On Site Opera Presents ‘Il Tabarro’ On South Street Seaport Lightship, ‘Ambrose’

On Site Opera, New York’s opera company specializing in site-specific storytelling and immersive experiences, will present Puccini’s and Adami’s Il tabarro ((The Cloak) on the South Street Seaport Museum’s lightship Ambrose from today through May 17.

On Site Opera describes the one-act opera as “a jealous love triangle that turns deadly on the banks of the Seine River. Staged on the lightship and on the pier where the audience is seated, the historic seaport offers the sights and sounds of 1900’s Paris where barge owner Michele, portrayed by baritone Eric McKeever, suspects his wife Giorgetta, sung by soprano Ashley Milanese, of being unfaithful with dockhand Luigi, sung by tenor Yi Li. Packed with side plots and richly-drawn characters portrayed by tenor Jose Heredia (Tinca), bass-baritone Artega Wright (Talpa), contralto Sharmay Musacchio (La Frugola) and tenor Dane Suarez (Song Seller), the opera reaches its dramatic conclusion when Michele unexpectedly catches his wife’s lover at the strike of a match and strangles him to death.”

Part of the company’s cycle of Puccini’s Il Trittico, Il tabarro will have four 60-minute performances starting at 6:30 p.m. It will be sung in Italian, with English translation available through mobile device.

Founded in 2012, On Site Opera has produced 19 operas in locations including the Bronx Zoo, Harlem’s Cotton Club, Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum, the Atlanta Botanical Garden, the American Museum of Natural History, Holy Apostles Soup Kitchen and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Exploring new technology to make opera more accessible, it also was the first opera company to use Google Glass supertitles.

A National Historic Landmark, the Ambrose was built in 1908 as a floating lighthouse to guide ships safely from the Atlantic Ocean into the Ambrose Channel, the largest shipping channel in and out of the ports of New York and New Jersey. The U.S. Coast Guard donated her to the South Street Seaport Museum in 1968.