Hello! This is resident artist Michael Nyby updating after our final run-through of Casanova’s Homecoming before we go into production week. This opera was a challenge musically, but the end result is going to be well worth the effort. When I first received my score, I spent some time reading through the text and laughed out loud on several occasions. Now that I’ve had the chance to see the entire production come together, I can honestly say that this is one of the most hilarious operas I have ever encountered. Argento wrote both the music and the libretto, a feat only a few composers have dared,  and with a few exceptions, many of whom ended up with rather middling to woefully poor results. Casanova on the other hand has a delightfully funny libretto in which the text never becomes subservient to the music nor vice versa. It boggles the mind that this opera hasn’t been produced more than three times since the original premiere twenty-five years ago. I hope this time around it is again well-received and more productions are mounted elsewhere; this work certainly deserves it. I hate to sound like an advertisement, but I really love this opera!