A fully-staged production of Ibarra and Olguín’s fascinating take on “Dracula”, the great Bram Stoker Gothic novel, “Despertar al Sueño” lauches West Bay Opera’s New Opera Works program, designed to showcase outstanding works by Latin American contemporary opera composers and artists.

The story (the title means “Awakening into a dream”) is set in a mental institution. Jonathan Harker, the realtor that travels to Transylvania to settle the sale of an old London mansion to Count Dracula, is imprisoned there after having been convicted of the rape and murder of several women. In Ragnar Conde’s staging, the now classic vampire story is revealed as a kind of romatic allegory of much darker problems, supressed by society in Victorian times. Propelled by Ibarra’s highly atmospheric and captivating score (for just three instruments: clarinet, cello and piano), the work blurs limits and makes us question notions of good and evil, in much the same way as the original novel did, lending a contemporary urgency to the “horror” label.