Why does this brief work, less than an hour long, create such a powerful, emotional impact? 

We’re fortunate to have Ellen T. Harris, eminent Baroque scholar and Professor Emeritus of Music at MIT, on our team. Dr. Harris, who quite literally wrote the book on Dido, will be delivering the pre-concert talk before our performance in November. Here she shares with us her thoughts about this incredible, compact musical drama.

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Rising opera star Tahanee Aluwihare, who will be interpreting the role of Dido in Camerata’s new production of Purcell’s great masterpiece, shares with us her thoughts on this upcoming adventure.

“I am really looking forward to exploring this powerful feminine role with Tahanee, a major young talent on the North American music scene,” says Artistic Director Anne Azéma. “You can catch a glimpse of Tahanee’s enquiring spirit in this short clip.”

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Music by Henry Purcell (1659-1695)  –  Libretto by Nahum Tate (1652-1715)

This new production of Purcell’s only true opera features performances by live and remote musicians and media elements conceived by Peter Torpey, all stitched together to be viewed from the safety and comfort of your home. Artistic Director Anne Azéma leads a stellar cast, with Tahanee Aluwihare as Dido, Luke Scott as Aeneas, Camila Parias as Dido’s sister Belinda, and Jordan Weatherston Pitts as the Sorcerer, assisted by students from Longy School of Music of Bard College and the Harvard Choral Fellows directed by Edward Elwyn Jones.

The show will be available for streaming, on-demand, from November 14-29, 2020 – ticketbuyers will be emailed links to the show, as well as a pre-concert presentation on Dido and Aeneas by Ellen T. Harris (Professor Emeritus of Music, MIT) and a post-performance conversation between Anne Azéma and Peter Torpey. 

Our trailer was created by Peter Torpey featuring music from the 1979 Boston Camerata recording of Dido and Aeneas.

Tahanee Aluwihare, Dido; Camila Parias, Belinda; Luke Scott, Aeneas; Jordan Weatherston Pitts, Sorcerer; Anne Azéma, Music and Stage Director

Aeneas, Ascanius, Venus, and Dido
Mosaic from the Low Ham Villa (UK), AD 340

In anticipation of Camerata’s new production of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, we begin another thread. We’ll follow this powerful story of love and betrayal, as it is transmitted across the centuries.

BUT anxious cares already seiz’d the queen:
She fed within her veins a flame unseen;
The hero’s valor, acts, and birth inspire
Her soul with love, and fan the secret fire.
His words, his looks, imprinted in her heart,
Improve the passion, and increase the smart.

~ Aeneid, Book 4, translated by John Dryden