‘La Traviata’ preview is April 18

Arizona Opera closes the 2007/2008 season with Verdi’s much beloved opera “La Traviata.”

It will be previewed at 2 p.m. on April 18 at the Rehearsal Hall of the Center for Performing Arts, 1250 W. Continental Road.

Soprano Anna Schoff and tenor David Dickinson will sing excerpts from the opera, accompanied by Dean Schoff. The lecturer will be Iris Arneson, editor of “The Opera Glass.”

The preview is sponsored by the Arizona Opera League. Admission is $5 per person. Refreshments will be served after the presentation.

Anna Schoff began her career at age 19, representing the United States in an exchange with Sweden as the Nightingale “Jenny Lind.”

At the age of 20 she won the Metropolitan Opera National Auditions.

She earned her degrees from the New England Conservatory of Music and the Manhattan School of Music.

She has performed throughout the United States and Europe in over 30 operatic roles, has appeared in recitals and concerts in Oslo, Stockholm, Wiesbaden, and Paris, on PBS, on and off Broadway, and concertized throughout the United States.

Anna is the mother of a multiply handicapped son. She has worked extensively with retarded children and lectured throughout the metropolitan New York area and New Jersey on birth defects.

She currently maintains a successful private duo-voice studio with her husband in Tucson.

She accepts engagements as a motivational speaker emphasizing Self Esteem and Goal Setting, and facilitates and lectures on “Self Esteem and the Performing Artist.”

David Dickinson is a singer turned teacher due to debilitating asthma until an innovative doctor turned the tenor back to his first love, singing opera and performing in concerts.

He is also a talented trombonist and can be heard playing with a Tucson Swing band when he is not singing.

He received his vocal training at Cal State/Fullerton and has sung with the Long Beach Opera, had the tenor part in Handel’s’ “Messiah,” and recently partnered with Soprano Lissa Staples for the Arizona Opera League.

David has performed frequently with the PCC Opera Studio and can be heard as “Tarnino” when Opera Pima presents Mozat’s “Magic Flute” on April 26.

He is a sought-after tenor in the Green Valley area and lives with his wife in Sahuarita.

Available tickets to the two Arizona Opera performances of “La Traviata” at the Tuscon Convention Center Music Hall on Saturday, April 26, at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday, April 27, at 2 p.m. can be obtained at the Arizona Opera Box Office (293-4336) or at a Ticket Master outlet.

Reservations for the Green Valley Opera Shuttle to the Matinee on Sunday, April 27, can be made by calling Trude Raymond, 625-3361.

Cost for the round-trip is $16 per person. Departure is I p.m. sharp from the upper parking lot of the Desert Hills Center on Camino del Sol.