Dido & Aeneas With Opera After Hours

For the first time ever, and I hope it won’t be the last, I was able to saunter down Commercial Drive to my favorite restaurant/pub, order my favorite beer, and enjoy one of my favorite of Purcell’s theater works in an informal setting. It was a treat to see Dido and Aeneas performed on the Cafe Deux Soleil stage that I normally associate with slam poetry and open mic nights.

Besides being in English, Dido And Aeneas clocks in at a brisk hour and a half which makes it an ideal candidate for a new opera company’ first outing. The singers are all familiar faces in the music scene out here and it was a real treat to hear them sing this fabulous score. If you’ve read this blog before you know I gush about the composer in this space again and again.

Opera After Hours, which I believe is the brain child of Chris Bagan and Debi Wong, has adapted the libretto to present a socially aware message about bullying and it’s consequences. It’s a cool idea and it was effective in a way that I’m not sure was necessarily planned. The message of an anti-bullying campaign has something to do with dealing with bystander apathy or being sucked into the mob mentality against more empathetic judgment. I noticed that audience easily slipped into the role of becoming part of the mob as the cast delivered barbs directed at Dido, relayed both through song and texts from the cast, and it was an odd juxtaposition for me to be simultaneously aware that she was going to kill herself at the piece’s conclusion and tittering politely to my stout.

I also can’t help but be in love with presenting smaller theater pieces like this in a setting that isn’t a stuffy concert hall. Too bad tonight’s concert is sold out. Here’s hoping I can be around for their next show.