This year's Lyric Opera of Chicago broadcast season concludes on Classical 90.5 at noon this Saturday, July 4, with a performance of Porgy and Bess by George Gershwin, set to a libretto by Dubose and Dorothy Heyward, and Ira Gershwin, the composer's brother and frequent collaborator. The performance will be sung in English and will run approximately three and one-half hours. Ward Stare conducts.
Lyric Opera Music Director Sir Andrew Davis calls Porgy and Bess "the great American opera.” George Gershwin’s 1935 opera is bursting with iconic songs and powerful themes.
Six years after its triumphant Lyric Opera debut in 2008, Francesca Zambello's production of Porgy and Bess returns with a finely etched portrait of Catfish Row, a poor but vibrant Gullah community on the Carolina coast. Based on Dubose Heyward’s Porgy, the opera follows Bess, a good-time girl who finally finds love in the goodhearted Porgy, a man who is disabled but strong and courageous. Human vice threatens to destroy their happiness, however, as the smooth-talking, drug-dealing Sportin’ Life and a thug named Crown sow the seeds of danger and temptation.
CAST
Porgy: Eric Owens
Bess: Adina Aaron
Sportin' Life: Jermaine Smith
Crown: Eric Greene
Clara: Hlengiwe Mkhwanazi
Serena: Karen Slack
Jake: Norman Garrett
Maria: Gwendolyn Brown
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