Last weekend, all over the country, all over the world, people held signs proclaiming the age of the “Nasty Woman.” A nasty woman is strong and competent, she embraces her power, and she doesn’t allow men to decide for her who she is and what she wants. “The future is nasty,” read one popular sign at the Women’s March in Washington, D.C.

Guess what? The past was nasty, too. This weekend, Panopera will stage Georges Bizet’s “Carmen” at the Academy of Music, an opera that celebrates a very nasty woman, the gypsy Carmen, through gorgeous song, mesmerizing dance, and theatrical spectacle.

The production is directed by Sam Rush, co-founder of Northampton’s New Century Theater, and conducted by E. Wayne Abercrombie, professor emeritus of music at UMASS Amherst. The role of Carmen is sung by Rebecca Krouner, Don José by Alan Schneider, Escamillo by Joshua Jeremiah, and Micaela by Emily Baker.

“Love is a rebellious bird that no one can tame,” sings the tantalizing gypsy in the famous “Habanera” in Act I. Bizet’s music is so crowd-pleasing, so ubiquitous that even audiences new to opera are likely to experience the thrill of recognition. The Toreador’s March has perhaps been included on more “Best Hits of Opera” albums than any other song.

In a classic female dichotomy, the earthier, more sensual notes of Carmen’s dramatic soprano are juxtaposed with Micaela’s lighter, purer lyric soprano. As a 26-year-old student of opera in New York, I was very upset to be cast as this quintessential girl-next-door while Carmen flounced, flirted, and flared all over the stage.

After seducing everyone, getting into knife fights, and hiding out in a smuggler’s den, however, Carmen comes to a bad end, as do most operatic heroines. The romantic and scintillating flourishes of this opera make it an old favorite for long-time appassionatas, like myself, or first-time opera-goers.

Also playing until Feb. 12, “Amadeus” written by Peter Shaffer is at the Majestic Theater in West Springfield. This Tony award-winning play was made into an Academy award-winning movie in 1984 (just in time to rock my teenage world). Considering the script is about Antonio Salieri’s obsession with the irreverent and absurd, yet uncomprehendingly talented Mozart, it is an irony that this movie inspired an obsession for a whole generation of musicians, myself included.

Learning roles for such operas as “The Magic Flute,” “Cosí fan Tutte,” and “Don Giovanni,” the naturalness of Mozart’s musical lines, legato or coloratura, were incredibly easy to learn, even if difficult to execute. It is as if his music always existed, as embedded in our being as blood or bones, but we weren’t aware of it until Mozart discovered it, giving it shape.

The Queen of the Night’s Vengeance Aria from “The Magic Flute” is a miracle of form and feeling, and the flamboyant, rebellious power of it — fixed within me through long hours of practice — actually sustained me through many personal challenges, the revolutionary relevance of this song both of the moment and of all time.

It’s easy to see why Salieri was convinced that Mozart’s was a gift from God. His music seems a nexus of the human and divine, temporal and eternal. Although “Amadeus” is a fictionalized drama — the aged Salieri, played by Keith Langsdale, reflecting on the relationship and events that drove this devout man to murder — it provides provocative context for those seeking to understand Mozart’s musical gift.

Also in the cast is Stephen Petit playing Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Kaytlyn Vendeloecht playing Constanze Weber, and Stuart Gamble playing Emperor Joseph II, who offers that famously philistine critique, “There are too many notes. Just take some of them out and it’ll be perfect.”

Both of these works — “Carmen” and “Amadeus” — reflect on the danger of beauty, freedom, and artistic creation as these tend to challenge a more staid morality, but the larger and less life-affirming danger comes from the “respectable” response to art. In order to maintain a hold on conventional perspectives of the world, both Don José and Antonio Salieri are driven to murder exactly the people they most love and admire.

Meditating on such jealousy, these works show it to be connected to ego in its unhealthiest, most discrete form. It’s because Don José and Salieri feel themselves to be disconnected from freedom and beauty that they must kill it where it stands, dances, laughs, and sings.

Carmen’s freedom as a gypsy woman and Mozart’s talent as musical prodigy are gifts to us, as well, as part of the human community. We have the choice to connect to and appreciate them or to stand apart, seething in our individual inadequacy, unable to accept that something so fine exists apart from us until, in our frustration, we hurl such insults as “nasty.”

Georges Bizet’s “Carmen” produced by Panopera is playing at the Academy of Music in Northampton on Friday, Jan. 27, at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday, Jan. 29, at 2 p.m. For tickets and more information, visit: http://www.aomtheatre.com.

Peter Shaffer’s “Amadeus” is playing at the Majestic Theater in West Springfield Wednesdays through Sundays through February 12. For tickets and more information, visit: http://www.majestictheater.com.

Jenny Abeles is a writer and educator living in Greenfield. You can search her work online by including her middle name, Terpsichore.