Catherine Lewis reports:<BR>And now for something completely different: Opera! No, wait, keep reading. A group of Washington, DC's most dedicated punk rock devotees are taking their DIY ethic to another medium with The Nitrate Hymnal, a multimedia opera by writer/musician Bob Massey and filmmaker David Wilson. The show will open at the end of the month. <P>The opera is based on the lives of Massey's grandparents, whose 8mm home movies from 1941-1985 serve as the work's source material. The Nitrate Hymnal plays on seen and unseen moments in the couple's life-- throughout, these film relics are complemented by on-stage actors, beginning at the end of their lives and moving backwards to images of the young couple, newly married, innocently playing on a Hawaiian beach (just weeks before the Pearl Harbor attack). Massey (Tsunami, Telegraph Melts, Gena Rowlands Band) has been instrumental in DC's music scene since the 1990s, booking shows and curating a local composer's salon called Punk Not Rock, while Wilson (Kansas Anymore, Magic City) has had his films shown in countless festivals worldwide, including New York's Underground Film Festival.<P>If you haven't tired of the not-so-familiar namedropping yet, try this on for size: The Nitrate Hymnal's all-star orchestra features members of Circus Lupus (Dischord), Skull Kontrol (Touch and Go), HiM, Frodus, Fast Eddie, and folks who perform with Mary Timony, Edith Frost, and Jenny Toomey, among others. Jonathan Kreinik, who has toured relentlessly as a soundman for Trans Am and the Hot Snakes, provides the show's sound design. Now we're ringing some bells. The Nitrate Hymnal will run from January 23rd to January 25th at the George Washington Masonic National Memorial Auditorium in Alexandria, VA. The group hopes to take this show on the road in the spring.<BR>
