Calgary Opera has announced a 2007-08 season that features a Canadian premiere, a world premiere and an appearance by Dame Kiri Te Kanawa.

Te Kanawa, the world renowned Maori soprano, will sing in Calgary Sept. 26 as part of her farewell tour.

New Zealand-born Dame Kiri Te Kanawa performs in New York in May 2006. She will include Calgary in her farewell tour. New Zealand-born Dame Kiri Te Kanawa performs in New York in May 2006. She will include Calgary in her farewell tour.
(Stephen Chernin/Associated Press)

After a celebrity start, the season delivers audience favourites such as Rigoletto and Tosca, and takes some risks with modern works, including one developed in its own emerging artists' workshop.

The Hannaraptor, a new one-act opera for young audiences, will have its world premiere a year from now as part of Calgary Opera's development program.       

"People in Toronto, people in Vancouver and Montreal — they all have such a respect for Calgary as a leader in bringing new works to Canada," Michelle Ketke, who is singing the role of Hannah, said in an interview with CBC Radio.
 
The Hannaraptor, written by Allan Gilliland and Val Brandt, is Calgary Opera's fourth world premiere in six years and will tour Alberta schools.

Once devoted to the classics, Calgary Opera is increasingly basing its reputation on Canadian and world premieres, including this year's Frobisher, a new opera about the Arctic explorer.

As part of that strategy, the company will present the Canadian premiere of The Ballad of Baby Doe, an American classic about love, power, scandal and financial ruin set in a Colorado mining town in the 1880s.

The all-Canadian cast features soprano Valdine Anderson, baritone John Fanning, mezzo-soprano Elizabeth Turnbull, bass baritone John Avey and mezzo-soprano Marcia Swanston.

After Te Kanawa, the spotlight will be on Guiseppe Verdi's Rigoletto, the story of a scheming court jester who seeks to protect his daughter from a womanizing duke, directed by Glynis Leyshon and conducted by Timothy Vernon.

Dahl returns

Soprano Tracy Dahl, who starred in Don Pasquale in 2003, returns to Calgary in the role of Gilda, tenor David Pomeroy plays the Duke of Mantua, mezzo-soprano Norine Burgess is Maddalena and baritone Richard Paul Fink makes his Calgary Opera debut as Rigoletto.

Another classic of love and loss, Puccini's Tosca, closes the season. It will be conducted by Robert Dean with Canadian soprano Michele Capalbo making her Calgary debut as Tosca.

Opera is striking a chord with many Calgarians, general director Bob McPhee said after announcing the new season Wednesday.
 
The Calgary Opera has had several sellouts in the past few seasons.

"In Calgary, it's the best place to be right now. We've got amazing growth of our population …they're educated and they have the serious income that goes along with that education. This is the perfect place for opera to grow and blossom," he said.