En Route to the Musicopolis...

It's now Saturday, far past the midnight hour, and I'm only a day away from my departure for Prague to attend the Mozart Society of America conference. My travels will take me to the city that adored Mozart, where his music met with unrivaled success. Indeed, the Bohemian musicopolis is the most appropriate place in which to celebrate Mozart's life with musical performance and scholarly applause. The conference will address Mozart's relationship to Prague with lectures, concerts, museum/residence tours and so forth, representing an impressive array of activity any admirer would only concoct as dreamy happenstance.

Perhaps you'll recall the previous entry concerning my Figaro Year. I kept wondering when and where I'd come across the opportunity to see a performance, but the search has ended with the best of scenarios, quite unexpectedly! On Monday evening, I'll attend a performance of Mozart's Figaro at the Estates Theater, which is shown above. Little did I realize until a few months ago that this opera would be performed during my visit by the National Theater troupe (Narodni Divaldo). This is the venue where Mozart himself conducted the opera in 1787 in addition to the premieres of Don Giovanni later in 1787 and La Clemenza di Tito in 1791, just a few months before he died. In 2004, I attended a performance of Don Giovanni in this historic theater, so Tito will be my aim to complete the trio on a future visit to the city! For now though, allow me to be still a moment and reflect on what is to come...

Adieu! I'll write upon my return!

Sherry