I went to the opera on Saturday at Glimmerglass (being the opera house in the middle of nowhere central new york - ok, near cooperstown
http://www.glimmerglass.org/ ). We all picnicked before hand with plenty of wine and cheese and fruit. And it was apparently the usual Sid and his harem of five or six women... The opera was Gluck's Orphée et Eurydice with the libretto by Ranieri de' Calzabigi (yep, a French opera). The whole thing was fabulously beautiful, the lighting was amazing, and the costuming and sets were also fabulous (ok, I'd make a slight change to the costuming myself, but only slight - I'd make Orphée et Eurydice's costumes about two shades darker than they were), and generally the orchestra was also fabulous (but.... there were about three times I felt they overpowered the singer).... Anyway, here's the big reason I'm posting about this... Orphée is sung by a MALE SOPRANO. His understudy is actually a female mezzo soprano to give you an idea about the range he is singing in and how rare male sopranos are. It also really does not at all sound like he is singing in a falsetto. It just sounds like his natural range.
The rest of the weekend was camping, more bread and cheese, and a brewery tour (with an interactive feature of the guide using my bio skills).