Opera Houses

Ombra mai fu is an aria from the opera Xerxes, premiered by Georg Friedrich Händel in the year 1738 in London.

At that time, operas, concerts and ballets were events convened for the most select members of society. They were occasions used by royalty, nobility and wealthy families to brag the splendor of their jewels and rich costumes.

Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona

The main boxes were occupied by emperors and kings. The top floors, often without direct view of the stage, were intended for real music fans.

Nowadays, we can still find some opera houses, from those glorious times, in many Spanish cities, such as Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona, Teatro Real in Madrid or Teatro Lope de Vega in Seville.

Fundació Aurora seeks quality music being known and appreciated by all children. Therefore, each of the stories Anita, our narrator, will tell us, will be accompanied by an excellent piece of music, including several arias and fragments of great operas.

Apart from Ombra mai fu, children and young people will listen to many other arias as Dido’s Lament from Dido and Aeneas opera composed by Henry Purcell, or Lascia ch’io pianga also composed by the great Greorg Friedrich Händel.

We will also give show them well-known orchestral excerpts, as Siegfried’s Funeral from the opera Götterdämmerung, or the Chorus of Pilgrims from the opera Tannhäuser, both composed by Richard Wagner.

Furthermore, the foundation will seek to popularize among children and youth other melodies which are not a part from any opera. For instance: Song of Solveig from Peer Gynt composed by Edvard Grieg.

In one episode, Anita will explain the endless struggle for the conquest of a castle, which is going to be accompanied by fragments of the St. John Passion by Johann Sebastian Bach. In another episode, while a maelstrom burns heaven and earth with its flames, we will listen to the Dies Irae of the Requiem by Mozart.

Other selected musical pieces are traditional Russian songs, and some beautiful songs composed in the twentieth century.

Fundació Aurora will contact singers, conductors and musicians, both amateur and professional, to ask them to interpret these pieces for children and to provide us with copies to be distributed among them. The foundation is especially interested in collecting the interpretations of the musicians and singers who are not with us anymore, with the intention of transmitting their memory to future generations.

Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona

Teatro Real in Madrid

Teatro Lope de Vega in Sevilla

Teatre Fortuny in Reus

Nowadays, the great opera houses are no longer exclusive places for a dominant aristocratic class. They are open to all audiences, but still remain inaccessible to the vast majority of children, since the performances are very complex and scheduled in unsocial hours.

Fundació Aurora will contact all theaters and coliseums, orchestras and opera singers, both professional and amateur, with the intention to get them to schedule small shows to be attended by children and youth from the schools.

Our foundation will also call upon all professionals and music lovers to join as members of the foundation, and to choose their representatives in the Board, so that they can organize these large tasks.

For the price of a small donation, they are going to be given a membership card from Fundació Aurora with their name.

Fundació Aurora will make a remarkable effort to add as members all teachers who are dedicated to the musical education of our children and youth, who are the ones who will become the transmission belt of our illusions.

Click on the image of the membership card where you can register as a member of Fundació Aurora.