By: Rebecca Zimmerman, Copy Editor

Feb. 28, Furman Lyric Theatre presented an Operatic Double Feature: “Dido and Aeneas,” co-presented with the Furman Chamber Choir, and “The Medium” by Gian Carolo Menotti. Both one-act operas, sung in English and directed by Professor Grant Knox, showed off the talent of Furman’s student musicians and the possibilities of the Lyric Opera’s lighting design, led by Matthew Leckenbusch.

While snow days prevented the operas’ first performance Feb. 26 and diminished rehearsal time between its performers and orchestra, “Dido and Aeneas” fully presented the story of Dido, the widowed Queen of Carthage, and her ill-fated love affair with the Trojan Prince Aeneas from “The Aeneid.” Dido, junior Jessie Barnett, entertains the handsome and shirtless Aeneas, junior Walter Godfrey, before falling prey to the plots of a Sorceress, junior Alicia Russell, to separate the couple, ensure Dido’s death, and make Carthage burn.

The Furman Chamber Choir filled the stage in McAlister Auditorium, dressed in black against the color-changing backdrop, used stylized movements mimicking ancient theatre traditions to portray Dido’s court, Aeneas’ sailors, and the cackling fiends of the Sorceress.

In “The Medium,” Madame Flora, junior Kristen Murdaugh, and her daughter, senior Katy Wilson, pose as a medium summoning ghosts from beyond the veil. The opera takes a cautionary note, however, as Madame Flora takes on a mute lodger, Toby, played by sophomore Mason Lambert. Then, she and her clients begin to experience their own haunting, unexplained phenomena which may or may not be caused by Toby. After Madame Flora shoots and kills Toby, she and the audience will never know.