Puccini Occupies Santa Barbara, via Gotham, at the Granada

Santa Barbara’s opera culture calendar has enjoyed a healthier life than might be expected from a city its size, thanks to the ongoing splendors of Opera Santa Barbara. Another regularly and reliably impressive “opera moment” in town occurs mid-summer, thanks to the fully staged opera production presented as a keynote event on the Music Academy’s roster.

Coming to the Granada Theatre, this year’s Academy opera of choice is one of the sturdiest standard rep favorites, Giacomo Puccini’s La bohème, with performances on the evening of Friday, July 14 and Sunday afternoon, July 16.

This summertime operatic flowering arrives with deep credentials intact, linked to the world-renowned vocal/opera focus of the Academy’s voice department, dating back to the seminal roles of Lotte Lehmann and Martial Singher in the formative period and with a long-lasting tenure of mezzo-soprano Marilyn Horne at the helm. Many singers and instrumentalists involved in these summer-in-Santa Barbara opera productions have gone on to illustrious posts and careers. Coveted slots in the Academy’s voice department, selected from close to 700 applicants, go to prized young artists, adding to the high talent bar.

Over the years, the Academy opera repertoire has leaned in less-trafficked corners of the operatic canon, including Benjamin Britten’s Albert Herring, George Frideric Handel’s Rodelinda, and William Bolcom’s operatic treatment of the Robert Altman film A Wedding. But the trusty standards — such as La bohème — always return to roost onstage, as a ripe opportunity for young singers entering the field and the hearts of audiences.

Conductor Daniela Candillari, also conductor of Opera Theatre of St. Louis, in charge of last summer’s production of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, returns to lead the Academy Festival Orchestra, whose Saturday night concerts at the Granada have demonstrated its taut ensemble artistry. The cast of Fellows from the Lehrer Vocal Institute — led by co-directors John Churchwell and Sasha Cooke — includes Angela Lamar and Luke Norvell as star-crossed lovers Mimi and Rodolpho, and Kylie Kreucher as Musetta.

Candillari commented that, in La bohème, “Puccini’s colorful orchestrations and his music depict the emotions of excitement, tenderness, playfulness, and the opera is one of the best examples of what makes a really good ensemble on stage.”

One modernizing twist this time around the romantic tragedy and bohemian romp is its staging and setting. Director Mo Zhou — whose work has been seen in Hamburg’s Elbphilharmonie, Santa Fe Opera, Wolf Trap Opera, and beyond — has created a new production, landing the tale of struggling artists and a Romeo and Juliet-esque fate in the New York of the “Occupy Wall Street” era, circa 2011, a suitably tense socio-economic-cultural atmosphere for the tale. The first act’s Brooklyn setting moves to Union Square Christmas Market to open the second act, swapping out the original Café Momus for the hip hangout of Café Balthazar.

Zhou’s premise, airlifting this 1895 opera set on the bohemian not-so-mean streets of Paris to 2011 New York, promises to remind us of the ability for an opera of La bohème‘s stature to transcend time and place, and to win us over on repeat encounters. See musicacademy.org/big-shows/la-boheme