My name is Linda Ginsburg...
I grew up a casual opera fan, courtesy of the Ed Sullivan Show and my mother’s occasional visits to the Academy of Music. The Jewish opera star was in ascendant and she went with her sister to see their figurative mishpocha (family) of Robert Merrill, Richard Tucker, Roberta Peters and her particular favorite, Jan Peerce. Although, truth be told, it was a certain Italian singer with extraordinary good looks and an even more extraordinary voice that the sisters were the most excited to see and hear.
I listened to the Met’s Saturday broadcast on an irregular basis and as I grew older I was an interested fan who tuned in enough to send away for the season broadcast guides. Which is how I got on the Met’s mailing list and in late 1992 received a brochure for the spring 1993 Der Ring des Nibelungen. I decided it was a rare chance to hear the operatic masterpiece of Western music and I would discharge a cultural obligation. Now here I am, having attended the Met’s Otto Schenk production through five presentations and anticipating the new Robert LePage one.
Those four Saturday matinees in April 1993 set me on a path to learn and listen and love opera in a way I could never have imagined. And in 1981 I discovered AVA where it has been a joy to discover so many enormously talented young singers at the beginning of their careers. It has been so much fun to be a regular subscriber and volunteer and I’m delighted to be associated with them as a blogger.
