Alum Susan Narucki Stars in 'Threepenny Opera'

U-T SAN DIEGO -- Narucki, 58, grew up in Belleville, New Jersey, where her father enjoyed singing country music around the house. She started singing and playing guitar and violin in high school, eventually playing weddings in a jazz combo with two of her teachers. She studied filmmaking at Syracuse University, then at age 21 moved to San Francisco, where she began studying vocal music at San Francisco State and the city’s Conservatory of Music. Then one day she discovered the songs of the American modernist composer Charles Ives and her mind was blown. “I’d never imagined that someone could set text in such an interesting way,” she said. “He had a way of using the voice that I’d never thought of before. I thought, ‘Wow, this is such an exciting thing to do with your voice that this is what I want to do.’”