Get Involved: Events

HCO’s season also includes several events not oriented around performing! These events include the Annual Opera Gala, Alumni Brunch, and variously named Matinée children’s meet-and-greets, which all accompany the mainstage production, as well as our open social events, screenings, and outings, often provided in collaboration with other organizations and the Office for the Arts at Harvard.

These events are not only a source of fun to accompany and enrich our artistic season, but also a key means of building community around opera, classical music, and art on campus by embracing settings and activities with the lowest possible barriers to entry in terms of experience or background.

Explore ways to get involved with HCO’s season of casual, non-performing-arts events below.

Boston and Cambridge are both home to thriving music and performing arts scenes, and there are countless amazing productions occurring somewhere within the greater metropolitan area at any moment. HCO seeks to make experiencing this broader arts and music scene more accessible by reducing the financial barriers to attending performances and by organizing community around such events.
In keeping with our mission of spreading the art of opera on Harvard University campus, HCO has often sponsored outings to live performances of operas, though we have also organized outings to other performances in classical music, dance, and other performing arts. HCO also occasionally organizes outings to live, in-theatre broadcasts of operas, such as those in the Metropolitan Opera Live in HD series.
Past outings and showings have included:
- Cavalleria Rusticana (Boston Lyric Opera)
- Die Zauberflöte (Isango Ensemble)
- The Handmaid’s Tale (Boston Lyric Opera)
If there is a performance or showing coming up that you would like to see HCO organize an outing to attend, please reach out to our Social Chairs at events.harvardcollegeopera@gmail.com.
Harvard College Opera puts on semi-regular, informal screenings of operas each year as a way to build community, as well as offer a safe, casual, and enjoyable setting for members of the wider Harvard community to engage with the art of opera — sometimes for the very first time.
HCO regularly hosts internal socials for all members of its productions, and the company is also expanding to collaborate with other artistic groups on campus to organize open socials and mixers aimed at strengthening ties across the Harvard arts community and establishing new connections across organizations and disciplines.
If you our your organization would like for us to host, or would like to collaborate with us in hosting, a screening, social, or mixer in the near future, please reach out to our Social Chairs at events.harvardcollegeopera@gmail.com.
The Harvard College Opera’s biggest planned event of the year, the Annual Opera Gala brings together our friends and family with students, alumni, and audience members from across the arts world for an evening of music, merriment, and refreshments in the spirit of the timeless art of opera. Held in the Horner Room across the hall from the Agassiz Theatre mainstage, it typically* follows the final Saturday evening performance of our winter opera and is open to and attended by students, alumni, parents, and all manner of opera-goers alike.
An all-inclusive, ticketed, black-tie event whose planning begins months in advance, the Opera Gala includes food (cheese and charcuterie boards, desserts, hors d’œuvres), drinks (including champagne), a step-and-repeat Harvard College Opera banner with a professional photographer, music (occasionally live), and usually some form of fundraising (such as a silent auction or the sale of HCO-branded or show-specific merchandise). The event is usually structured in two contiguous phases, beginning with an atmosphere comparable to a cocktail reception and ending analogously to a wedding party. Ticketing for the event is coordinated by the Harvard Box Office, though tickets are also sold at the door.
If you would like to contribute to the Annual Opera Gala (for example, by supporting or partnering with the Harvard College Opera in a sponsorship capacity), please reach out to our events team at events.harvardcocollegeopera@gmail.com.
* Note: In 2022, we decided to hold the 5th Annual Opera Gala and G&S Victorian Ball as a collaborative effort with the Harvard-Radcliffe Gilbert & Sullivan Players to work with the conditions presented by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Held the morning of the final Saturday evening performance of our winter mainstage opera, the annual alumni brunch is an opportunity for alumni who have come to see our performance to gather, reconnect with one another, and meet the current undergraduate members of our Board of Operators.
If you are an alumn who plans to see our next opera in person and would like to be kept apprised of any plans regarding the alumni brunch, please reach out to our alumni chair at alumni.harvardcollegeopera@gmail.com.
HCO very often stages operas with aesthetics of magic, fantasy, and other themes beloved by the children in our audience. When we stage such operas, we typically devote our final Sunday matinée performance to all the families in our audience, following the show with a dedicated children’s meet-and-greets where our cast members remain available in costume to speak and take photos with our youngest fans.
We provide light child-friendly snacks (including gluten- and allergen-free options), beverages, and, of course, the beautiful daylight ambiance of the Horner Room. We would love nothing more than to kindle an enduring passion for opera in every one of our audience members, and we’ve learned from parents that the opportunity to see and meet performers up close can be a uniquely exciting experience for young children, with the potential to leave a lasting impression and kindle precisely that passion from an early age.
Recent years’ meet-and-greets include:
- The Fairytale Matinée, for Cendrillon (2019)
- The Fantasy Matinée, for Die Zauberflöte (2020)
If you plan to attend a family matinée and have requests of questions regarding accommodations that we can make for your child — e.g. planning for any uncommon or severe allergies or food sensitivities, arranging a darker or less stimulating environment, making additional preparations to ensure accessibility across language barriers or vision/hearing impairments, etc. — please don’t hesitate to reach out to our event coordinators at events.harvardcollegeopera@gmail.com and to our chair for belonging, inclusion, and accessibility at belonging.harvardcollegeopera@gmail.com. We’d be delighted to hear from you any steps we can take to ensure the very best experience possible for your child!