Detroit Free Press Mark Stryker Music column MARK STRYKER Listen in on MOT gala

Michigan Opera Theatre marked the 10th anniversary of the opening of Detroit Opera House last April with a gala recital under the banner of "A Decade of Divas, Dramas and Dreams." It was a grand night of singing but also a relatively modest affair -- only about 700 of MOT's closest friends and donors were in the audience and the evening was less a glitzy black-tie party than a warm gathering of friends.

There was, of course, a lot to celebrate: The opera house has helped reshape Detroit's urban and cultural landscape, elevating MOT into the Top 10 of American opera companies and breathing new life into a once-slumbering downtown neighborhood; it opened long before nearby Comerica Park and Ford Field.

Luckily, the concert was recorded for broadcast. WRCJ-FM (90.9) will air a one-hour program of highlights on Sunday. The singers include the vivacious mezzo Vivica Genaux leaping through Handel's ornaments, Detroit's hometown mezzo Irina Mishura delivering a spirited "Habanera" from Bizet's "Carmen" and later accompanying herself at the piano while singing a Russian folk song, soprano Indra Thomas bathing Gershwin's "Summertime" in tasteful rapture and much more. MOT's general director David DiChiera is the genial host.

The program airs at noon Sunday on WRCJ-FM (90.9).

Speaking of the radio, "Saturday Afternoon at the Opera" whisks us to the Opera Bastille in Paris for a production of Tchaikovsky's "Queen of Spades" (based on a tale by Pushkin). It's a fascinating opera, with a propulsive, tragic plot and deftly constructed score full of dramatic lyricism. The cast is notable for the appearance of big-lunged tenor Vladimir Galouzine (Detroiters will remember him from his appearance in MOT's "Otello" a few years back), as well as Nikolai Putilin, Ludovic Tezier and Irena Bogatcheva. The great Russian maestro Gennady Rozhdestvensky is on the podium. 1:30 p.m. Saturday, CBC2-FM (89.9).

JAZZ

A few weeks ago as I was flipping through the bins at a hip used record store along Queen Street in Toronto, the music emanating from the store speakers stopped me cold: A slippery, sorcerer-like melody gave way to some open modal improvising, and my first thought was that I was hearing a Miles Davis track from the '60s that I couldn't quite place.

An instant later my brain caught up with my ears, and I realized that the clerk had put on "Multidirection," the second of two LPs recorded in 1968-69 for Blue Note by the Contemporary Jazz Quintet, a band of young post-boppers from Detroit led by pianist Kenn Cox.

Cox is still making vital music. He's equally comfortable exploring the weightless harmonic universe and elastic forms favored by the CJQ, swinging a standard or wringing emotion from a ballad. 9:30 p.m. Saturday, Baker's Keyboard Lounge, 20510 Livernois, Detroit. 313-345-6300. $5.