Nine years after their daring first premiere, the musical stage show “Opera Queer” is returning to the Buenos Aires theatre scene. The performance looks to expand opera appreciation to a larger audience, all from a distinct transfeminist perspective. 

Starring fraternal twins Ferni and Luchi de Gyldenfeldt, the show challenges musical cultural heritage and traditional gender roles in classical music, reinterpreting arias and opera pieces with elements of popular culture. 

The show, which debuted in 2016, is returning to the Argentine capital after an initial extensive tour of the porteño circuit followed by presentations in multiple other provinces, from La Plata and Mar del Plata in Buenos Aires province to Córdoba, Jujuy, and Santa Fe. 

The “Opera Queer” theater run will kick off on August 2 in the iconic Teatro Picadero (Pasaje Santos Discépolo 1857) and run every Saturday in August except the 9th. Tickets are already available for all four shows. 

The show opens with Luchi, a classically trained lyrical singer, telling the audience the history of opera. Her fraternal twin Ferni, who is also a lyrical singer but a bit more disruptive, is poised to interrupt her and interject other rhythms into her tale in a bid to show that “classical” music can perfectly coexist with other genres. 

The back-and-forth between the twins, who are joined on stage by piano player Jazmín Tiscornia, is an invitation to explore different moments in musical history, with a repertoire that includes arias, chamber duets, zarzuela, and musical theater, as well as Argentine popular music and folklore rhythms like chacareras.

Ferni and Luchi de Gyldenfeldt are both trained musicians, as well as teachers and activists. Ferni completed her studies in the “Ástor Piazzolla” City Conservatory and was the first trans non-binary singer and member of the LGBTIQ+ collective to sing on the Atahualpa Yupanqui stage at the iconic Cosquín Festival folklore event. 

Luchi has a degree in musical arts from the National University of Arts, where she is also a teacher in the first department of “dissident” lyrical singing. She is currently studying a specialization in Baroque opera at the Superior Art Institute of Teatro Colón. 

Cover photo of Ferni and Luchi de Gyldenfeldt (Credit: Lina Etchesuri).