"The Marriage of Figaro" is one of the most popular and oft-performed operas of all time, and according to conductor Mark Ensley, it hasn't been performed at The University of Memphis of Memphis in over a decade.
This weekend's performance of the classic opera also marks the return of director Giovanna Maresta, an Italian native who specializes in comic opera.
"I am pleased to be working again with Professor Ensley," Maresta said. "We have been working together for many years. It's a great relationship - the best a director can have with a musician."
In addition to having an Italian-speaking director on hand to give the performers direction, the costumes for the production have been ordered direct from Milan.
But you don't have to be fluent in Italian to understand what the actors are singing about.
"They are singing in Italian, but there will be projected English subtitles," Ensley said. "If you want to look at the titles you can, and if you don't, you can just keep looking at the stage."
The opera is set in the palace of Count Almaviva and it tells the story of two servants, Susanna and Figaro, who are to be wed. The Count, however, has developed an interest in Susanna, and "wants to exercise his feudal right to have the bride on her wedding night," according to Ensley.
The Count's wife is none to happy about this and she begins to chase after Cherubino, the Count's page.
"Cherubino may be the most important character," Maresta said. "He represents the love as a force of knowing the world. When all the characters have to deal with him it really brings a revolution in the characters."
One important revolution that Cherubino facilitates is when the Countess discovers he is her son, and "the comedy changes," according to Maresta.
Even though the opera was composed in 1768, many of the ideas and feelings it evokes are still relevant today.
"The themes are as old as the relationship between men and women," Ensley said. "There is a married couple whose marriage is going stale, where the man sees someone younger and perhaps prettier, and the Countess has a wandering eye as well."
Mozart composed the opera as a sequel to "The Barber of Seville," but Ensley said "the opera certainly does stand on its own as far as understanding the characters."
"The Marriage of Figaro," "normally would have three intermissions between its four acts and last at least four hours at the Met," according to Ensley, but he and Maresta have worked hard to keep this performance brief.
"We're doing our best because of our primarily student audience and performers," he said. "We've linked together Acts I & II, then an intermission and then Acts III & IV. We've also made some cuts in sung dialogue and standard cuts of arias that are not heard in the states, but are normally sung in Europe."
Even if the plot is a little complicated, Ensley said that "the music alone" should be enough for anyone to attend a performance.
"If they'll listen with their hearts it's just absolutely gorgeous," he said. "It's some of the most beautiful music Mozart ever wrote."
