Almost every opera lover agrees, Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” is among the finest.  Opera librettist E.T.A. Hoffmann called it “the opera of all operas”. Michigan State University Opera Theater will be presenting the work in four shows; Melanie Helton, director of the Opera Theater and a professor of voice, will stage-direct it. The opera will be sung in Italian with surtitles.

It opens with an overture (written on the very morning of its premiere) that begins with strong and foreboding D minor chords, almost proclaiming “nothing good will happen here.” Although this masterpiece was written in 1787, it is more relevant today than when it was first heard in Prague.