Arts+Culture North Texas

Dallas opera’s season opener Aida stars Texas-born soprano Latonia Moore.

Photo courtesy Dallas Opera.

It is the stuff of dreams. Understudy goes on at the last minute. Important performance. Internationally broadcast over the radio. Wows the audience. Endless ovation as the curtain falls. Press raves. Career launched into the stratosphere overnight. The next day, agent’s phone rings off the hook. Booked for years in the future.

Is there a performer alive who hasn’t had this vision? We’ve even seen it in the movies.

It happened in 1943 when Leonard Bernstein, the brash fresh-faced assistant conductor of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra made a last minute conducting debut, without rehearsal, when an ailing Bruno Walter canceled.

It happened again in March of this year. That is when, Latonia Moore, the girl from Houston, who started out singing in the New Sunrise Baptist Church and studied at the University of North Texas, first stepped onto the stage at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York, as a last minute replacement in the title role of Verdi’s Aida — and without rehearsal — for the internationally broadcast final performance.

Not only is this the dream of every soprano, this is the dream role of all sopranos (who are able to sing it). She created a sensation. As Anthony Tommasini wrote in a review published on March 4, 2012, “When Ms. Moore took her solo curtain call at the end, she received an ecstatic ovation…this was Ms. Moore’s day. Bouquets were tossed, cheers rang out, and she looked overcome with excitement.”