Opera combines glorious music, beautiful, often extravagant costumes and sets, and singing. What singing! Until you have been to a live performance by an opera singer, you can't really comprehend the feats a human voice is capable of. These vocal magicians have to fill a theater and be heard over an orchestra, without the benefit of a microphone. Recordings just don't convey the power and majesty of an operatic voice in full song.

There is acting too, because this is theater, after all, on a grand scale. Operas are the most expensive of the performing arts to produce. If you have ever been to one, you have seen why.

What it all adds up to is heaven for a shooter like me. There is more action, light, color, and sheer fun and drama in operas than in anything else I've seen on stage.

I also enjoy shooting singers in recital or a masterclass, just to get knocked out by those voices.