Parkdale performer takes stage in original opera

Parkdale performer takes stage in original opera. Saphire Demitro, a 24-year-old Parkdale resident, will take the stage as Sarah in an original opera called Obeah Opera which runs at 918 Bathurst in the Annex Feb. 22 to March 3. Photo/COURTESY

"One of the reasons I love bands like that is because they are very theatrical," she said. "They take you away."

With this love of music and theatre it was only natural, she said, that she would end up perusing a career in musical theatre.

While growing up in Parkdale, where she still lives with her family, Demitro's dad was a rock singer in a cover band.

"I was brought up in band rehearsals and I stole the (microphone) from him when I was about three years old and never stopped (singing) since then."

It was after her parents took her to see the musical Miss Saigon when she was six that Demitro said she decided on a career in musical theatre.

"I just have this love for music, I have since I was a child," she said. "I can't see myself doing anything else."

Demitro attended the Etobicoke School for the Arts and has been involved in a number of community productions. She said she didn't quite fit in at the school because she sang rock-and-roll.

"That wasn't typical for someone who walks into a musical theatre program, so I was different," she said. "But I think it (helped) shape me as a performer."

She also worked with the Toronto Youth Theatre, which Demitro said prompted her to go to college and study musical theatre. She graduated from St. Clair College's Musical Theatre Performance program in May.

Classically, she would be considered a lyric soprano, but Demitro said she considers herself more of a dabbler who wants a little of that as well as a little jazz with pop and rock mixed in.

Now Demitro will take the stage in her first paid production Obeah Opera, an original opera that will have its world premier Feb. 22.

When she auditioned for Obeah Opera, Demitro said she didn't know what she was walking into, but the experience has been magical - much like the feeling she said the audience will experience after seeing the production.

Set in the late 17th century, Obeah Opera follows Tituba and a handful of Caribbean women imported as slaves into the American colony of Salem, who are accused of practicing obeah, a healing art seen only as blasphemy and witchcraft through the eyes of the local Puritans.

"Tituba, who is kind of the light of the show, comes off the boat, has no idea where she is and there are three other slave women who have been living in Salem and know the rules," Demitro explained. "Slowly they get pulled into this witch hunt and get put on trial."

Demitro plays a woman named Sarah, a beggar who, when refused, would curse people under her breath.

"They accused her of being a witch and casting spells," Demitro said.

The women aren't witches, but they practice healing.

"Because it is unknown to the people of Salem, they call it witchcraft," she said. "Because they are in the forest finding herbs and roots and praying to something these people think is evil."

This original work was penned by Nicole Brooks, who is not only the creator but also composer, librettist and a performer in Obeah Opera.

"It is not opera in the classical sense of the word," Demitro explained. "It is not high and soprano-ie, but it is an opera because it is completely sung through."

"The music just takes you and grabs a hold of you and doesn't let you go until the very end," she said. "I think people are in for a real treat with this show."

The show, sung in complete a capella form and performed by a cast of 15, is about two hours long with a 15-minute intermission and is being staged at the 918 Bathurst Centre for Culture, Arts, Media and Education, an old church at 918 Bathurst St.

"I think it is the perfect space because they are not in our world, we are in theirs, we are in the Puritans' land," she said. "And I think the way we're interpreting it is that it is not witchcraft, it is fear of the unknown."

Obeah Opera runs until March 4 and tickets are available at www.obeahopera.com