The Barber of Seville: Famous Music

The music in The Barber of Seville permeates pop culture. From its use by Bugs Bunny, Woody Woodpecker, Alfalfa in the "Little Rascals," and even Homer Simpson, you're almost guaranteed to have heard some of its recognizable melodies. Enjoy the famous tunes over video highlights from Seattle Opera's previous production of Barber, last performed here over 10 years ago.

To learn more about Seattle Opera's upcoming production of The Barber of Seville, visit the Seattle Opera website.

A Message from KING FM about Tomorrow's Met Broadcast

Due to the Christmas Holiday, this weekend’s KING FM Metropolitan Opera broadcast will be presented at a new time, Sunday afternoon at 2pm. Featured is a Met Opera archive broadcast of Smetana’s Bartered Bride, originally presented December 2, 1978, with Conductor James Levine, Teresa Stratas, Nicolai Gedda, Jon Vickers, and Martti Talvela. The rest of the Metropolitan season on KING FM will be presented at its regular time on Saturday mornings. Learn more at http://king.org/opera!

Photo: At rehearsal for Seattle Opera's Barber of Seville the other day, Dean Williamson conducts the first act finale, starring Burak Bilgili (Basilio), Patrick Carfizzi (Bartolo), David Hogan (in well, Ambrogio), David Adam Moore (Figaro), Nick Phan (Almaviva), Kate Lindsey (Rosina), and Sally Wolf (Berta); Alan Alabastro, photographer.

A Chat with Patrick Carfizzi

Before we let our singers go away for a quick holiday break from rehearsal, we have time to check in with Bass-baritone Patrick Carfizzi (left, in orange, with Burak Bilgili as Basilio). Carfizzi, who made his Seattle Opera debut in 2006 as Prison Warden Frank (aka Chevalier Chagrin) in Die Fledermaus, returned in 2009 as the stern Nourabad in The Pearl Fishers. In all of our upcoming performances of The Barber of Seville, he plays Dr. Bartolo.

Bartolo is older than the other characters in The Barber of Seville, yet you're the same age as most of your colleagues onstage. What is it like to portray someone significantly older than yourself?
Portraying a character older than myself is something I do quite often. As a singing actor there are many steps that I go through to prepare for the task of "aging," each more fun that the next. I am a kinesthetic learner and physicality is part of the foundation which helps and supports the musical gesture. With each new production of Barber that I do, I tend to find unique physical characteristics during the rehearsal process and performances which bring the character to life through a organic process. Certainly there is welcome influence and experience from past productions but each time I try to create a slightly or, in some cases, a vastly different Bartolo.

Exactly how do you describe your voice? Would you consider yourself a buffo bass?
No, I don't consider myself a Buffo, but rather a Bass-Baritone. While I do sing quite a bit of Buffo repertoire, many other types of roles also fit my voice.

Patrick Carfizzi with Adrian Rosas as the Sergeant (Alan Alabastro, photograph)

I’ve talked to several singers lately who have told me that they had jobs I never would’ve expected, before they ultimately pursued an opera career. What about yourself? Did you always know you wanted to be an opera singer?
I started out wanting to be a jazz pianist or a pediatrician, then I went to see my first opera and everything changed. I was " bit by the bug" at age 16 and I have rarely ever looked back. Singing was and is one of the few things that keeps me sane, though everyone's definition of sanity is different.

Seattle audiences may remember you most recently from your performance in our 2009 Pearl Fishers. What’s it like to return to Seattle, and do you have any plans--besides singing, of course!--for while you’re here?
Seattle is my second home, so coming back is extra special for me. I have plans to get to the mountains and finally get out to the Olympic Penisula this time around. There will also be several dinners at some of my favorite Seattle restaurants. I also do as much volunteer and educational work as much as I can in my free time.

Have you previously worked with anyone in this Barber cast? The other day, José Carbó (Figaro) mentioned the importance of camaraderie within a cast. Do you agree with him?
I have had the great joy of working with Larry, Kate, Burak, Sarah and Mo. Williamson prior to this production, and what a joy it is to share the stage with all of them together. I agree with José completely: in Barber, ensemble is an essential part of a successful performance. Only a week into rehearsal the energy of both casts is proving to be electric! I am very excited for what will be a great run.

Rehearsal of Act 1 finale: Burak Bilgili as Basilio, Hand of Maestro Dean Williamson, Patrick Carfizzi as Bartolo, David Adam Moore as Figaro, Nick Phan as Almaviva, arms of Kate Lindsey as Rosina touching him (Alan Alabastro, photograph)

Do singers spend any time getting to know each other outside of the rehearsal studio? Or is it all business?
It's all discipline! All the traveling we do for our work is made that much easier by spending time, and in some cases, developing strong friendships with our colleagues. Preservation is where discipline becomes essential, we all enjoy our time with each other but we all know that we need our rest as well. You just have to find the balance.

StaffChat with Seneca Garber

Our Winter Issue of Seattle Opera Magazine, published last week, featured (in addition to lots of information about The Barber of Seville and Don Quixote) an interview with Seattle Opera's Education Associate, Seneca Garber. If you have attended any of Seattle Opera’s previews in area libraries and museums, or the pre-show talks at the hall, you have likely learned a thing or two from the dashing young bow-tied Garber, who got hooked on opera as a student himself, and has been here ever since.

You are now the Education Associate, but you’ve worn many hats. What is the trajectory of your time at Seattle Opera?
I was initially a student in our programs in 1997. My high school attended Il trovatore. At that point I didn’t know that I loved opera, but I enjoyed the performance and thought the music was fun and kept going to the shows. Then I interned in 2001, when we did the Ring of the Nibelung, and worked with Perry Lorenzo on his talks. After finishing college, I began working in the ticket office during Mourning Becomes Electra, and later became programs coordinator for Education, handling the scheduling and some of the budgeting. About four years ago, I started doing some of the previews and working with the high school program.

So you hold all the secrets.
Kind of.
You know how to get a young person interested...
It’s different for every kid depending on what they’re drawn to. I grew up in a family with parents who were rock ‘n’ rollers, so to be rebellious the only thing I could think of was to listen to opera.

Rebellion is one thing--but then actually...falling in love with it...is another. Can you pinpoint when that happened?
Wagner was really imperative to my development and love of opera. At Tristan back in ’98, I fell in love with the stage imagery and the singing. It was one of those magical productions where the power of what opera can be just clicked.

What’s a typical week for you during performances?
I give a couple of talks at libraries or I might go to a school to talk to students directly. I’m always preparing for those talks. When we did Tosca, for instance, I knew a bit about Puccini, but I had to research to learn more about Rome and the period when that opera is set. You feel like you’re in a college class because you’re always reading some literature and history, finding those connections between opera and other artworks, visual arts, and ways to tie them together.

I know you’re reading Cervantes’ Don Quixote. Have you finished?
Not yet. First up is a biography of Rossini by Stendhal.

Public speaking is one of the most common fears. Not for you?
I know a lot of people have it. My first pre-show talk was Bohème, and I was also a waiter onstage in the performance. I was so stressed about not dropping a plate that the speaking part was secondary.

What’s fun about bringing kids to the dress rehearsals?
The kids are completely honest, and it’s fun when you see an opera like Tosca, and Scarpia comes out for a final bow and they boo the performer because he did such a good job of being a bad guy. Directors pay attention to the way the kids respond. If they laugh at a moment that’s supposed to be serious, the director might make a change. They’re an educated audience. When we see the partnerships that we create with the schools and the time that we spend in the class pay off at the hall, that, to me, is when we know that we’ve done the job right. We want to give the students an educational experience that goes beyond sitting and enjoying the show--the idea is that they learn how what they’re doing in school applies beyond today. We want them to realize: There is a job out there for me. If I follow along this path, whether it’s the opera or not, there are ways to use my skills, languages, etc. That’s one of the reasons that I got as involved as I did and have stayed...I realized that there was something that I could do to be involved with the arts in a way that I wouldn’t have guessed, being fairly unartistic myself...Nobody wants to hear me sing.

Oh, come on.
I’ve done it at a few lectures, a few melodies, and people have come up afterward and said great talk, just don’t sing. So I try not to scare them too much.

To meet some of the other fascinating people who work for Seattle Opera, click here.

A Chat with José Carbó

Now that rehearsals for The Barber of Seville are officially underway, we’ve been able to catch up with some of our fantastic singers, and we’ll be bringing you Q&As with them over the next several weeks. First up is our opening night Figaro, José Carbó, who happens to be making his U.S. debut in Seattle, as well. We talked to him about his character, his Argentina-meets-Australia background, and what career he originally wanted.

José, can tell you us a little about your background? I’ve heard that you grew up in Australia but were born in Argentina.
I was born in Argentina and lived my first five years there. The reason my family immigrated to Australia was the state of the Argentine economy at the time. Dad was working two jobs per day (that's 16 hours a day, plus travel) and Mum was working part time, and we still could not scrape through to the end of each month without asking favors of our family and friends. Luckily, Australia was looking for skilled construction workers at the time, so Dad decided to apply and was accepted. The reason I maintain fluency in Spanish is that my parents sent me to Spanish school every Saturday until I was 14. More importantly, though, they insisted we speak Spanish at home—something I am trying my hardest to emulate with my 9-year-old son Zach, but with variable success.

Do you identify strongly with your Argentinean roots?
Even though I grew up in Australia, the blood that runs through my veins remains Latino. My love of tango was instilled by my grandfather who would play his bandoneón for my brother and me on request. There was always tango playing on the radio in those first five years while Grandma (a seamstress) and Grandpa (a tailor) would cut and stitch the days away as my brother and I tried our best to destroy the home.

José Carbó as Enrico in Opera Australia's 2008 production of Lucia di Lammermoor.
Photo by: Branco Gaica

Did you always want to be an opera singer?
I did all of my schooling in Australia and left school with what I remember as a very clear ambition to become a highly-skilled furniture-making master. I developed a love of crafting timber with my hands through our woodworking classes in secondary school and hoped I could one day make a living from this love.

But I left school and realized that the advent of industrial super-efficiency marked the end of any aspirations of trying to make a living by producing one or maybe two pieces of refined furniture per week. Machines could produce hundreds per day! So, the next best thing was carpentry and the building industry. I completed my apprenticeship and became a carpenter and immediately began to work for several builders while studying three nights a week for three years to obtain my builder's license. Once the builder's license was achieved I began working for myself as a carpenter/builder and began building up a small building company which I ran for 10 years before opera took over.

Now that you’re in Seattle, one of your castmates is tenor Lawrence Brownlee, who will be performing the role of Almaviva. You’ve two have performed these roles together before, haven’t you?
Yes, at the Teatro Real in Madrid, in 2005. We had a great time together and became good friends. It's like old times being in the same cast again. We went out for sushi after a rehearsal last week to catch up.

I imagine that camaraderie between cast members is important in comedies.
Camaraderie in comedy is paramount because it translates onto the stage. It's all about giving each other enough space to do what we do best without being selfish and needing to hog the limelight. Comedy will always work better when both artists are firing. The greatest thing about doing this role again with Larry is that we get a chance to refine our chemistry and to delve a little deeper into our respective roles.

José Carbó as Figaro in Le nozze di Figaro at Rome's Teatro dell'Opera in 2005.
Photo by: Jeff Busby

This production of Barber marks your U.S. debut. How does that feel to be performing here for the first time?
This is a double debut for me: first time singing in both the States and also my first visit to Seattle, this beautiful city. I am a bit of a coffee nut so I look forward to sampling your best coffee institutions while I'm here. And spending time with my family who arrive in a couple of weeks will be heaven!

You’ve had a very active career in Australia, but what about Europe—where have you had the opportunity to sing there?
At the Teatro dell' Opera in Rome, the Swiss Symphony, the Teatro Real in Madrid, the Mozart Festival in La Coruña, Spain, and at La Scala in Milan.

Now, about Barber and your character: How is Figaro different than some of the other characters you’ve performed? Is this a character your particularly enjoy, and if so, what do you like about him?
He is different in the way that he is a title role rascal. This is very different to the way a standard rascal (for example, Lescaut in Manon Lescaut) is set in that it allows great comic and interpretational latitude. The standard rascal tends to be more constrained and therefore a slave to the story. Figaro, on the other hand, is expected to be the manipulator of the plot. This bestows a far greater responsibility of stage presence and command of character.

I adore the role because it gives me a chance to play a very accomplished personality. Figaro is the quintessential Jack of all trades. To become such a person one needs an enormous amount of life experience, wit, intelligence, and intuition—but most of all, optimism and enough courage to take life-changing risks. What makes him so attractive is the confidence he exudes as a man who has hit rock bottom on more than one occasion. You always sense that, no matter what situation he gets himself into, his knowledge and guile will always be more than enough to pull him through.

Figaro spends the entire opera helping to play matchmaker for someone else. Why do you think he doesn’t have a love interest himself in Barber, particularly considering how highly he thinks of himself?
Beaumarchais is the person responsible for this. He has saved Figaro's love interest for his next play, Le nozze di Figaro. There is already enough going on in the story of the Barber. To add any more content to this masterpiece would have ruined its impact and flow.

Countdown to a Comic Opera

Yesterday marked the first day of rehearsal for Seattle Opera’s upcoming production of Rossini’s Barber of Seville, and as I sat in the room and listened to our singers run through the score, I realized something surprising: I can’t remember the last time I saw a comic opera on stage.

Now, I haven’t seen as many operas as most of my colleagues, but I’d venture to say I’ve been to more than your average 24-year-old. Even so, when I tick through my list, nearly all I get is tragedy, pain, and death (usually of the leading lady, which is somewhat disheartening to this woman). But Barber is the complete opposite of that. There’s fun music, witty characters—including (hurrah!) a clever woman, Rosina—and a happy ending. It all sounds like just the feel-good therapy I need after crying like a baby at the end of Lucia di Lammermoor in October (oh, Edgardo...).

Looks like someone needs a few laughs....
Photo by: Rozarii Lynch, from Seattle Opera's 2009 production of Marriage of Figaro

And it seems like I’m not alone in needing a break. Italian opera audiences long ago felt the same way. It was during the eighteenth century, in the days of opera seria, that intermezzi—short, comedic interludes performed between acts of a serious Italian opera—began gaining in popularity, until composers started writing stand-alone comic operas in a genre that became known as opera buffa. The other Figaro story, Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro, is as beloved an opera buffa as Barber. We all can immediately recognize at least some of the lively and fast-paced music in Barber, including the famous overture and Figaro’s “Largo al factotum” aria (“Fi-ga-ro!”). Then there’s the core group of relatable and likable characters. Who hasn’t known someone as cocky as Figaro, sassy as Rosina, or love-struck as Almaviva in real life?

Sitting in on yesterday’s rehearsal and on last month’s Young Artists Program production of Donizetti’s Viva la Mamma! has also reminded me a lot of the cartoons I watched growing up, with their feisty characters, slapstick humor, quickly unfolding plots, and mile-a-minute singing. Actually, hearing bass-baritone Patrick Carfizzi, our Dr. Bartolo, race through the end of "A un dottor della mia sorte" made me think of a certain Warner Bros. cartoon I grew up with...



(Ha! You thought I was going for a Looney Tunes reference, didn’t you?)

Hearing Carfizzi sing his tongue-twisting aria was akin to hearing Yakko here sing all the words in the dictionary—except that Carfizzi energetically powered through in a way that this little Animaniac couldn’t (though they both made it to the finish line, and were greeted with plenty of applause).

We're now only a month away from the opening of The Barber of Seville and I'm already smiling at the thought of what's in store. What better way to start the new year than with a bunch of laughs and a playful outlook? In the meantime, keep an eye on this blog and our Facebook and Twitter pages for more on Barber as we look forward to January 15!

-- Tamara Vallejos
Seattle Opera's Public Programs & Media Associate

BARBER Rehearsal Provides Its Own Electricity

Nothing is better for comedy than unexpected disaster. So it worked out well to have a power outage that made Seattle Opera’s headquarters and rehearsal studio (in the South Lake Union neighborhood) dark and cold today, just in time for the first day of rehearsal of The Barber of Seville! The singers were good-humored about it, even one who arrived with luggage, directly from the airport, after getting bumped from a flight yesterday. And it turns out that you don’t need electricity to rehearse an opera: great performers make their own chemistry. After all, live music sounds the same in the dark as it does in the light. The amusing situation--with little battery-powered lights on the music stands, courtesy of the stage management department, and winter coats and sweaters that went back on as the rehearsal studio lost heat--set an appropriate tone for opera’s ultimate sit-com. Laughs aplenty were had, and more were promised for the weeks to come.

(In case this story makes you nervous, be assured that there's a generator at McCaw Hall that can put out enough electricity to satisfy a small neighborhood. So performances are safe from such power outages!)

Photo: Bartolo (John Del Carlo) tries to blow a piece of lint out of Figaro (Earle Patriarco)'s eye in Seattle Opera's 2000 Barber of Seville, but ends up spitting shaving cream every which way. Gary Smith, photo.

Beaumarchais and the Figaro Saga

Tomorrow, rehearsals begin at Seattle Opera for The Barber of Seville. Over the coming weeks we'll be exploring what promises to be a fantastic production here on our blog, interviewing the singers and creative team, checking in on rehearsal, and learning a thing or two about this most popular of all comic operas.

Today, a refresher on the original Figaro: Pierre Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais, who created the character (based on himself) in a famous series of plays. Monsieur de Beaumarchais was the son of a middle-class watchmaker named “Caron”, and when he was a teenage apprentice in his father’s workshop they called him “fils Caron,” or “Son of Caron.” The nickname stuck, and eventually became the name of his fictional alter-ego, Figaro.

Beaumarchais wrote three plays about this character:

1) The Barber of Seville, a high-energy comedy based on ancient models, in which the wily servant Figaro helps the young and dashing Count Almaviva rescue the beautiful Rosina from the clutches of her tyrannical guardian, the old and foolish Dr. Bartolo.
2) The Marriage of Figaro, first performed in 1784, was the most popular (if not the most important) play of the eighteenth century. According to theatrical legend, the king of France, who feared a public uprising, had held up the performance; but he relented when his wife, Marie Antoinette, championed Beaumarchais’ work. (Apparently, she loved the plays so much she put on a performance of The Barber of Seville at Versailles starring herself as Rosina.) Three people were reportedly trampled to death in the line to buy tickets to the first performance of The Marriage of Figaro.
3) The Guilty Mother, Beaumarchais' third Figaro play, is a sentimental story which has never become widely popular outside of France. In it, Léon, the son of the Countess (fathered by Cherubino, who has since died in battle) loves the illegitimate daughter of the Count, Florestine, but the villainous Bégearss (a nastier version of Basilio, just as Hagen is more dangerous than Alberich) makes them believe they are biological brother and sister. This play, which also inspired a couple of operas, isn't as funny as the first two Figaro plays. In its plot, Figaro again saves the day at the end, although he doesn't have the spark that made him so popular in the earlier chapters.

Like his Figaro, Beaumarchais was a jack-of-all-trades, a guy who tried a little of everything, constantly got himself in over his head, and somehow managed to come out on top nevertheless. He started as a watchmaker but went on to become a writer of pamphlets and a publisher, a courtier, a teacher, a financier and philanthropist, a famous litigant, an untrustworthy member of the French Secret Service, a playwright who established the idea of author's copyright, and an important figure in the American Revolution.

In his comic plays Beaumarchais satirized characters like the unbelievably pompous Dr. Bartolo, who becomes even more hilariously ineffective when he starts singing Rossini's break-neck patter:



...or the slimy, sycophantic toady Don Basilio, who I’ve always thought was Figaro/Beaumarchais’s arch-nemesis because there but for the grace of his extraordinary pride would go Figaro/Beaumarchais himself.

You can find lots more information about Beaumarchais in books and on the web; but let me recommend the 1996 movie Beaumarchais l’insolent, one of my all-time favorite bio-pics. This terrific French film, directed by Edouard Molinaro, has all the gorgeous eighteenth-century costumes, locations, and music an opera-lover could possibly want, plus it stars the great Fabrice Luchini as the mercurial Beaumarchais, Sandrine Kiberlain as his adorable muse, Manuel Blanc as his loveable amanuensis, and such familiar French actors as Jean Yanne, Jacques Weber, and Michel Serrault as Beaumarchais’s many friends, enemies, and contemporaries. I’m sorry to say it’s not yet available as a Region 1 DVD, but you should be able to find it in US video rental stores on VHS.

There’s a trailer (sorry, no titles) of the film available here:

Beaumarchais l'insolent sur Comme Au Cinema

Happy 100th Birthday, Fanciulla del West!

Tonight, the Metropolitan Opera celebrates the 100th anniversary of the premiere of Puccini's La fanciulla del West, which was met with rave applause and numerous curtain calls in 1910. In a review of the Met's current revival, the New York Times' Anthony Tommasini praises the cast, including soprano Deborah Voight, tenor Marcello Giordani, and baritone Lucio Gallo. He also notes that "the Met’s current staging is close to the original and allows this remarkable score to come through beautifully."

Seattle Opera last performed Fanciulla in 2004, and we think it's fitting to celebrate this occasion with a few photos from that production.

Seattle Opera's 2004 production of La fanciulla del West, directed by Bernard Uzan, starred Greer Grimsley as Jack Rance, Richard Margison as Dick Johnson, and Andrea Gruber as Minnie. Here Minnie cheats at cards when she's playing Sheriff Rance, with the bandit Johnson's life at stake.

The production also featured the US debut of Antonello Palombi as Johnson in the alternate cast. Palombi has gone on to sing Radames, Canio, and Manrico at Seattle Opera.

Grimsley gave Seattle one of his marvelously complex, attractive villains in Fanciulla's sheriff.

In the final scene, Minnie rescues Johnson from the Sheriff's lynch mob, and they head off into the sunset singing a sonorous "Addio, mio California!"

All photos by Rozarii Lynch

A Count Almaviva Taste Test

Next month, Seattle Opera raises the curtain on Rossini's comic masterpiece The Barber of Seville, an opera which introduces audiences to the quick-witted barber Figaro and his friends. Barber also features the love-struck Count Almaviva, a role for which tenor Lawrence Brownlee -- a Seattle favorite and a past Artist of the Year -- returns. Having Brownlee in the opening night cast gives us an especially exciting opportunity: his performances will feature Almaviva's commonly-excluded final aria, "Cessa di più resistere."

"The most important reason for not doing the aria is because it is fiendishly difficult, and only those tenors who can sing it easily should do it," says Speight Jenkins. "We are very fortunate in Seattle to have one of those tenors, Lawrence Brownlee. When a tenor enjoys singing it, it simply must be done."

Last year, Brownlee performed the role -- and the aria -- with Washington National Opera, prompting Washington Post columnist Anne Midgette to post an Almaviva taste test on her blog. She compared videos of Francisco Araiza, Rockwell Blake, Juan Diego Flórez, and Brownlee singing "Cessa di più resistere," and asked readers which they preferred. We'll do the same here. Check out these videos below:


Francisco Araiza


Rockwell Blake


Juan Diego Flórez


Lawrence Brownlee



Based on these videos, who do you think does the best job? Midgette said she'd reserve much of her judgment until after witnessing Brownlee live -- and a few days later she reviewed WNO's production of Barber and praised his performance. "He can do the showy fireworks that the role requires with aplomb, as he displayed in the tour de force eight-minute final aria, 'Cessa di più resistere,' which was every bit the show-stopper it needs to be."

Lawrence Brownlee sang the aria in question in Bart Sher's production of Barber of Seville at the Metropolitan Opera. Photo by Ken Howard.

Needless to say, we're all looking forward to hearing Brownlee tackle the aria here in Seattle. How about you? Have you ever heard it performed live before?

BARBER Excitement: New Brownlee CD, Enthusiasm for Kazaras

Seattle Opera's Barber of Seville cast will be assembling to begin rehearsals in another week and a half. And here are two items to fan the flames of excitement for what promises to be a brilliant production:

New Brownlee Recording.
In newspapers across the country, the Associated Press says tenor Lawrence Brownlee "at moments even surpasses the late Italian superstar" Luciano Pavarotti. CLICK HERE to read Verena Dobnik's review of EMI Classical's new recording of Rossini's Stabat Mater, starring Brownlee, Anna Netrebko, Joyce DiDonato, and Ildebrando d'Arcangelo and conducted by Antonio Pappano. Amazon has samples from this exciting recording posted HERE.

Praise for Jenkins and Kazaras.
On her blog Opera Theater Ink, Los Angeles-based critic Carol Jean Delmar praises Speight Jenkins' "impeccable taste" and wise leadership at the helm of Seattle Opera, and calls Barber Stage Director Peter Kazaras "a masterful director because he enables non-noteworthy actors to become noteworthy singers who can suddenly act. How does he do it? By giving them stage business which enables them to become the characters they portray."

Kazaras is currently in Cincinnati, auditioning singers for Seattle Opera's 2011/12 Young Artists Program with YAP Music Director Brian Garman. We hope on this blog to check in with them next week as they head for more auditions in New York City!

Needed: Hair(y) Models for “The Barber of Seattle”!

We’re excited to announce “The Barber of Seattle”--a competition among local stylists and barbers, presented by Seattle Opera and WARM 106.9/KRWM-FM in celebration of one of our favorite operas, The Barber of Seville.

Calling all Seattleites who are up for getting a haircut, and/or a shave, in public—we’re looking for ten models to participate in this event and let one of our competing stylists transform you into a miraculous beauty. Five models (both male and female) will get makeovers in our “stylist” competition, and another five (male) models, with facial hair, will meet a skillfully-wielded razor in the timed “shaving” competition.

When: Saturday, January 8, 2010, 1 pm
Where: McCaw Hall
What: Opera subscribers (or potential subscribers) can check out the best seats in the house, tour backstage, and cheer on participants in several competitions, including the hairstyle and the shave competitions.
Who: YOU!
Why: Each model will receive a pair of tickets to the final dress rehearsal of The Barber of Seville on Thursday, January 13, 2011 at 7 pm.

REQUIREMENTS:
Must be at least 18 years old and sign waiver
Must arrive with lots of hair and be willing to lose (some) hair during event

TO APPLY:
Upload a photo of yourself, showing your hair (facial or otherwise) to Seattle Opera’s Facebook page
As caption to your photo, answer the question: “Why do you want to come to Rossini’s The Barber of Seville?”

Application Deadline: Friday, December 31, noon (PST)

Bearded opera enthusiast image by Pug50