LoftOpera is back, with a production of La Bohème

Remember LoftOpera, those guys and gals who are making opera cool again? Well, they’re alive and well and living in Paris are all set to do a show about living in Paris. So once you’re done recovering from the commercial oppression of the holiday-that-isn’t-even-a-holiday (I’m talkin’ to you, Valentine’s Day), how about taking some highbrow art in a loft with a view of the city skyline with LoftOpera’s production of La Bohème?

What’s especially exciting about this show is that La Bohème follows “the lives and loves of a group of young artists in Paris at the turn of the century.” Correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m pretty sure that’s just the French musical version of Girls.

Since its inception, LoftOpera—the musical brainchild of Brooklynites Daniel Ellis-Ferris and Brianna Maury—has been cultivating a community of performing artists seeking to feed the need for opera without pandering to the buyer’s market of popular entertainment (i.e. big price tag, but shoddy workmanship). And man, can these cats sing: vocal pipes at LoftOpera’s last production, The Marriage of Figaro, brought the 18-foot-ceiling house down—not to mention featured a live orchestra of twenty-somethings filling the space with an intimate symphony.

Don’t worry about feeling out of place if you’re not familiar with opera: the night has plenty more to offer. A bar serving wine & beer at a meager five bucks a pop and runway-ready costumes (courtesy of Target’s in-house designer Philip Lim) make the night feel more like an artsy kickback than a hoity-toity auditorium. And at just $20 per ticket for the show, LoftOpera beats out the Met by a mile.

Bohème opens this Friday and has performances Friday and Saturday until March 1st at The 1896 Lofts in Bushwick (215 Ingraham Street). They’ve only got four performances, so you’ll want to get your tickets soon: Now that it’s part house party, part catwalk and part badass classical concert, opera’s getting sexier by the minute.