Just finished watching Julie and Julia and after lots of thinking and talking about starting a blog, and a bit of prodding from my lovely wife, here goes...

The movie, if you don't know it already, follows Julia Child through the years as she is inspired by her love of eating (definitely something we have in common) to learning how to cook (something I love to do) to becoming the author of one of the most important cookbooks ever. The parallel life is follows is of a young woman, Julia, who decides to cook all 500+ recipes in Child's cookbook in the space of a year and blog about them. 365 days....

That's the inspiration for the first post: 365 days. It has been my dream for a long time to produce Humperdinck's "other" opera (besides Hansel and Gretel, for any non-opera person to wander along), otherwise known as Konigskinder, or The Royal children. It was first performed at the Metropolitan Opera right here in New York City, 99 years ago last night, and it hasn't been repeated here in the city in almost that long, though I learned about the piece from working on a beautiful and touching production at Sarasota Opera in 1997.

The other impetus for the blog comes from my resolution for the new year: "Ask for help." So here's the other direct address to anyone reading. Please learn about this amazing work and if you are as moved by it as I was and still am), think about how you'd like to help bring about the 100th anniversary production. Sure, cash donations to dell'Arte Opera Ensemble would be lovely and necessary (www.dellarteopera.org) but more meaningful to me would be thinking about how you might bring yourself to the project. Maybe you're a fantastic bassoonist and would like to volunteer to play in the orchestra. Perhaps you're a wonderful seamstress (or seamster...is that that word?) and want to help stich costumes. Do you know how to make stage snow? Do you speak German and are you great with a powerpoint projector? Someone needs to create a wonderful packet of materials for schools, because I want LOTS of children to see this piece. After all, the piece is about how children provide the greatest resource possible: truth.

I can't wait to share more about Konigskinder, about dell'Arte Opera Ensemble and our other upcoming projects, about my private coaching studio, and once in awhile, maybe just a little bit about cooking. Thanks Julie and Julia.