Current Projects
Song from the Uproar
by Missy Mazzoli
The Website: http://www.songfromtheuproar.com
LISTEN to selections from the score:
download an info packet HERE
Missy Mazzoli was recently deemed "one of the most consistently inventive, surprising composers now working in New York (New York Times), as well as "Brooklyn's postmillennial Mozart" (Time Out New York). Following a workshop version of the piece that sold-out Galapagos Art Space in Spring 2009 and workshops at New York City Opera's VOX: Contemporary American Opera Lab, Carnegie Hall and Bard College, BMP brings a full directorial and design team to the newly expanded score for its world-premiere. Song from the Uproar is a multi-media chamber opera conceived by composer Missy Mazzoli and filmmaker Stephen Taylor. Directed by Gia Forakis, it will feature musical performance by the five-piece chamber group NOW Ensemble with vocals by mezzo-soprano Abigail Fischer and new vocal ensemble M6. The premiere performance will include scenic design by Zane Pihlstrom, sound design by Dan Bora, costumes by Alixandra Gage Englund, and lighting design by Scott Bolman. The world premiere production will take place over two weekends in February/March 2012 at The Kitchen in New York City.
Song from the uproar is supported by a grant from The MAP fund, a program of Creative Capital supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Song from the Uproar was commissioned in part by Linda and Stuart Nelson and Chris Ahearn and Marla Mayer.
“If Brooklyn is becoming a Vienna of the new millennium, Mazzoli may well be its Mozart.” – Olivia Giovetti, Time Out New York
“An ambitious opera company would do well to take note. The Met or otherwise, Ms. Mazzoli is going places fast. Bank on it. “- Steve Smith, The New York Times
RESIDENCY, The Kitchen NYC, August 8-12, 2011
WORLD PREMIERE, The Kitchen NYC, February 24-March 3, 2012
Video Clips
Press for Song from the Uproar
Brooklyn Village
World Premiere
The New Roulette
Brooklyn, NY
March 24−25, 2012
Alan Pierson and the Brooklyn Borough's oldest orchestra take the stage at Roulette's impressive new space, joined by the Brooklyn Youth Chorus Academy in presenting a multimedia event telling the tale of BROOKLYN VILLAGE, the borough's original settlement. Featuring world premieres by Brooklyn composers David T. Little (in collaboration with librettist Royce Vavrek) and Sarah Kirkland Snider, as well as a lead performance by songstress Mellissa Hughes. The performance draws inspiration from Francis Guy's 1820 painting "Winter Scene in Brooklyn," which hangs in the Brooklyn Museum.
“David T. Little is amazing” -The New York Times
“Sarah K. Snider is too.” -The New York Times
a Brooklyn Philharmonic and Brooklyn Youth Chorus Academy production
co-produced by Beth Morrison Projects
love fail
composed by DAVID LANG
featuring quartet ANONYMOUS 4
"My piece love fail is a rewriting of several episodes from different medieval versions of the doomed courtly love story of Tristan and Isolde, interleafed with settings of my own texts, Richard Wagner’s libretto and stories by Macarthur Prize winning author Lydia Davis. My original idea was to create a piece that would honor Anonymous 4’s longstanding commitment to medieval music, while at the same time feeling completely up to date. At the ensemble’s suggestion I looked at the lais of the medieval author Marie de France, and I was struck by how in her retelling of the Tristan and Isolde story Isolde is never named, even though she is clearly an equal in the narrative.
I started wondering what would happen if all the names were removed, along with all the events or objects or details that would locate the story within a particular time, or with a particular set of lovers. What remains is the skeleton of the story, the outline of a relationship that is spare enough to remind us of our own modern lives. To this I added other spare retellings of details from other medieval love stories, along with several emotionally acute stories by Lydia Davis, creating out of these little scraps a larger narrative that makes them feel as if they describe a single relationship, gone hopelessly wrong.
love fail will be presented in a simple theatrical setting with effective lighting, simple sound enhancement, and will also employ a range of small instruments for Anonymous 4 to play, including autoharps, whistles, bells and simple percussion. The duration will be approximately 70 minutes."
- from the composer, David Lang
Oceanic Verses
composed by Paola Prestini
with video design by Ali Hossaini
OCEANIC VERSES is an operatic tableau of rituals that pays homage to Italian folk music from across the ages. Each tableau illuminates a different ritual from the Salento, Genoan and Sardinian regions of Italy, from weddings, to curative rituals. Drawing from a stunning panopIy of anthropological investigations alongside vigorous aesthetic experimentation inspired by five millennia of folk music, Prestini combines original field samples from Salento with ancient reconstructions and contemporary nods to Italian singers Fabrizio D'Andre and Roberto Licci, creating a new music of the Mediterranean. OCEANIC VERSES features a libretto by Donna Di Novelli, video designs by Ali Hossaini, celebrated vocalist Helga Davis, Grammy-award winning soprano Hila Plittman, new music specialist, baritone Chris Burchett, and internationally acclaimed Italian folk singer-songwriter Claudio Prima. For more photos and videos click here.
April 8, 2011 for the 21c Liederabend, op. 2 festival at The Kitchen with the Brooklyn Youth Chorus
June 23, 2012 for Washington Chorus at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C.
June 2012 for River to River Festival, New York
download an informational packet here
Video Clips
COMPOSER PORTRAITS: Mazzoli, Muhly and Prestini at NYC’s River to River Festival
3 unique multimedia concerts, featuring composers MISSY MAZZOLI NICO MUHLY & PAOLA PRESTINI respectively.
After this year's preview collaboration between Beth Morrison Projects and lower Manhattan's annual River to River Festival, next year's festival brings you three unique multimedia concert evenings, celebrating the composers and multimedia collaborators that BMP has championed since its inception.
“The River to River Festival... hits the postclassical jackpot”
-Time Out New York (about Beth Morrison Projects 2011 River to River Festival concert, NEW MUSIC NOW)
Venues TBA/ The River to River Festival, New York, NY/ Summer 2012
