Upcoming Performances

2024

OperaFest
Hansel and Gretel
March 14, 15, 16, 21 & 23, 2025


"Hansel and Gretel" is an opera by nineteenth-century composer Engelbert Humperdinck. The libretto was written in German by Humperdinck's sister, Adelheid Wette, based on the Grimm brothers' fairy tale of the same name. Our production is sung in an English translation.

Hansel and Gretel are the young children of a poor woodcutter. When a famine settles over the land, the woodcutter's wife tells him to take the children into the woods and leave them there to fend for themselves. The woodcutter opposes the plan, but his wife repeats her demands until he reluctantly agrees.

ACT I
Hansel and Gretel, the young children of a poor broom-maker are at home and hungry since the family is nearly out of food. Gretel shows Hansel some milk that a neighbor has given for the family’s supper. Their mother returns and is angry with how little work the children have done. She accidentally spills the milk and chases the children out into the woods to pick strawberries. The father returns home with an unexpected load of food after selling all his brooms at the market. The mother tells him she has sent the children into the woods. The father says there is a dangerous Witch who lives there, and the parents go to look for their children.

ACT II
In the woods, Hansel and Gretel pick strawberries but soon get lost and grow frightened. When night falls, the Sandman comes to bring them sleep. The children say their evening prayer, and while they dream, guardian angels come to protect them.

ACT III
The Dew Fairy wakes Hansel and Gretel when morning comes, and the children discover the Witch’s gingerbread house. The Witch captures the children and makes a plan to eat them. Gretel outwits the Witch, and defeats her by pushing her into her own oven. All the children the Witch captured before are turned back from gingerbread to real people. The mother and father find the children, and all live happily ever after.

Anthony Buck - Director
Dulais Rhys- Music Director, Chorus Master, Accompanist
Debra Gloor - stage and prop Manager
Mary Ann Conners - Costumes
William Stearns - sets

Sarah Waggoner - Gretel
Bethany Smith - Hansel
Mandi Barrus - Gingerbread Witch
Kathryn Clark - Mother
Jan Michael Kliewer - Father
Debra Gloor- Sandman and the Dew Fairy

poster credit Melanie Fabrizius