OPERALAND

OPERALAND follows Richie Verdun, a funny, fearless little dynamo, as he enters the glamorous and treacherous world of opera facing almost impossible odds. He's in his early forties, unusually old for a beginner, and without the benefit of either musical or theatrical training. To make matters worse, this irrepressible fireplug of a man is overly fond of inappropriate, almost infantile jokes that are wildly out of place in his sophisticated new surroundings. We first meet him as a hustling car salesman in upper Michigan, deeply devoted to his literate and caring wife Kit and their three young children. When his family urges him to try his luck as an operatic tenor, he enters a world that is utterly foreign to him. The struggle is intense and rejections proliferate, but Richie's energy and ambition never desert him. A seemingly ordinary man unleashes his inner artist and discovers a new way of life.

OPERALAND follows Richie Verdun, a funny, fearless little dynamo, as he enters the glamorous and treacherous world of opera facing almost impossible odds. He's in his early forties, unusually old for a beginner, and without the benefit of either musical or theatrical training. To make matters worse, this irrepressible fireplug of a man is overly fond of inappropriate, almost infantile jokes that are wildly out of place in his sophisticated new surroundings. We first meet him as a hustling car salesman in upper Michigan, deeply devoted to his literate and caring wife Kit and their three young children. When his family urges him to try his luck as an operatic tenor, he enters a world that is utterly foreign to him. The struggle is intense and rejections proliferate, but Richie's energy and ambition never desert him. A seemingly ordinary man unleashes his inner artist and discovers a new way of life.

Ian Strasfogel is an author, opera director and impresario, who has created over a hundred productions of opera and music theater in European and American opera houses and music festivals. Well known for his frequent collaborations with composers Gyoergi Ligeti, Luciano Berio, Bruno Maderna, Hans Werner Henze and the visual artist Otto Piene, he has written numerous plays, libretti and scenarios. IGNACE STRASFOGEL- THE REDISCOVERY OF A WUNDERKIND has been published in English and German by Hentrich & Hentrich Verlag, Leipzig. OPERALAND is his first novel.