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Bringing opera to younger audiences

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There are few things as satisfying as seeing the Wicked Witch get what she deserves.

An audience of youngsters — in ruffled dresses and clip-on ties — erupted into cheers and laughter Saturday morning during the climatic last acts of the Pacific Symphony’s remake of the Engelbert Humperdinck opera “Hansel and Gretel.”

“They loved it,” said Assistant Conductor Maxim Eshkenazy while sitting backstage in between the show’s 10 and 11:30 a.m. performances. “I can always tell when I see the kids turn and talk to their mothers and the smiles on their faces.”

The performances, which ran 45 minutes and were held at the Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall, were part of the symphony’s ongoing Family Musical Mornings series.

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“Sometimes, more often than not, it’s the first time the kids are touched by live music, period,” Eshkenazy said. “The only music they’ve heard is on the TV and the radio. This is the first time they go and hear the sound coming out of a live orchestra.”

Eshkenazy and Andreas Kraemer, who sang baritone as the narrator and father roles, led the audience in an interactive education segment at the beginning of the performance in which key vocabulary — “aria,” “soprano,” and “mezzo soprano,” to name a few — were defined for the potential future opera patrons.

“There is a wide range of music available,” said Phil Chap, an organist for First Christian Church of Orange, after the event. “I’d like my kids to understand as much of it as possible and let them choose what they like.”

Chap, who was with his wife, Chie, and two children, Camille, 7, and Ethan, 5, said that the family has attended all of the 2011-2012 season of Family Musical Mornings.

The “Nutcracker For Kids,” which was performed Dec. 8, was a favorite of the season thus far, but the soaring voices and enthusiasm of “Hansel and Gretel,” performed by mezzo-soprano Danielle Marcelle Bond and soprano Shira Renee Thomas, respectively, held a certain kind of fairy tale magic for young Camille.

“I liked how high Gretel’s voice goes,” said Camille, who sings at home frequently, according to her parents. “And I also like the costumes and the makeup.”

The opera was different from other performances a seasoned opera aficionado might attend.

Not only was it shorter to maintain the interest of its target audience, ages 4 to 12, but the Pacific Symphony also placed its orchestra up on stage, behind the singers, to add to the energy of the performance.

The Family Musical Mornings concludes May 12 with “Happily Ever After?” The production, also conducted by Eshkenazy, includes pieces from Tchaikovsky’s “Sleeping Beauty.”

The family series picks up again in October for the 2012-2013 season.

“We want kids to experience music in [the] purest way possible, in a way that they can understand it and feel it in their hearts,” Eshkenazy said. “If I can turn one child onto classical music, then I have done my job.”

sarah.peters@latimes.com

Twitter: @speters01

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