Minas Presents la Giara, an Operetta by Patricia King at World Cafe Live

La Giara, the Water Jug, merges Italian Folk music and Opera with Brazilian Choro and Jazz, telling the story of Patricia’s family’s emigration from Sicily to Philadelphia. Comprised of compositions, both dramatic and comedic, La Giara expresses themes relevant to gender oppression, migration and cultural losses that families experienced in adapting to a new world.

Music & Lyrics by Patricia King
Musical Director: Orlando Haddad
Artistic Director:  John Nicholas Peters

With Patricia King, piano;  Orlando Haddad, guitar; Jessica Lennick & Martha Stuckey, sopranos;  Mike Dorsey, tenor;  John Nicholas Peters, baritone; Jim Stager, bass;  Joe Soprani, accordion. Narrated by Charlotte Blake Alston....

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La Giara, the Water Jug, merges Italian Folk music and Opera with Brazilian Choro and Jazz, telling the story of Patricia’s family’s emigration from Sicily to Philadelphia. Comprised of compositions, both dramatic and comedic, La Giara expresses themes relevant to gender oppression, migration and cultural losses that families experienced in adapting to a new world.

Music & Lyrics by Patricia King
Musical Director: Orlando Haddad
Artistic Director:  John Nicholas Peters

With Patricia King, piano;  Orlando Haddad, guitar; Jessica Lennick & Martha Stuckey, sopranos;  Mike Dorsey, tenor;  John Nicholas Peters, baritone; Jim Stager, bass;  Joe Soprani, accordion. Narrated by Charlotte Blake Alston.

Story Synopsis:

Hot-tempered Nunzio, explosive as Mount Etna back home in Sicily, thinks he wears the pantaloni in his family until his wife and two daughters suddenly disappear, leaving behind a successful family bridal business in Philadelphia, changing their names, and jumping a cross-country train. Their goal: to get as far from him as possible. When he finally locates them, with the help of a private detective two years on the case, Nunzio discovers that his female “bimbas ” are more resourceful than he imagined, making a successful living in Denver, Colorado. But an incident from Nunzio’s past in Sicily has determined his misfortune - if only he had thought before rudely cutting in line to the town water fountain and breaking his Aunt Vincenza’s water jug. If only he knew Aunt Vincenza would someday be his mother-in-law. If only he knew it would cause a lifetime family curse. Nunzio must make right and buys an impressive mansion to persuade his family to return to him. He creates a lifestyle that charms those on the outside looking in. But inside the fairy tale palazzo, full of gold mirrors, fountains, operatic music and singing birds, sad spirits are longing for love to quell the family curse. Long shattered relations are healed later by the grandchildren, but only after their mother has broken from old world traditions, and they find that it’s not only La Giara that has survived the cracks and damage that Nunzio has caused!

Based on King’s upcoming book La Giara.

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