Irene and I were in Wooster, Ohio last weekend attending three operettas put on as part of the Ohio Light Opera‘s 2012 season. Irene’s been wanting to go for years, and this year we finally made it happen. The company’s appeal to us isn’t its productions of such shows as The Mikado—I mean, I’m sure they did an excellent job, but if you have a hankering to see The Mikado, it’s not that difficult a thing to do wherever you happen to be—but in lesser performed shows, such as Emerich Kálmán’s Miss Springtime, which I believe hasn’t been performed anywhere in the world since the mid-’90s.

One thing I’ve got to say about attending performances of old-timey operettas—doing so sure made me feel young! I was one of the few guys in the audience who was neither bald nor wearing a toupee. Plus, I didn’t need a cane or walker to make it to my seat. I was a kid again!

Mentioning all the geezers who were there probably isn’t the best way to convince you to also head to the Ohio Light Opera, but still, you should. There’s a reason these were such smashes in their day, which means not only will you be able to enjoy some stellar performances, you can also try to figure out why they were such major hits.

I wish I could share recordings of the Ohio Light Opera productions, but since those don’t exist, here are some other singers performing numbers from the three shows we saw.

The Chocolate Soldier

When George Bernard Shaw gave permission for his 1894 play Arms and the Man to be adapted into an operetta, he made three conditions: “None of Shaw’s dialogue, nor any of the character’s names, could be used; the libretto must be advertised as a parody; and Shaw would accept no monetary compensation.” When the operetta opened on November 14, 1908, the song “My Hero” became an immediate hit. Here it is performed by Beverly Sills and Sherrill Milnes.

Miss Springtime

Die Faschingfie (The Carnival Fairy), now known as Miss Springtime, opened in Budapest on February 23, 1915. It’s rarely performed, as is shown by the fact that the only recording I could find is from 1916.

A Connecticut Yankee

Rogers and Hart’s adaptation of the Mark Twain novel opened November 3, 1927, was revived on Broadway November 17, 1943, and features the wonderfully evil number “To Keep My Love Alive,” which has been performed by Ella Fitzgerald, Nancy Walker, and in the instance below, by the caustic Elaine Stritch.

We can’t wait to see what the Ohio Light Opera has planned for 2013. As far as we’re concerned, the more obscure the better!