Students will participate in a professional opera experience with sets, lighting and a stage crew provided by LA Opera when they perform for the school alongside our professional artists. Through engaging and lively weekly workshops, your students will learn their roles as chorus members in The Prospector, a charming opera by Lee Holdridge and Richard Sparks celebrating Puccini's The Girl of the Golden West.

The Prospector takes place in a California desert where a prospector is traveling with his mule to the mountains to mine for gold. Taking a break, he is set upon by a pack of hungry wolves who tell the prospector that he and his mule look mighty tasty. To save himself, the prospector promises the mules that he will treat them to food at Minnie's saloon if they allow him to go free and proceeds to tell the wolves about the girl of the golden west. This story is set in a gold rush camp in the mountains of California where Minnie owns a saloon and takes care of all the miners there. Through the story we learn about forgiveness and second chances as the Sheriff allows Minnie, and the outlaw she has fallen in love with, to depart to find their own happiness. Moved by the tale of love and forgiveness, the coyotes let the prospector leave as they contemplate the lessons they've learned.  

Teachers will find opportunities to integrate this opera into curriculum studies of California history, geography and more.

Things to know:

Students perform onstage with sets, lighting, and stage crew from LA Opera Connects.
Provides cross-curricular ties with California history.
Teachers must attend a required orientation at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.
Students meet once a week for five weeks, January 9 through February 10, 2023. Performance days will be scheduled between February 13 and March 3, 2023.
All workshops are scheduled for one class period, one day, each week between 9am and 3pm.
Enrollment is open for up to 15 schools within a 30-mile radius of The Music Center.
Maximum of 70 students per school from the 4th and/or 5th grade.
The school participation fee is $1,500.
Teachers must attend an informational In-Service meeting on Zoom on Thursday, December 15, 2022.



Want your students to build model sets and learn the basics of set design?

Add on the Elementary In-School Opera + (EISO+): Introducing kids to offstage magic.
Show your students that you don’t have to be a performer to play a vital role in an opera production with EISO+.  4th and 5th graders use math and measurement skills to build model sets based on the production of "The Prospector." (Hello cross-curriculum, STEAM learning!) On performance day they get to show off their designs to the audience.

Students will:

Employ critical thinking skills to make their selections based on the libretto.
Learn to build their set within a budget.
Defend their design choices (never too early to practice for that PhD).
Show off their finished designs on performance day.
Students meet once a week for five weeks, January 9 through February 10, 2023.

Things to know:

45 students can enter the program.
This is a separate set of students from the performers.



Deadline:

Applications for this program are accepted throughout the year and participation is dependent on availability.