Deinós

By: Editorial Board

This Sunday, August 23, 2026, at 7 p.m., a new edition of Sunday in the Park with Lyric will take place at Jay Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park. The annual summer event brings the Lyric Opera of Chicago to the park for a free concert featuring excerpts from operas and concerts from the company’s upcoming 2026-27 season.

The new Lyric season features seven operas spanning centuries and continents, four concerts—including a special evening with Broadway icon Idina Menzel—two Academy Award-winning films presented live with orchestra, and the return of Lyric’s summer musical with a new production of Guys & Dolls.

This year, the Sunday in the Park program includes selections from Don Pasquale by Gaetano Donizetti (Overture; “Tornami a dir”; “Cheti, cheti, immantinente”), Hérodiade by Jules Massenet (“Ce breuvage pourrait … Vision fugitive”), Don Giovanni by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (“Madamina”; “Là ci darem la mano”), Ariadne auf Naxos by Richard Strauss (“Sein wir wieder gut”), Susannah by Carlisle Floyd (“Ain’t it a pretty night”), Le roi d’Ys by Edouard Lalo (“Puisqu’on ne peut fléchir ces jalouses gardiennes … Vainement ma bien-aimée”), Sapho by Charles Gounod (“Où suis-je … O ma lyre”), and La traviata by Giuseppe Verdi (Prelude to Act 1; “Lunge da lei … De’ miei bollenti spiriti”; “Libiamo”). 

Stars from the new Ensemble of the Patrick G. and Shirley W. Ryan Opera Center will join the Lyric Opera Orchestra for this year’s Sunday in the Park with Lyric program. The performance will be led by Lyric’s dynamic Music Director Enrique Mazzola, alongside Luke Poeppel, the newly appointed conductor of the Ryan Opera Center.

A Surprise in the Program: Sapho by Gounod

Sapho is an opera by Charles Gounod, premiered in 1851 and based on legends surrounding the Greek poet Sappho of Lesbos, her love for Phaon, and her tragic suicide. Despite the presence of the celebrated mezzo-soprano Pauline Viardot in the title role, the opera failed to win over the Paris Opera audience at its premiere. 

The opera’s most famous aria is “O ma lyre immortelle.” The dramatic moment emerges from the opera’s central love triangle. As the program explains: “Sapho loves Phaon, but she has a rival in Glycère, a devious courtesan.” In the final act, Phaon curses Sapho and leaves her forever. She turns to her beloved lyre, lamenting that it can no longer console her as it once did. The aria is the last music heard in the opera, leading to Sapho’s final act as she throws herself into the sea.

The story of Sappho and Phaon has inspired poets, composers, and artists across the centuries. Among the musical works based on the legend are Simon Mayr’s Saffo, an opera from the 18th century, and Giovanni Pacini’s Saffo, composed in the 19th century. In 1902, Cuban poet Mercedes Matamoros published the long poem El último amor de Safo (Sappho’s Last Love). In 1965, Australian-American composer Peggy Glanville-Hicks composed her opera Sappho, based on Lawrence Durrell’s 1950 verse play. 

It is wonderful, then, that Sunday in the Park with Lyric has chosen to include part of this work in its program. From antiquity to the present day, Sappho remains one of those timeless figures who continue to speak to us across centuries and in different artistic forms. Her voice has even reached us through fragments of previously unknown poems attributed to her, discovered in 2004 and 2014.

Our Department and the Lyric Opera

The Department of Languages, Philosophy, Religion, and Cultures (LPRC) at Rockford University has a longstanding connection with the Lyric Opera of Chicago and frequently attends its productions. These visits organized by the Programs of Classics and Spanish often include students, faculty, and staff members, creating opportunities to experience opera not only as performance but also as a subject of study and cultural engagement. In the Fall of 2025, our students and faculty attended Medea by Cherubini at the Lyric.

Our journal, Deinós, periodically publishes reviews and reflections on Lyric productions, ranging from classics such as Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto to contemporary works such as The Listeners. We have also had the opportunity to interview opera artists, including Lisette Oropesa and Levi Hernández, whose experiences offer valuable perspectives on language, performance, and the art of opera.

For us, Sunday in the Park with Lyric is another wonderful way to begin the new academic year and fall semester. Today, some of our Rockford University members will join the Chicago community and enjoy the concert and celebrate the beginning of Lyric Opera’s new season.