The best of both worlds.

That’s the best way to describe Carla Huhtanen’s artistic positioning as an opera loyalist who deviated from potential careers as a sought after chanteuse or full flown thespian to pursue a cultural path that, for the most part, brings together a flare for both disciplines.

And with ‘new opera’ demanding more from performers than it ever has in the past, the soprano starlet has discovered arcane fulfillment commandeering the stage not just hitting the highest of high notes but to physically express thought an emotion through movement.

She plays Allegra in Alex Poch-Goldin and Omar Daniel’s premiere of The Shadow on stage this month at the Berkeley Street Theatre. The character lives the life of a sheltered 17-year-old from Barcelona who can see an entire world going on outside her window with no real means to break free from the watchful eye of her austere father.

That is until a wealthy suitor comes around and offers her a way out. Yet there’s more than meets the eye with this transformer and Allegra soon learns that a person can go to extremes to win the love of another.

In real life, Carla Huhtanen seems like she can spot a crafty deceiver from fifty paces away due to her resolute nature and focused approach to the performance art craft.

Has the evolution of opera created superior performers? Can opera change the world as we know it?

The answers to these and other superlative queries are simply a mouse click away.