After work I headed to the final dress rehersal of Madama Butterfly at the Queen Elisabeth Theater, having been invited there to sketch the performers. Having never been to an Opera, it was a huge inspiration. I set up my giant easel right above the pit band in front of the first row of seats. With the stage on my left and the pit band in front of me I caught enough bounce light from the stage lights to see what I was doing without totally ruining my eyes, though a small clip light would have been helpful
Most of the sketches were done on my giant pad, so I'll scan those ones later when I have access to a better scanner. This wimpy little 8.5X11 thing is way too tiny. Even the medium size sketchpad required multiple passes and comp to get these images you see. Gotta invest in a big ol' flatbed soon ...
Leading man. It was crazy how he used his whole body to project, his head would jut out with each bellowing note
Loved watching the conductor, so well animated
Finished off with a sequence of gestures for the last scene
After that was done I headed down to Pub 340 for the metal show to jar my senses. Tanner was in town for the night so we got a chance to hang. After trying to be quiet so as not to disturb people at the opera I was ready to rip it up, so I pounded a few back and started headbanging while I scrawled faces and poses of the bands and crowd. You can see my inebriation progress in the sketches
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