Opera Santa Barbara at 30

Opera Santa Barbara at 30

From ‘Carmen’ to Callas
and a Hopeful Beyond

By Josef Woodard | Photos by Zach Mendez
November 2, 2023

Carmen — and Carmen — blew into town in late September, with all her seductive cunning and mellifluous melodic charms. The tragic anti-heroine of the ever-popular opera by Georges Bizet, boldly embodied and realized here by mezzo-soprano Sarah Saturnino, serenaded two hefty houses at The Granada Theatre, her toothy ulterior motives tucked into the folds of her Spanish costume.

It was another opening night, another year among 30 now for Opera Santa Barbara (OSB), a brave experiment turned institution in the local cultural landscape. And yet it was not just another night at the opera. For one thing, this was the first full-scale, two-performance season opener since the COVID onslaught on culture in 2020, and a further testing of the waters for the company. Like many more modestly scaled versus urban opera companies in America, OSB faces a survival struggle while culture lurches slowly back to normality.

Is opera too entrenched in Santa Barbara’s cultural soil by now that it’s too important to fail? OSB has been led by the charismatic and doggedly committed artistic and general director Kostis Protopapas since 2017. He has proven adept at both resourcefully meeting challenges of opera presentation — including novel drive-in productions during the lockdown and varied and adventurous smaller projects last season — and facing fiscal and demographic realities surrounding the company.

In the post-game analysis of OSB’s grand Granada opener, Protopapas asserts that “Carmen was a huge artistic success. We were rewarded with standing ovations and cheers, showered with praise in the press and social media, and letters of congratulations and gratitude from patrons are still pouring in.”

On the downside, though, “the post-Carmen financial reality is somber.” Despite appearances and an enthusiastic response at the Granada, audience head count and box office numbers were disappointing, pulling in less than half the project’s half-million-dollar budget (yes, grand opera is a grandly expensive operation). Protopapas relays, “Our current assessment is that, although ‘going big’ is within our capabilities artistically, it was not such a good idea financially. Productions of this scale seem to be beyond what our community is willing to support, and our future programming will reflect that.”

Somber reports notwithstanding, the OSB story thus far has been heroic in its own organizational way since it was launched by Marilyn Gilbert and Nathan Rundlett in 1994 and now has more than 70 productions to its credit.

Although the current season’s main events continue in the spring of 2024, with Verdi’s Il Trovatore (Apr. 9 and 11) and the company premiere of Héctor Armienta’s swashbuckling 2022 opera Zorro (Apr. 19 and 21), there are key sideline elements tucked into the season. This December at Center Stage Theater, the company will serve up a family-friendly treat in the form of Xavier Montsalvatge’s chamber opera El Gato con Botas.

And as it happens, Carmen serves as a ripe segue into the next step in the current OSB season, La Divina: The Art of Maria Callas, a special tribute to the Greek soprano Callas (née Kalogeropoulos), taking place at the Lobero Theatre on Friday, November 10, and — in a new venue twist for the company — at Bank of America
Performing Arts Center in Thousand Oaks on Sunday afternoon, November 12. Callas, one of a handful of opera singers with a mythic status and with qualifications as a rare “household name” celebrity in opera history, is being celebrated in this, her centennial year.

Although Callas never appeared onstage as Carmen, her recordings of arias from the opera are legendary and beloved, quickly evidenced by the fact that, among her top five arias on the official Spotify page, three are from Bizet’s opera.

As Protopapas explains, “the idea of La Divina came about when we were approached by Helen Morales, Argyropoulos Chair of Hellenic Studies at UCSB, to propose a collaboration for celebrating the Callas centen-
ary, an event celebrated by opera companies worldwide. UCSB was planning on presenting a lecture about Callas with London-based journalist, writer, and opera scholar Helena Matheopoulos, and offered financial support to us for creating a performance to complement that.”

Not incidentally, the tribute arrives with a sturdy Greek cross-connection, Protopapas being a product of that country and point of cultural pride. “Greeks are especially devoted to their national heroes,” says Protopapas. “Callas embodied something essential of the Greek psyche and was deeply loved by the entire nation. Having a Greek artist be featured in this celebration adds a great sense of occasion to an already very special event.”

La Divina: The Art of Maria Callas has, as its starring singers, artists with strong links to the company, soprano Jana McIntyre and soprano Eleni Calenos, whose kinship to the musical subject is particularly strong, given her own Greek heritage.

Calenos was in Florida last week, preparing to perform Orlando Opera’s Tosca — a role she memorably delivered in Santa Barbara — when we spoke about the upcoming Callas homage. “Maria Callas was sui generis — one of a kind,” says Calenos, “a tremendously gifted artist and a very dedicated hard worker. She was a great technician and had great control of her voice for as long as nature allowed her. She wasn’t flawless, but interpreted all kinds of roles that she made her own like no one can. She has changed the standards of acting in opera, by making it more human and thus more touching and real. Most Greek opera singers listen to her — especially when they start studying — and use her as a guide and example. She’s been and still is one of the most important cultural representatives for Greece.

“Looking at her life, however, I wish she could have found more happiness and balance on a personal level, which is always a challenge in such a successful career as hers. Her life was unfortunately short (she died in 1977 at age 53), but she left a rich heritage not only to Greece, but to the whole world with her recordings, thus becoming a legend. I have ‘studied’ her through recordings, books, and documentaries, but how I wish I could have witnessed a live performance of hers,” said Calenos.

For the upcoming tribute, Calenos will draw from the “more lyrical” roster of arias in Callas’s repertoire, including from Tosca, Norma, and Otello. She adds that “even though people tell me I remind them of Maria Callas — especially physically and as a Greek soprano — I feel that my voice is different. Callas was my guide in my first steps as a student, and still is today for different reasons.

“Unconsciously, as a young singer, one tends to imitate their idol until they discover their own voice. As I am closer to my own voice, she still lives in me through her example as a singer, artist, and person.”

Reflecting on OSB, for which she has now performed in a few high-profile roles, Calenos said, “Kostis Protopapas heroically keeps the company alive and in a challenging time for the arts in general. What I find in OSB is a home away from home. I have a sense of family when I perform here. A sense of care for the art form, care for each other as colleagues and people, and care for the community.”

For his part, Protopapas is working overtime to keep said home fires burning. He was given the artistic director role after a nationwide search in 2015, and two years later, he took on the responsibility as general director. He can often be seen — and, by extension, heard — in the pit as a conductor in OSB productions, as he will be in La Divina.

Asked if it comes naturally for him to take care of business in a multi-tiered way, he admits, “It is true that it is in my nature to assume responsibility and get things done no matter what it takes. I also have an insatiable interest in every aspect of our operations, which developed over time from my passion for music and theater, and a vision of what leadership in the arts can mean.

“I take the word ‘General’ in my title quite literally and believe that being hands-on with everything is the best way to serve Opera S.B. This of course is especially useful during a time when OSB can’t afford the luxury of a big staff or endless meetings. I am blessed to be surrounded by a small but fearless team of overachievers who work and think the way I do, and achieve things that even teams twice as big don’t. I am also grateful to have the trust, support, and counsel of an extremely committed board.”

He is well aware of bottom-line imperatives, to be balanced with the fine art of creating an opera company with both preservation and a sense of adventure in check. As he says, “Our continuing existence depends on people buying tickets and paying a price commensurate with the value they receive. Unlike Hamilton or Taylor Swift, even if you buy our most expensive ticket, you won’t have to take out a loan. Having vibrant live performing arts in our community requires financial commitment from everyone who values it. Otherwise, we risk losing arts programming in Santa Barbara.”

Cautious optimism remains his prevailing stance, but Protopapas realized that “the future for small opera companies like ours is extremely tenuous. Nothing should be taken for granted. We read every day about companies closing and suspending programming. My vision is to create a sustainable business model for Opera Santa Barbara for the next 30 years and beyond, while also producing extraordinary art.

“There is no doubt that our work will continue to be extraordinary. It will just be on a different scale.” 

For more information about Opera Santa Barbara and its upcoming programming, see operasb.org.