The Utah Festival Opera & Theatre will perform "Les Miserables" with a full orchestra

According to Michael Ballam, founding general director of the Utah Festival Opera & Theatre, the festival is one of the last places in America to see classics akin to “Les Misérables” as intended.
“’Les Mis” is huge,” Ballam said. “People here will get to experience it differently than they have any place else because of the full orchestration that we’re using. Our orchestra are principle orchestra players from all over the U.S.”
According to Gary Griffin, managing director of the festival, Broadway shows have a cap of 13 musicians.
“The last time I went to see ‘Oklahoma’ there were 13 musicians in the pit,” Griffin said. “That’s what you get when you go to Broadway.  If you’re lucky you get 13 and most of them are synthesized. We’ll have a full 30, 40 piece orchestra.”
Ballam said that operas require a full ensamble and that enables them to produce the classics as scored.
“We have them because we do opera as well which requires the larger orchestra,” Ballam said. “And we’d like to present the classical musical theater pieces that people can’t experience in the way that they were conceived. That’s part of our mission.”
“Les Misérables” opens July 12th.