to 1,500 theaters, and add Egypt, Portugal and Spain to its network of now 46 participating countries.

Ticket prices for the series are the lowest available in the nation: $18 for an adult, $15 for senior citizens, $12 for students and $9 for youth age 18 and under.

Tickets are available by calling the Community Performance Series Box Office at (315) 267-2277, or visiting the Roxy Theater or Northern Music & Video in downtown Potsdam or the CPS Box Office in the lobby of Sara M. Snell Music Theater. You can also reserve tickets online by visiting www.cpspotsdam.org.

For more information on the 2010-11 The Met: Live in HD season, visit the Metropolitan Opera website at www.metoperafamily.org/metopera/broadcast/hd_events_next.aspx. To learn more about the Crane School of Music at the State University of New York at Potsdam, visit www.potsdam.edu/crane.

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Founded in 1886, SUNY Potsdam's Crane School of Music has a long legacy of excellence in music education and performance. Life at Crane includes an incredible array of more than 300 recitals, lectures and concerts presented by faculty, students and guests each year. The Crane School of Music is the State University of New York's only All-Steinway institution.

-www.potsdam.edu/crane-