Festival Opera to Present Two OPERA IN THE PARK Concerts In Orinda + Walnut Creek

Festival Opera will launch the company's 32nd season with a pair of free popular

Opera in the Park concerts for the entire community will take place on Thursday, June 20, 2024 at 6 p.m., Orinda Community Park, 28 Orinda Way and Sunday, June 23, 2024 at 4 p.m., Walnut Creek Civic Park, 1375 Civic Drive. Both Opera in the Park concerts will feature a quartet of accomplished Festival Opera artists – Lila Khazoum, soprano; Courtney Miller, mezzo-soprano; Taylor Thompson, tenor; Liam Daly, baritone – performing operatic highlights from La Boheme, Carmen,

Featuring La Traviata, The Magic Flute, Rigoletto, Romeo et Juliette, and popular favorites from Broadway and the Great American Songbook. Chun Mei Wilson, pianist with Festival Opera General Director Zachary Gordin, host.

Attendees will lounge on ample lawn seating, their picnic dinners spread out before them like a feast for the senses. For those seeking culinary delights beyond their picnic baskets, nearby food trucks will offer an array of tantalizing options, inviting concert-goers to indulge in dinner al fresco, under the stars. An idyllic setting for a summer evening concert of beautiful music and new cherished memories.

Festival Opera General Director Zachary Gordin commented, “I'm thrilled to bring a splendid cast of Festival Opera artists to Orinda and Walnut Creek for a pair of popular and cherished Opera in the Park concerts. These annual events, graciously sponsored by Orinda Rotary Club and the Walnut Creek Civic Pride Foundation, have become a celebration of music and community, bringing hundreds of people out to enjoy picnics and food trucks while being serenaded with music from opera to Broadway - with a few surprises thrown in. There will be something for everyone, from the opera aficionado to the opera-curious of all ages.”

These concerts are the prelude to Festival Opera's 2024 season which will present an innovative double bill of two one-act operas on the theme of love and loss: Francis Poulenc's gripping 1958 French monodrama for soprano, La voix humaine (The human voice), and Henry Purcell's Baroque masterpiece, Dido and Aeneas, based on Virgil's epic and ancient poem The Aeneid, set for two performances Friday, July 12 at 7.30 p.m. and Sunday, July 14 at 2 p.m.. Hofmann Theatre, Lesher Center for the Arts in Walnut Creek.