Carmen has Carmen gone

Last weekend we opened (and closed) the collaborative production of Carmen with the Orlando Philharmonic and Mad Cow Theatre.  It was a wonderful experience!  My first time visiting the Bob Carr Performing Arts Center was as a performer on the stage--I got a major kick out of that.  It ended up being a really fun venue to perform in.  Exploring the backstage area was a total adventure.  Stage stars had autographed the walls when their shows came through town so I lingered quite a bit gawking at our heroes' signatures. 

The show itself seemed a success and the house looked full on Sunday afternoon and Friday night.  My folks--the very educated and cultured parental unit of three professional musicians--have sat through a lot of boring musical performances in their lifetimes, but they both geniunely enjoyed every moment of a three-plus-hour evening at the opera, even the parts where their kid wasn't onstage.  And the Orlando Sentinel's theatre critic even noticed that we received a pretty lengthy round of applause at the end of the night (read the review).  That could have been the result of the lengthy, non-underscored curtain call, but who knows?  I can say that between my first rehearsal three weeks before opening night and the interminable final bows, I made some invaluable memories, contacts, and friends.