The Hottest Arts Ticket in Town: Local Girl Scouts Attend Night at the Opera!

Girl Scouts Troop #31293: Samantha Buchy, Kassidy York,
Brooke Perreira and Marissa Marburger.

FEBRUARY 24 – For 24 years, Dayton Opera has opened its doors to Girl Scouts and their leaders for a special behind-the-scenes experience. It’s a community outreach that introduces opera to the next generation. This year was no different with 250 scouts and leaders attending on Friday night and a second performance added on Sunday.

Girl Scout troops including Troop #31293 from Greenville attended the Friday evening performance of Charles Gounod’s ‘Romeo and Juliet’ after completing backstage workshops in wig and make-up design, dance, music and voice.

By completing backstage workshops and attending the Friday evening performance, Girl Scouts from all over the Miami Valley including Greenville, met several badge requirements on the junior and cadette levels, as well as earn a commemorative badge from the Dayton Opera.

This night gives the girls the opportunity to see how a production is put together and how the parts come together like a jigsaw puzzle. Set designers explain through a backstage tour how cables and light fixtures function on stage. Make-up artists from the current performance paint the faces of one young scout according to the characters in that opera. Dancers from the Dayton Ballet perform and teach an interactive dance.

“This is a wonderful opportunity to expose girls to the arts,” according to Deanna York, leader of Troop #31293. “It expands their minds and allows them to grow an appreciation for instrumental music, vocal music including opera, dance and theatrical performance.”

“Since the opera was performed in French, the language of the musical composer, the girls learned several words in a different language as well as a song about a lark, Alouette,” shared York.

“Girl Scout Night at the Opera is just as magical to Dayton Opera as it is to the troop members,” explained General and Artistic Director Tom Bankston. “This is always a great night in the theatre. Their presence injects a different kind of energy in the audience.”

For more information on Girl Scout Night at the Opera, contact Mindy Wallace at 228-7591, ext 3039 or mindy.wallace@victoriatheatre.com. For more information on Girl Scouts of Western Ohio, visit www.GirlScoutsofWesternOhio.org.