THE ESSENTIAL A&E PICKS FOR JAN 19 - 25 

• Fort Worth Opera

Utah Opera: The Daughter of the Regiment
For some folks, the very concept of "opera" is tied to tragedy—to soaring arias expressing grief and despair, and plots built around death and loss. That notion ignores a long and rich tradition of more lighthearted opera buffa fare, which inevitably involves business like mysterious parentage, lovers trying to work around obstacles and outrageous misunderstandings.

You'll find plenty of that kind of material in The Daughter of the Regiment, the 1840 opera by Gaetano Donizetti based on a French libretto. It's the story of Marie, a young woman who has been adopted by a regiment of French soldiers during the Napoleonic Wars. She falls in love with Tonino, a soldier from the opposing forces who has saved her life, inspiring complications as Tonino finds himself needing to win the approval of battlefield enemies. But the c,ourtship between Marie and Tonino faces another road block when a connection to Marie's birth family is found in a wealthy marquise, Marie's aunt, who resolves to take in the woman who has been raised among coarse soldiers and make her a real "lady."

If you believe that there might still be more twists and turns ahead before Marie and Tonino live happily ever after, you're ready to delight in the music and the engaging story. Utah Opera's production of The Daughter of the Regiment wraps up this week with performances Wednesday, Jan. 18 (7 p.m.), Friday, Jan. 20 (7:30 p.m.) and Sunday, Jan. 22 (2 p.m.) at the Capitol Theatre (50 W. 200 South). Tickets are $15 - $110; visit utahopera.org for tickets and additional event information. (Scott Renshaw)

• Courtesy Photo

Love in the Abstract @ "A" Gallery
Heading into February and its frequent Valentine's Day theme, it's important to remember how many different ways there are of thinking about the concept of love. Especially where artistic work is concerned, capturing what "love" is can involve much more than an anatomically-incorrect representation of a heart, or bucolic scenes of partners at play. Love itself defies easy definition, and exists only as an abstract concept imbued with our own individual meanings. So it seems more than fitting that "A" Gallery's group exhibition, running through Valentine's Day week, takes an abstract view of whatever it is that the represented artists happen to be expressing love for at a given moment.

Love in the Abstract is a group show presenting the work of several different artists represented by the gallery. David Adams' images in acrylic and pastel turn individual blips of color into something resembling close-up, pixelated photos. Andy Taylor's oil on linen work evokes landscapes through large swathes of color that forces attention onto the finer details. Emily Robinson casts surreal hues onto her portraits of the natural world. And Brent Godfrey ("Quilt" is pictured) explores a wide range of media to cast the real world into the abstract.

Love in the Abstract runs Jan. 20 – Feb. 18 at "A" Gallery (1321 S. 2100 East), with an artist reception on Friday, Jan. 20, 6 p.m. – 9 p.m. Regular gallery operating hours are 10 a.m. – 5 p.m. Monday – Saturday; the exhibition is free and open to the public. Visit agalleryonline.com for additional information on represented artists. (SR)

• Courtesy Photo

Depths of Wikipedia @ Wiseguys
The web can be bewildering at times. Social media, YouTube and all things having to do with the internet can take you down a rabbit hole from which there's often no escape. Take Wikipedia, for example. Granted, you can find just about anything you want to explore—and many things you don't—on that know-it-all platform. Thankfully, then, Depths of Wikipedia takes audiences to the far reaches of this all-too-popular online encyclopedia. It illuminates the strange and interesting facts Wikipedia has to offer, from the obvious to the obscure.

It originated on Instagram as a personal project in 2020 by Annie Rauwerda, a University of Michigan student whose social-media accounts share excerpts from various Wikipedia articles that specifically pertain to strange, surprising, weird and wacky subjects—including, but not limited to, exploding trousers, Nuclear Gandhi, chess on really big boards and, perhaps most curious of all, certain popes' sex drives. In addition to the live Depths of Wikipedia comedy show, she's also hosted a Wikipedia editing workshop, and even launched a newsletter that furthers her fascination. Since anyone can offer additions to a Wikipedia entry, it's all pretty practical as well as enticing. In fact, Rauwerda says she gets any number of suggestions for topics to feature in her show. Can Encyclopedia Britannica or the World Book Encyclopedia claim the same? It's safe to say Wikipedia's popularity outpaces them both.

Depths of Wikipedia Live visits Wiseguys Gateway (194 S. 400 West) at 7 p.m. on Tues, January 24. Tickets for the 21 + show cost $25. Visit wiseguyscomedy.com for tickets and additional event information. (Lee Zimmerman)