LAKE HUNTINGTON, NY — Brooke Schooley’s performance at the Delaware Valley Opera Company (DVOC) this weekend might have a different feel. She’s exploring the years she spent helping to care for her parents. But it will still be Schooley, a veteran of the DVOC and other regional opera companies, and the audience has a chance to connect anew.

“Maddened by the Stars” will take place from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. on Saturday, September 23 at the Nest.

Schooley will perform her one-woman show sharing classical, popular and cabaret songs, as well as stories about losing one’s bearings. 

In a newsletter from the DVOC, Schooley offered backstory. 

“During the last decade,” she wrote, “a lot of my energy was spent organizing the care of my parents, both of whom experienced dementia in their final years. They were living in the rural Ohio house in which I grew up. I flew home for several days each month, during which I made many many many lists. We FaceTimed daily. We invested in all sorts of safety devices to keep them at home. We pieced together a team of incredible caregivers who ended up being with us for five years.”

 Still, Schooley wrote, calamities happened. Memory blurs some into funny stories, and other events were not funny at all.

“It was organized chaos,” she wrote.

“These are personal details, but they help put the show into context. The first half is a recital of classical art songs about evening and nighttime, including a narrative of why these songs have come to have new meaning for me both metaphorically and literally.”

Casual cabaret dominates the second half, framed, Schooley wrote, with stories about her parents.

Life changes the way you see, hear—or perform—a piece.

“My experiences are not unique. But singing about them is. We do not often see these stories featured in the creative arts,” she wrote.

Not a cabaret fan? That’s all right. The DVOC and Schooley hope you will come for the stories and the sharing.

“My hope is that they will see themselves and get a little bit of a boost,” Schooley wrote.

The Nest is located at 6692 State Rte. 52.

 Tickets cost $20 each. Purchase them at https://myrivertickets.com/events/brooke-schooley-in-concert-9-23-2023.

About the Nest

The Nest will offer a large variety of entertainment year-round in a comfortable, friendly setting—a fun place for serious artists, a spokesperson said. 

All are invited to join friends at a table, and have a few drinks and small plates while enjoying the performances.