In this new version, Handel’s glorious music and surprisingly relevant drama reemerged as a site-specific, cinematically-driven, wild contemporary party with expanded orchestrations, sound design, and installation art. A story of fate, destiny, long-lost familial relationships, and a probing exploration of "conquerors" and their captors, Giustino will feature LBO Artistic Director James Darrah’s breakthrough stylistic hybrid of cinema-theater, recontextualizing the salon-like qualities of Handel’s 18th century setting to a transitory, temporal space in an imagined California desert motel. Featuring orchestration and new adaptations by Shelley Washington, conducted by LBO Music Director Christopher Rountree, and performed in collaboration with Musica Angelica Baroque Orchestra.

LBO will now open the 2022 season with the opening night of Giustino, followed by The Central Park Five in June. Then in July, LBO will have two weekends of presentations which will replace the first two originally announced productions from this season (STIMMUNG and Quando). On the weekend of July 16th and 17th, LBO will present the inaugural LBO Film Festival, featuring a full weekend of opera films, talks, and live performances, including a world premiere film. The final presentation will feature a weekend of immersive performances, which are still being planned with dates, times, and locations to be announced very soon. Tickets and further information for the two new presentations in July will be available in the coming weeks!

Long Beach Opera is committed to ensuring a safe environment for all of our guests, staff, artists, and crew. These new health and safety measures are designed to maintain an excellent experience for our guests. We encourage you to review the new protocols as you prepare for your visit to LBO. As always, you can contact the LBO Box Office if you have any questions regarding these updates. We greatly appreciate the continued support of our community as we forge on producing live art!