East Village Opera Company

While we're in San Francisco we're staying with our good friends Catie and Greg, and somehow Catie managed to score free tickets to see the East Village Opera Company:

The East Village Opera Company was co-founded by lead singer Tyley Ross and arranger/multi-instrumentalist Peter Kiesewalter. They assembled a full-on rock band, adding two guitars, bass, and drums to Peter’s keyboards, then synched it to a string quartet.

By embracing what Peter Kiesewalter calls “the pomposity of rock and the pomposity of opera” without demeaning or satirizing either form, the East Village Opera Company flies where countless other “classical-crossover” efforts have failed.

“We have a profound love and respect for the opera,” Peter insists. “But it’s so dramatic, so over the top by today’s standards, that it cannot be delivered with a straight face. You need a little bit of irreverence in it.”

“With modern recording technology and a wide variety of musical styles at our disposal, our goal has been to approach these songs the way we feel the composers would were they alive today,” says Tyley Ross.

I wasn't sure how I'd like it, but they were awesome. Besides, you have to give credit to anyone who can go from The Who to Carmen to Eminem all in the space of one three minute song.

Check out some samples here.

Posted by flow Frazao on February 3, 2006 at 03:17 PM in Music | Permalink