Why Is Everyone Hanging Out in a Santa Fe Parking Lot?
If you are anything like me, you might think of tailgating as a beer-soaked activity that precedes cheering for athletes playing with numbers on their shirts. But in the huge Santa Fe Opera parking lot, dining behind your parked vehicle precedes cheering for players in the orchestra pit and costume-adorned singers on stage.
Although tailgating is usually on a college campus or outside an event venue, the Santa Fe Opera’s parking lot is at an altitude of over 7,000 feet, looking out at the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. The setting offers gold, pink, and purple sunsets splashed across the wide-open western sky. Tailgaters often arrive several hours before the summer opera performances begin and opt for prime parking spots near the theatre in the upper lot. Sometimes, especially on opening nights, ticket holders may dress like characters in the particular opera, so bullfighters, Parisian bohemians, a bird catcher, or even the Queen of the Night may wander past your paella as you dine.
This summer, diners dotted the parking lanes and filled picnic areas before a performance of composer Guiseppe Verdi and librettist Francesco Maria Piave’s 1853 opera, La Traviata. I loved the fact that the dinner crowd spoke about the pleasure of eating and drinking while enjoying the company of friends; then, the opera opened with a lavish Parisian soirée where Violetta, a famed sex worker, sings about her love of partying and pleasure.
Paul Ross
Under a 10×10 foot white tent, eight friends and relatives from Albuquerque pleased their palates with broiled salmon, kale salad with cranberries and parmesan, crisp fresh vegetables, rosemary picked from one of their gardens, corn and avocado salad with black beans and jalapenos. Four of them were lawyers, four were doctors, two were brothers, and they’d all been buddies for 30 years.
Silvia Negrete, one of the women, explained that “every year, we pick one of the operas to see. I chose La Traviata because Italian was my minor in college, and the date worked for all of us.”
Vanessa, a psychologist, recalled an unusual tailgating memory: “Last year, we were the only ones eating here because it was raining, and we had a tent.”
A couple from Denver sat behind a Mustang convertible, which they had rented before coming, so they could have a cool driving experience en route to New Mexico. They packed their Yeti cooler, avoided freeways, and stopped for four days in Taos before spending four days in Santa Fe. They explained that they are casual opera fans, and “after 26 years of marriage, we still love adventure. We ski, we travel, we eat out a lot. For our dinner here, we got couscous curried chicken wraps from Whole Foods Market.” At home, the wife takes care of two teenage kids, and the husband is a radiologist. They were clearly enjoying their vacation.
Another group of tailgaters was composed of eight longtime friends from Dallas and Santa Fe.
“We’re all of like minds when it comes to politics and religion. So, we’re not fighting over food.” They ate take-out sushi and drank sake at a card table decorated with a small horse sculpture. Their jobs in real life include fiber optics education, designing software for regenerative agriculture, and being a publicist.
Paul Ross
“My dad, Joe Bounds, loved opera,” says tailgater Kelley Bounds. “He was stationed in Germany and on restriction for smuggling booze. He broke away from restriction to see Aida in Germany, and he lost his stripes for doing that.”
One of the reasons for coming early to a tailgating meal is to meet folks like these who are partying alongside you.
Before a performance of one of the season’s highlights, Der Rosenkavalier by Richard Strauss with libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal (1911), a gaggle of girlfriends from Colorado Springs was sipping wine and dining on a salmon salad with mango, avocado, tomato, and toasted pecans, with their own salad dressing from bottles that once held rosé. “We aren’t opera fanatics,” they said, “but it’s an event for us.”
Sherry Coutts adorned the table with “a candelabrum that was a wedding gift 50 years ago.” The chairs were provided by Mary Arnold’s son-in-law from the Masters Golf Tournament in Augusta. She was very proud of their provenance. The women went on a House and Garden tour of Santa Fe the day before, and as they explained why they loved it, they offered me some of their rich dessert Napoleons from the La Fonda bakery. As a good reporter with a sweet tooth, I accepted. As I ate, I admired the attire of opera patrons who passed by—one tux, a few sequin tops, a jacket and Bermuda shorts, and elegant Native American jewelry.
A group of Raucci family members from Albuquerque said they got all their food from Tully’s Italian Deli in their hometown. Although the libretto was written in German, the Rauccis dined on Greek and Sicilian subs and drank pomegranate Italian soda. Noah Devan, a nephew from Baltimore, Maryland, sat inside the open hatch of their car, sheltered from rain that was starting to come down, and explained that this was going to be his first opera. I wanted to learn more about this family that dined in the parking lot of the opera once a year, but the light rain turned into a heavy downpour, and they quickly packed up their comestibles. Other diners opened umbrellas, sought shelter in their cars, or ran for the theatre.
Summer is monsoon season in Santa Fe, but no one at the opera was complaining. The audience area is covered, but the opera stage is open on both sides and at the back to reveal a spectacular landscape that includes the Sandia Mountains, the lights of Los Alamos, and the streaks of sunset amid clouds and shadows. When the skies open up, the set, lighting designs, and world-class singers are complemented by startling and unpredictable lightning shows and the bass notes of rolling thunder. They sometimes arrive at appropriate times in the story, but whenever they come, they add to the drama onstage.
On another evening, the parking lot was studded with diners who had come to see Don Giovanni, a 1787 opera by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart with libretto by Lorenzo da Ponte. The title character, more commonly known as Don Juan, was a lothario—a seducer and user of women. He is a cold narcissist who takes pleasure in bedding thousands of women, many of whom are already married or otherwise spoken for. I didn’t see anyone costumed as Don Juan in the parking lot, maybe because some of the diners might have stabbed him with a fork.
A group of three opera fans and one self-described “learner” from Phoenix, Arizona, and Bernalillo, New Mexico, displayed international flair on their table: bison and somen noodles, chicken yakitori, falafel, and lemon hummus.
“The bison is really good,” one of the women volunteered, and another, named Margaret, offered her friends Mediterranean potato salad, cheese, grapes, and spiced peanuts. Like many other diners, their repasts were mainly purchased from local stores that offer take-out and are also partially prepared at their private homes. In prior years, and especially for opening nights, some tailgaters brought meals from several of the high-end restaurants in town. Their tables sometimes looked like they had been prepared for weddings or coronations.
The most glam group of the evening was a group of opera buffs who sat under a white 10×10 foot tent. They came from Santa Fe, Los Alamos, and Berkeley, California.
INSIDER TIPThe opera offers picnic meals as well. They must be ordered by 3 pm, two days prior to the opera. Information about food, opera tickets, and free prelude talks can be found on the website.
Their spread included this year’s top food contender: salmon. This time, it was in a salmon salad with kale. It was accompanied by a sweet and savory charcuterie platter that included French Roquefort, Danish Havarti, English cheddar, prosciutto, pepperoni, and honey. One of the diners, Carrie Blake, from Santa Fe, is a midwife, grant writer, and was a non-denominational missionary in Niger. I asked her what that kind of missionary does. She said her motto was,” show up, drink tea, talk Jesus.”
I was invited to taste any of the cheeses, and I guess this reporter felt that Don Giovanni was such a cheesy character that, in honor of the opera, she said yes.
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