RESEDA : Students Get a Firsthand Look at Opera

They packed the Reseda High School gym, but it had nothing to do with sports.

And everything to do with sentiment.

Students came to see “Journey to Cordoba,” which, for them, was a journey to a mostly unknown world.

Opera.

Members of the Los Angeles Opera Company, backed by a chorus of Reseda High students, performed the story of a teen-age girl sent by her father in the United States back to Mexico to learn about respect. Her father had strongly disapproved of the man she chose to be her boyfriend.

She takes the train and meets a mythical woman who shows her a new way of looking at the world and herself.

“It’s about relating to people of other generations and finding your identity,” said Llewellyn Crain, director of community programs for the opera company.

For Gaby Gangas, a chorus member, it’s a very relevant story. “Our parents want us to still be like they were in their country,” said Gaby, 16, who came to the United States with her family from Bolivia in 1989.

At first, Elsie Ritchie-Mano, the Humanitas coordinator who supervised the chorus, wasn’t sure how to tell her students that they would be working on an opera. She thought that they might feel intimidated by the whole concept.

But gradually, she said, they began to embrace it as they gained access to working professionals. They rehearsed once a week for two months.

“Their excitement began to build and build,” Ritchie-Mano said. “It made them feel special at doing something other kids weren’t doing, and being treated as real performers.”

The opera, written by Lee Holdridge and Richard Sparks, will be performed at six other schools in the Los Angeles area. It made its debut earlier this year at venues across the Southland.