Season 2023
The details of the new season will be published shortly
Season 2022
We, The Innumerable
Niloufar Nourbakhsh (music)
Lisa Flanagan (libretto)
Harris Doran (stage director)
Sara Jobin (conductor)
Cristina Bakhoum (Roya)
Daveed Buzaglo (Siavash)
Mary-Hollis Hundley (Maryam/Protestor)
Joseph Trumbo (Chief Interrogator)
Markos Simopoulos, Maurio Hines, Brian Alvarado, Jonathan Harris (Chorus)
A chamber opera in one act in concert form
Set during Iran’s Green Movement – a precursor to the Arab Spring- We the Innumerable explores one woman’s courage to demand freedom in the face of state-sanctioned violence and resist the distorted reality of authoritarianism.
We, The Innumerable considers lessons about political violence and revolt learned from the Iranian Green Movement including the fragility of democracy, the poison of propaganda, and the collective will of the people.
In 2019 this opera received the Discovery Grant from Opera America for the female composers program.
Workshop premiere – October 21, 2022 7.30 PM
National Sawdust, Brooklyn, NY
Deeply
Matteo Manzitti (composer)
Daniela Morelli (libretto)
Fred Santambrogio (stage director)
Pilar Bravo(conductor)
Laura Catrani (soprano)
Erika Urban (actress)
An opera in one act for five cellos, arranged for piano with one soprano and one actress.
Deeply explores the struggle of living a life with stereotypes and norms, the endless search for freedom, and the challenge of finding one’s place in the world. This work covers a wide range of topics: love and death, gender identity and outing, passion, anguish and, above all, the desire to be, ultimately, deeply ourselves. In collaboration with The Center LGBT Community Center, NY
US Premiere
The Center LGBTQ+ NYC
a sweet silence in cremona
Roberto Scarcella Perino (music)
Mark Campbell (libretto)
A comic opera in one act
Commissioned by NYU-Florence, NYU-Casa Italiana Zerilli-Marimò
A Sweet Silence in Cremona is inspired by an event in recent history when the mayor of the Italian city imposed a moratorium on urban noise while the Museum of Violins painstakingly recorded some of its renowned string instruments for posterity. The story imagines four human lives—and one canine—that
reside near the museum and are affected by this moratorium in ways both comic and touching. These disparate lives are connected by Yassine, an immigrant youth from Tunisia who delivers flowers and a message to the building’s residents.
World Premiere – May 8th, 2022
Teatro A. Ponchielli Cremona, Italy
Future Repertoire
purewater
Music by Andrew Rudin
Libretto by Ann McCutchan (adapted by the novel La Symphonie pastorale)
A chamber opera in seven scenes
Purewater is set in a small, upper Midwestern town during the Dust Bowl. A minister falls in love with a blind young woman, Clara, he sheltered, but so does his son. The story deals with the idea of blindness; although Clara is evidently blind physically, the pastor himself is blind in his morality, seemingly unaware of the full extent of his sinfulness in his obsession for Clara.
A Danger to Us All: Typhoid Mary
Music by Amy Ziff & Peter Kiesewalter
Libretto by Amy Ziff
A chamber Pop-Opera based on a true story
A Danger to Us All: Typhoid Mary is the true story of Mary Mallon, a poor Irish immigrant who came to New York City, alone in 1883, when she was only fourteen years old. While cooking for a very prominent family one summer in Oyster Bay, Mary Mallon was discovered to be one of the first “healthy carriers” of typhoid, and was sent away against her will to be isolated in quarantine to North Brother Island for a total of 26 years, where she eventually died. The story holds relevance for a myriad of issues polarizing our society today, including the ongoing plight of immigrants, the status of women, the authority of government and health officials, the anti-vaxer movement, class struggles, and the power of the press.