An Afternoon at the Opera

Did my part-time gig at the Seattle Opera this afternoon, another matinee performance of Rossini's wonderful L'italiana in Algeri, this time with Helene Schneiderman and Lawrence Brownlee in the lead roles, both of them excellent. As far as I could tell from the closed-circuit television, anyway.

I was amazed again at the people on display there in the auditorium - the Sunday matinees offer perhaps the best place for people watching anywhere, including the airport. I didn't see any men in tuxedoes, but there were some older couples that went all out. In 2006 that can sometimes mean pretty far out, and today I saw snakeskin cowboy boots and purple fedoras. There were a lot of kids there as well, which I certainly think is a good thing, and sometimes they look like replicas of their parents, and sometimes they look like replicas of rebellion: goth make-up, piercings, almost anything goes, really. And not just for the kids. One couple biked to the opera - or at least that appeared to be the case, given the brightly colored spandex, those nifty biking caps, and special bike cleats they were wearing while sipping white wine at intermission.