Houston Grand Opera Opens the 2022-23 Season with La traviata on October 21

Verdi’s opera returns to the Wortham Theater five years after Hurricane Harvey

On October 21, 2022, Houston Grand Opera (HGO) will open the 2022-23 season with Verdi’s La traviata, one of the world’s most beloved—and performed—operas. This production represents Houston audiences’ first opportunity to see award-winning director Arin Arbus’s full vision for the opera at the Wortham Theater Center. In 2017, only weeks after Hurricane Harvey flooded HGO out of its home at the Wortham, the company presented an adapted version at the temporary Resilience Theater inside the George R. Brown Convention Center.

The production features a trio of lead artists making their anticipated company debuts: Grammy Award-winning soprano Angel Blue in her signature role as the doomed courtesan Violetta, acclaimed tenor Matthew White as her lover Alfredo (replacing Bryan Hymel), and celebrated baritone Andrei Kymach as Alfredo’s father Giorgio. Conductor Matthew Aucoin, one of opera’s leading composers and a 2018 MacArthur Fellow, also joins HGO for the first time.

La traviata shares the moving story of the glamorous courtesan Violetta and her lover Alfredo. When the two fall for each other, it’s as if nothing can tear them apart. But, as tragedy unfolds over three sublime acts, family, classism, and deceit plague their relationship, and true love is shaken to its core.

A co-production with Lyric Opera of Chicago and Canadian Opera Company, the opera runs two hours and 41 minutes with two intermissions. It is sung in Italian with projected English translation.

Who:     The cast of La traviata includes soprano Angel Blue as Violetta Valéry, tenor Matthew White as Alfredo Germont, and baritone Andrei Kymach as Giorgio Germont, as well as three current HGO Studio artists: soprano Renée Richardson as Annina, mezzo-soprano Emily Treigle as Flora Bervoix, and bass Cory McGee as Doctor Grenvil. Arin Arbus directs, with Matthew Aucoin at the podium.

When:  Friday, Oct. 21, 2022, at 7:00 p.m.

Sunday, Oct. 23, 2022, at 2:00 p.m.

Saturday, Oct. 29, 2022, at 7:30 p.m.

Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2022, at 7:30 p.m.

Friday, Nov. 4, 2022, at 7:30 p.m.

Sunday, Nov. 6, 2022, at 2:00 p.m.

Where: Wortham Theater Center, 501 Texas Ave.

Tariff: Tickets range from $20 to $210. For more information and to buy tickets, visit HGO.org or call the Box Office at 713-228-6737.

Photo caption: Photos by Lynn Lane, Courtesy Houston Grand Opera.