There will be no Valkyries circling VFW Post 76 when The Falling and the Rising makes its February 2027 debut in San Antonio. The chamber opera trades Wagnerian spectacle for something more familiar to Military City USA: the story of a wounded soldier.

The 80-minute opera runs will be staged at four unconventional San Antonio locations. A free preview takes place February 2 at the downtown VFW post (10 10th St.), followed by a full production at Boeing Center at Tech Port (3331 General Hudnell Dr.) on February 4. Opera San Antonio will also run two private performances for the military community at Brooke Army Medical Center and the Fort Sam Houston Theatre.

Although wartime stories are part and parcel with opera, this one came from the ranks. In 2015, Ben Hilgert, a tenor in the U.S. Army Field Band's Soldiers' Chorus, pitched the idea of telling the Army's story through the form. Composer Zach Redler and librettist Jerre Dye took on the challenge, basing the text on interviews with active-duty service members, veterans, and families.

The finished work follows Soldier, an unnamed service member critically injured by a roadside bomb. Placed in a medically induced coma, she drifts through a dreamlike series of encounters with fellow troops on the road to recovery.

The story is not the only military connection. In the pit, Orchestra San Antonio musicians will play beside active-duty soldiers from "Fort Sam's Own,” the 323d Army Band. Local expert Dr. Alan L. Peterson and Strong Star at UT Health San Antonio will lead post-show conversations on PTSD, traumatic brain injury, and caregiving.

And Opera San Antonio is forming a chorus of veterans, active-duty troops, and military families to help bring The Falling and the Rising to life. Auditions will be held November 21 at downtown’s Radius Center (106 Auditorium Circle) from 10am-5 pm. No choral or operatic experience is required.

"The Falling and the Rising is not simply an opera about military service — it is a project built from military voices, performed alongside members of the military community, and designed to create connection between those who serve, the families who serve beside them, and the broader city," said E. Loren Meeker, Opera San Antonio's executive director, in a release.

Tickets to the Boeing Center production are $18.62 for the general public. Limited free tickets will be available to service members and veterans through VetTix.

Hilgert, who will produce the San Antonio run and sing the role of Jumper, hopes San Antonio audiences will see themselves on the stage.

“San Antonio is a city where those stories are not abstract,” he said in a statement. “They are your neighbors, your coworkers, your family. Bringing the opera here, where service runs through the whole community, feels like bringing it home.”