Opera Club of The Villages

The Opera Club of The Villages encourages all lovers of quality music who are residents of The Villages, Florida to attend our regular monthly meetings and the special performances scheduled. You do not have to sing or know anything about opera. Although "Opera" is in our name, we embrace a variety of good music including Broadway, Classical, Theater and yes, Opera. Members as well as visitors are welcome.

The mission of the Opera Club is to raise donations from members, friends, and organizations. We also sponsor special fund raising events, all in an effort to fund the Harold S. Schwartz Music Scholarships. Each year, scholarships are awarded to graduating high school seniors from Lake, Marion and Sumter Counties, who are planning to pursue music education in college.

Learn more about making a donation to support our Scholarship Fund.

In addition to checking the calendar on this website and the Recreation News of The Villages "Daily Sun," you may also receive advance notice of upcoming events, as well as news about the club by joining our email notification list.

To join our mailing list, become a member, or change your contact information - click on the "Get Printable Membership/Donation Form" button available at the bottom of every page.

Dear Friends,

As we wrap up another year, I'm so happy to report that we met our goals for 2020. In spite of the Covid limitations, the Opera Club held its "Three Tenors Plus One" annual fundraiser at The Sharon Morse Performing Arts Center in February, and we awarded four generous music scholarships in April.

Scholarship Chair, Marty Taylor presented the option of conducting "virtual"auditions for music scholarships to the Opera Club Board. The decision to shift to online auditions from in-person auditions was due to the virus limitations, and safety of the students and judges. 12 applicants sent in cell phone videos. Thanks to the generous loan of Central Florida Lyric Opera's technology platforms we were able to make it all happen online.

In addition to awarding four Scholarships, two $1,000 Encouragement Awards were also given in honor of past presidents, Marie Walsh and Angelo Pierro, who past away this past year. We also awarded $3,000 in honor of Opera Club Founder, Oscar Feliu, to two Charter High School seniors who emulated Oscar’s philosophy of assisting the schools Music Department throughout their high school years.

Since it’s beginning, the Opera Club has awarded more than $590,000 in Music Scholarships to eligible students from Marion, Lake and Sumter counties who pursue music career at the college and university level.

At our May 27th, instead of our usual live presentations by the four scholarship winners, the winning student's videos were made available on this website and the audience was presented an outstanding musical program by the musical professionals from Central Florida Lyric Opera.

Annual board of director elections were conducted by Roy Ulrich and the results are posted on this website.

I am also very excited to announce that Bill Peck has agreed to assume our growing Information Technology (IT) duties.

Next season, we intend to reach out to the residents in Villages South. Perhaps by presenting a musical program designed by Maestro Bill Doherty to be performed at the Everglades Recreation Center where we can introduce our new neighbors to the Opera Club of the Villages and our Harold S. Schwartz Music Scholarship Program.

Everyone is invited to attend our next meeting at Laurel Manor on Thursday, September 23rd, at 6:30PM.

Best wishes to our fantastic members and friends for a relaxing , enjoyable summer. Thank you so much for your generous contributions to the Harold S. Schwartz Music Scholarship Program.

Without you, we wouldn’t be here.

May God Bless you Always.

Gerri Piscitelli, President