Santa Clarita Agrees to Sponsor Performance of Opera

The Santa Clarita City Council has agreed to underwrite a performance of “Carmen” by a touring arm of the San Francisco Opera in Santa Clarita in February.

The council’s action guarantees that Bizet’s tragic opera will be performed Feb. 4 in the 999-seat William S. Hart High School Auditorium. The council, at the urging of the fledgling Santa Clarita Valley Arts Council, last week unanimously voted to set aside $14,000 in its next budget for the performance.

The council’s action comes a few weeks after Mayor Jan Heidt donated $1,000 to stage the work.

David Bozman, arts council chairman, said the arts council will reimburse the city after ticket sales. The average ticket price will be $25.

“Carmen” will be performed in English by the Western Theater Opera, composed of young singers training with the San Francisco Opera Center. The Santa Clarita performance is one stop on a 20-state tour beginning in September.

“They are all young artists--pretty much the pick of the crop,” said Darius Teter, a company spokesman.

The company will perform the opera in small towns rarely, or perhaps never, exposed to opera, Teter said. In California, the company will stage “Carmen” in high school auditoriums and even gymnasiums in Chico, Redding, Eureka, Victorville and Visalia.

Some of the venues are so small that only two pianos will accompany the singers, Teter said. The Santa Clarita performance will be sung with a full orchestra.

The Santa Clarita Valley Arts Council is working with the city to create a nonprofit foundation to support the arts in the new city. Although not officially incorporated, the council decided to bring the Western Theater Opera to Santa Clarita after one of the company’s Southern California bookings fell through, Bozman said. “It seemed like an opportunity that we couldn’t pass up,” he said.

The arts council also hopes to persuade CalArts to produce Tchaikovsky’s “The Nutcracker” by Christmas, perhaps using children from local ballet schools in the production, Bozman said.