THE OPERA OF TIMUR

Particularly impressive in the central role, the young Kazakh-American, Los Angeles based tenor Timur above gave a lovely performance, a calm center in the midst of the craziness, looking as if he had wandered in from a Soviet silent film version of Candide. It would be fun to see him with his glam-rock band Timur and The Dime Museum. Review by Richard Loranger "Because opera is voice, and the voices literally blew us away. In particular Timur Bekbosunov, an LA-based Kazakh-A

The music, performed by a small, agile orchestra neatly conducted by Bryan Nies, is a captivating mixture of minimalist arpeggios coupled with jazz. There’s also a little Eastern European styling thrown in for good measure. The talented cast, which includes the inimitable soprano Laura Bohn as Fefjulka and the rich-voiced mezzo Nikola Printz as Our Mama (and in the last act, Stalin), performs the work’s many duets and trios with precision and passion. Tenor Timur Bekbosunov