With Romanian dignitaries in attendance and only two full rehearsals completed, the University’s Sinfonia da Camera production company presented the American premiere of George Enescu’s opera, “Oedipe,” in a semi-staged performance Saturday evening.

Sponsored by the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts and the College of Fine and Applied Arts, the opera was performed in the Foellinger Great Hall in the Krannert Center.

Based upon the Oedipus myth plays by Sophocles, the opera featured a mix of orchestral music, acting, ballet and vocalist.

Ian Hobson, music director and conductor as well as a professor for the University’s Center for Advanced Study, said that the 2005 performance commemorates the 50th anniversary of George Enescu’s death. Hobson and Ioan-Sherban Lupu, professor of music at the University, collaborated their efforts to orchestrate the event.

“We decided to take the plunge and put on ‘Oedipe’ to honor Enescu,” Hobson said.

Enescu, who was in residence at the University in 1947 and 1950, completed the opera in 1933, and it has since been performed all over Europe. According to Hobson, the first production of the opera in Romania occurred in 1958, just three years after Enescu’s death, and has since been performed in Romania every two years.

Darren Anderson, who received a master’s degree in music from the University in 2003 and sang the role of La‹s in the production, said that Enescu’s strong ties to the University make the Krannert Center an excellent venue for the production.

“It is fitting that the only opera he wrote would be performed here,” Anderson said.