Eastman Opera Theatre (EOT) is pleased to announce its 2024-2025 season, The 21st Century, featuring operas written primarily within the last 25 years. Contemporary operas commonly push the boundaries of a traditional opera, allowing our students to approach their craft in new and innovative ways, which, according to Artistic and Music Director of EOT Timothy Long, “is such a valuable skill for young singers to have.” Further, “premieres are at an all-time high and most singers get their earliest career opportunities with newer works.” In the fall, EOT will perform Silent Light (2019), a chamber foley opera adapted from film with music by Paola Prestini and libretto by Royce Vavrek. Early in 2025 it will present a two-part “Winter Voice Festival,” featuring Evidence of Things Not Seen (1997), a 36-song cycle by Ned Rorem, and H & G, a great and terrible story (2021) with music by Allen Shawn and libretto by Anna Maria Hong & Jean Randich. The season concludes with a Kodak Hall mainstage production of Ainadamar (2003), which conjures the world and demise of Spanish poet Federico García Lorca, with music by Osvaldo Golijov and libretto by David Henry Hwang.
“This season we’ve put together pieces which offer exciting new ways of experiencing opera, transporting the audience to worlds previously unexplored by EOT,” shares Director of Production for EOT Pat Diamond. “These works not only push the envelope of what we consider opera, they will invite, engage and immerse the audience in breathtaking realms at the intersection of everyday life and the imagination.”
On October 31, November 1, 2 and 3, 2024, the season will launch with Silent Light in Kilbourn Hall, sung in English with supertitles. Diamond serves as director alongside Long as conductor. Facing themes of infidelity, crisis of conscience, and self-destruction, this opera is set within a Mennonite community in northern Mexico. Johan, a devoted husband and father, faces a profound challenge when he develops feelings for another woman within his conservative cohort. The writers share that Silent Light is “a story of people trying to do their best.” As this is a foley opera, sound effects are an integral part of the performance, serving to enhance an audience’s experience by using objects and tools (as opposed to instruments) to create realistic sounds that correspond to the actions on stage. “Our students have the great fortune to live inside the minds of two prominent creators and current ‘opera influencers,’ Paola Prestini and Royce Vavrek, through this innovative opera,” Long states.
EOT’s first “Winter Voice Festival” is scheduled for January 23-February 2, 2025. Part one of the festival, Evidence of Things Not Seen, is music directed by Professor of Vocal Coaching Alison d’Amato and will run from January 23-26 in Eastman’s intimate black box theatre (Annex 804). This song cycle explores the convergence of faith, queer identity and the pursuit of meaning and beauty in one’s life. With lyrics drawn from the works of various 19th and 20th century poets, this ensemble production will be sung in English.
A few days later, on January 30-31 and February 1-2, part two of the festival will be held in the same location. Long and Diamond reprise their partnership as music director/pianist and stage director respectively. H & G, a great and terrible story offers an abstract reinterpretation of the classic Grimm’s fairy tale, Hansel and Gretel. This surreal rendition transforms the known narrative into a feminist hero’s journey, exploring themes of terror and empowerment in the midst of the #MeToo era. The story delves into the harrowing journey of ‘coming of age’ by posing the question: “How do children survive abandonment and loss and learn to make their own way in life?”
EOT’s final production of the season, Ainadamar, will take place in Kodak Hall at Eastman Theatre from April 3-6, 2025. Directed by Assistant Professor of Opera Octavio Cardenas and conducted by Associate Music Director of EOT Wilson Southerland, it will be sung in Spanish with English supertitles. This dramatic one-act opera centers on three distinct images, each pertaining to the tragic fates of Mariana Pineda, Federico García Lorca and Margarita Xirgu. This mythical story takes place during times of political unrest in the Uruguay of 1969 and Spain of 1936, ultimately stressing the importance of leaning on courage and humanity to maneuver conflict. Rochester audiences will get to witness this moving performance in the same season as its Metropolitan Opera debut in New York City.
Tickets to all EOT performances will be sold through Eastman’s Box Office website, though they are not yet available for purchase.
Media only: Lauren Sageer, Assistant Director of Public Relations and Digital Content,
(585) 451-8492, lsageer@esm.rochester.edu
###
About Eastman Opera Theatre:
Eastman Opera Theatre offers a comprehensive program of training and performance opportunities for the modern singer-actor. Each year, productions feature a wide range of musical styles, unusual lyric forms, and both traditional and contemporary repertoire that prepare the motivated student for the professional lyric theater world of tomorrow.
Most productions have two complete principal casts (given an equal number of performances), are fully designed, performed in the original language, and depending on the venue, use full orchestral accompaniment. Studio productions, scenes programs, and outreach events are also offered to further enhance the variety of performance opportunities. Eastman Opera Theatre utilizes both undergraduate and graduate students in all roles for all productions.
Recent and past productions include Catán’s Florencia en el Amazonas; Davis’ Lear on the 2nd Floor; Sondheim’s Into the Woods; Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea; Glass’ Hydrogen Jukebox and Les Enfants Terribles; Guettel’s The Light in the Piazza; Gordon’s The Tibetan Book of the Dead; Mozart’s Don Giovanni; and Puts’ Elizabeth Cree. EOT is committed to working with living composers and librettists. Recent production collaborators have included Anthony Davis, Adam Guettel, Jake Heggie, Gene Scheer, Ricky Ian Gordon, Kevin Puts, and Mark Campbell.
About Eastman School of Music:
The Eastman School of Music was founded in 1921 by industrialist and philanthropist George Eastman (1854–1932), founder of Eastman Kodak Company. It was the first professional school of the University of Rochester. Mr. Eastman’s dream was that his school would provide a broad education in the liberal arts as well as superb musical training.
More than 900 students are enrolled in the Collegiate Division of the Eastman School of Music—about 500 undergraduates and 400 graduate students. They come from almost every state, and approximately 23 percent are from other countries. They are taught by a faculty comprised of more than 130 highly regarded performers, composers, conductors, scholars, and educators. They are Pulitzer Prize winners, Grammy winners, Emmy winners, Guggenheim fellows, ASCAP Award recipients, published authors, recording artists, and acclaimed musicians who have performed in the world’s greatest concert halls. Each year, Eastman’s students, faculty members, and guest artists present more than 900 concerts to the Rochester community. Additionally, more than 1,700 members of the Rochester community, from young children through senior citizens, are enrolled in the Eastman Community Music School.
About the University of Rochester:
The University of Rochester is one of the nation’s leading private research universities, one of only 62-member institutions in the Association of American Universities. Located in Rochester, N.Y., the University gives undergraduates exceptional opportunities for interdisciplinary study and close collaboration with faculty through its unique cluster-based curriculum. Its College, School of Arts and Sciences, and Hajim School of Engineering and Applied Sciences are complemented by the Eastman School of Music, Simon School of Business, Warner School of Education, Laboratory for Laser Energetics, School of Medicine and Dentistry, School of Nursing, Eastman Institute for Oral Health, and the Memorial Art Gallery.