Soprano Lucianna Astorga is the sort of emerging artist who doesn’t wait around for opportunities to present themselves. She’s energetic, persistent, and apparently quite willing to send a follow-up email. Or two. That determination has brought her to Opera Southwest, where she makes her debut as Lola in Cavalleria rusticana.
Lola is one of opera’s more economical troublemakers. She has relatively little music but manages to generate an extraordinary amount of difficulty for everyone else. Married to Alfio, romantically entangled with Turiddu, and not especially troubled by either circumstance, she demonstrates that stage time and dramatic influence are not necessarily correlated.
For Astorga, performing with Opera Southwest is something of a homecoming. A native New Mexican, she has maintained strong ties to the state’s musical community, including appearances in Nathan Felix’s immersive operas at the Albuquerque Museum. Her work has taken her well beyond New Mexico, but there’s something particularly satisfying about seeing a young singer return to perform on a major stage in her home state.
The opera business does occasionally reward persistence. In Lucianna’s case, it has produced a role in which making trouble is practically the entire job. Learn more about Lucianna Astorga here
Cavalleria runs October 25-November 1, 2026
