Rossini’s Il turco in Italia is a witty, self-aware comedy that playfully blurs the line between life and art. Fueled by curiosity, attraction, and cultural collision, the opera centers on the encounter between Selim, a Turkish traveler, and Fiorilla, a free-spirited Italian woman, whose mutual fascination ignites a whirlwind of romantic confusion and comic chaos. Beneath the laughter, the opera examines cultural and gender divides, and the tension between personal desire and social expectation. Rossini’s music drives the comedy with restless energy and quick turns of perspective, using rapid-fire ensembles and abrupt changes of direction to pull the audience into a world where flirtation becomes strategy, identity is constantly negotiated, and no one is quite as settled as they pretend to be. The music sparkles with rapid-fire ensembles, lyrical elegance, and irresistible comedic timing. As entertaining as it is insightful, Il turco in Italia remains remarkably relevant, offering a witty yet pointed look at relationships, identity, and the ever-lasting challenge of being true to oneself.

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Il turco in Italia

Balboa Park

Long before Gounod’s famous Faust, a 26-year-old French composer named Louise Bertin took on Goethe’s epic drama and created something entirely her own. Fausto, receiving its American premiere with Opera Neo, is an astonishingly rare work, seen only at its 1831 Paris premiere, its modern revival in Essen, Germany, and now here in San Diego. Bertin’s score is raw, visceral, and unfiltered, blending Mozartian classicism, Italian opera, German magic opera, and emerging French Romanticism into a strikingly eclectic yet deeply personal musical voice. The opera follows an aging and disillusioned scientist’s desperate bargain with the Devil to reclaim youth and pleasure, posing eternal questions about the value of knowledge and the price of love. Both bold and deeply human, Fausto invites audiences to rediscover a forgotten masterpiece and encounter a uniquely youthful female perspective on one of Western culture’s most enduring stories.

Fausto

Old Town San Diego State Historic Park

Through a heartless marriage of convenience, American naval officer Lieutenant Pinkerton ensnares young Cio-Cio-San (Butterfly), leading her to a tragic and profoundly unjust fate. A masterpiece of Italian opera, Madame Butterfly‘s lush score and timeless exploration of love, betrayal, and cultural clash soars with operatic grandeur. The enduring power of Butterfly lies in its ability to touch the deepest corners of the human heart, leaving audiences devastated.

Madame Butterfly

Lyric Opera of Kansas City

In Bizet’s sizzling epic of dark passion, Don José, a soldier with a checkered past, is seduced by Carmen, a fiery gypsy woman with an appetite for smuggling. Abandoning both his childhood sweetheart and his military career, José pursues Carmen’s attention with a desperation that grows into obsession.

Carmen

University of Memphis

The Devil finds work for the idlest of hands in Igor Stravinsky's neoclassical opera "The Rake's Progress." This 1951 masterpiece uses the glorious words of British-American poet W. H. Auden to tell the story of Tom Rakewell, a young man who inherits a fortune and abandons his hometown sweetheart, Anne Trulove, for the big-city pleasures of life in London. Obsessed with the idea that he is destined for greatness and cheered on by his diabolical companion, Nick Shadow, Tom trades his soul in exchange for fame and influence. An eternity of torment waits for him…unless true love can somehow find a way?

The Rake's Progress

An exploration of the iconic composer through the lens of music from the award-winning movie Amadeus. Opera Memphis artists join the musicians of the Memphis Symphony Orchestra for selections from Mozart’s symphonies, operas, and his towering Requiem.

Robert Feng

Events

Past events

24 - 25 Jul, 2026

Il turco in Italia · Opera Neo

26 - 27 Jun, 2026

Fausto · Opera Neo

Future and recently performed repertoire

Singer in Requiem by Mozart

Opera Memphis

The Imperial Commissioner in Madame Butterfly by Puccini

Lyric Opera of Kansas City

Zuniga in Carmen by Bizet

Opera Memphis

Nick Shadow in The Rake's Progress by Stravinsky

Opera Memphis

Don Geronio in Il turco in Italia by Rossini

Opera Neo

Mefistofele in Fausto by Bertin

Opera Neo

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