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Berkshire Opera Festival, playwright Erica Terpening-Romeo, Rep. Jim McGovern

We once again enter THE THEATER.

In Great Barrington, the Berkshire Opera Festival is launching its main-stage production of “Lucia di Lammermoor,” a difficult bel canto classic, on the stage of the Mahaiwe. But the festival does much more than present incredible works as it hones the craft of young singers in the summer months. We speak with festival founder Jonathan Loy and the tragic romantic interest from tenor Lucia Terrence Chin-Loy about the importance of this work and more

In the north Berkshires is a wholly different take on theater and our connections with it. “The Songbook” is a theatrical experiment and expansion, one woman’s curious exploration on where script ends and drama and comedy begin to weave those threads in real time in front of an audience. We speak with the show’s creator and actor Williams College visiting professor Erica Terpening-Romeo about this work and the upcoming performance at 62 Center this weekend.

And, our weekly chat with Rep. Jim McGovern sees the congressman exploring Maine, navigating his recent impromptu visit to a detention center in Plymouth, the local connections to the ongoing federal problems and shortfalls of SNAP, answering listener questions on legislative AI Slop, presidential runs and more.

Christopher “Monte'' Belmonte is host and executive producer of NEPM's The Fabulous 413. He was born and raised in Massachusetts and has been a radio host in western Massachusetts for the last 20 years — the last 17 of them as host of Mornings with Monte on The River 93.9/WRSI.
Kaliis Smith is a radio host and producer for NEPM's The Fabulous 413.