BLACK LODGE + BARDOBLACK LODGE + BARDO

A natural musical storyteller with “a knack for overturning musical conventions” (The New York Times), composer David T. Little is known for stage, concert, and screen works permeated with the power of the unexpected. Little probes the deep corners of human psychology, invoking political, historical, spiritual, and social themes as pathways for exploring the human condition. His broad catalog speaks to the mix of light and dark that we experience in life, unafraid to invoke the mythical, bewitching, disturbing, surreal, or comedic. He has drawn acclaim for operas including Dog Days, JFK, and the comedy Vinkensport, or The Finch Opera (all with libretto by Royce Vavrek), as well as his GRAMMY®-nominated opera Soldier Songs.

Little’s recent work Black Lodge was nominated for the 2024 GRAMMY® Award for Best Opera Recording and is the recipient of a Music Theater Now international prize. Black Lodge, a metal-infused opera with a libretto by poet Anne Waldman, was premiered by Beth Morrison Projects at Opera Philadelphia, with a soundtrack released by Cantaloupe Music. It received its European premiere at the O. Festival in Rotterdam this past May, received its West Coast Premiere in October, 2024 as part of an experiential Halloween event presented by CAP UCLA, and its New York premiere in January as part of the 2025 Prototype Festival. In November 2025, it will travel to Sweden for performance at Malmö Opera and Folkoperan.

In September, 2024, Little unveiled his opera What Belongs to You. Based on the celebrated novel by Garth Greenwell, developed for GRAMMY®-winning tenor Karim Sulayman and Alarm Will Sound, and directed by Mark Morris, and would go on to be awarded the 2025 Music Critics Association of North America Best New Opera Award. This arrived on the heels of another major work, the searching theatrical choral work, SIN-EATER, premiered in Philadelphia by The Crossing and Bergamot Quartet in the fall of 2023, conducted by Donald Nally. Based on the ancient practice of paying the poor to ritualistically “eat” the sins of the rich—allowing the privileged to move onto the next life cleansed of their guilty deeds—The Wall Street Journal praised the work’s “shattering impact.”

Little is at work on a commission from the Metropolitan Opera / Lincoln Center Theater New Works Program, as well as several other new stage, film, and concert projects.

Little has been commissioned by the world’s most prestigious institutions and performers, including recent projects for The Metropolitan Opera/Lincoln Center Theater new works program, the Kennedy Center, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, New World Symphony, London Sinfonietta, The Crossing, Kronos Quartet, and Beth Morrison Projects. His music has been presented by Carnegie Hall, Venice Biennale, Holland Festival, LA Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Opera Philadelphia, Opéra de Montréal, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and the LA Philharmonic. Little’s recorded catalog includes over 20 commercial releases, on such labels as New Amsterdam Records, Pentatone, Sono Luminus, Bright Shiny Things, and Cantaloupe Music.

Little is the founding artistic director and former drummer for the amplified chamber ensemble, Newspeak, which explores the relationship of music and politics, while confronting head-on the boundaries between the classical and rock traditions. They have released four commercial recordings, with a fifth on the way.

David T. Little received a 2023 Fellowship from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts and is a recipient of the Copland House Residency Award. His music is published by Boosey & Hawkes. Learn more at www.davidtlittle.com.

Anne Waldman has been an active member of what she terms the “outrider” experimental poetry community for more than four decades. She has written more than 60 books, including Fast Speaking Woman (2001), published by City Lights Books; Bard, Kinetic (Coffee House Press, 2022); and Vow to Poetry (Coffee House Press, 2001). She is the author of selected poetry editions, including Helping the Dreamer (Coffee House Press, 1989), Kill or Cure (Penguin Books, 1994), and In the Room of Never Grieve (Coffee House Press, 2008). 

Waldman has written on the long poem as a cultural intervention with such projects as Marriage: A Sentence (Penguin Books, 2000); Structure of the World Compared to a Bubble (Penguin Books, 2004); Manatee/Humanity (Penguin Books, 2009); and Gossamurmur (Penguin Books, 2013). Her anti-war feminist epic The Iovis Trilogy: Colors in the Mechanism of Concealment—a 25-year project—won the PEN Center Award for Poetry. Other books include Sanctuary (Spuyten Duyvil, 2020), Songs of the Sons and Daughters of Buddha: Enlightenment Poems from the Theragatha and Therigatha (translated by Andrew Schelling and Anne Waldman, Shambhala Publications, 2020), Trickster Feminism (Penguin Books, 2018), Extinction Aria (Pied Oxen, 2017), and Voice’s Daughter of a Heart Yet to Be Born (Coffee House Press, 2016), which, in Lyn Hejinian’s words, “brings Waldman’s work into the more intimate paradoxical folds of poetic (and prophetic) knowledge.”

Waldman is one of the founders and directors of The Poetry Project at St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery and a cofounder with Allen Ginsberg and Diane diPrima of the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa University, the first Buddhist-inspired university in the Western Hemisphere. Waldman is a distinguished professor of poetics at Naropa and continues to work to preserve the school’s substantial literary and oral archives and curate the celebrated Summer Writing Program. Waldman’s edited volume New Weathers: Poetics from the Naropa Archive (Nightboat Books, 2022), edited with Emma Gomis, is a collection of lectures transcribed from the audio archives of Naropa University’s Summer Writing Program that represents a continuing lineage of experimental literary movements. Other collections she has edited based on the holdings of the Kerouac School include the following published by Coffee House Press: Civil Disobediences (2004), Beats at Naropa (2009), and Cross Worlds:Transcultural Poetics (2014). She is also the editor of Nice to See You: Homage to Ted Berrigan (Coffee House Press, 1991) and The Beat Book (Shambhala, 1996) and is coeditor with Lewis Warsh of The Angel Hair Anthology (Granary Books, 2001).

Waldman has been a fellow at the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Center and the Civitella Ranieri Foundation, and she has held the Emily Harvey residency. She worked at the Institute of American Indian Arts and the Tokyo Women’s Christian University. Waldman works with the anti-nuclear Guardianship Project and was active in Occupy Art, an offshoot of Occupy Wall Street.

In 2010, her play Red Noir was produced by the Living Theatre. She has collaborated with Meredith Monk, her husband, Ed Bowes, and with the Fast Speaking Music label on multimedia productions and live performances. 

Waldman is a recipient of the Before Columbus Foundation’s Lifetime Achievement Award, a Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Book Awards, a 2013 Guggenheim Fellowship, and the Poetry Society of America’s Shelley Memorial Award. She also served as a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets. Waldman divides her time between New York City and Boulder, Colorado.

Michael Joseph McQuilken (Librettist and Director) works professionally across a variety of fields: as a director of film, opera, theater, and new media; as a screenwriter, librettist, and playwright; and as a producer and composer of music for film, theater, and for his solo project, The Few Moments. Notable collaborations include live film and video design for Drake, Cardi B, Nelly, Migos, The Weeknd, and many others; direction and co-creation of the opera Angel’s Bone (2016 Pulitzer Prize); and creation and direction of music videos with The Flaming Lips, Lupita Nyong'o, Amanda Palmer, Andrew McMahon, Daniil Trifonov, and many others. Michael is also known for writing, co-composing and directing his genre-reinventing trans-media creation The Infinite Hotel (Prototype NYC, 2019), soon to become a feature film entitled Parallelogram. Other forthcoming work includes an opera feature film, Black Lodge, soon to be presented by Opera Philadelphia, for which Michael wrote the screenplay, directed, and edited.

Three-time Emmy® and Annie Award nominated Peruvian-American editor, director and writer Sandra Bambarén Powers is currently the lead editor of Disney’s critically acclaimed series “Marvel’s Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur.” A graduate of the MFA Film Directing program at California Institute of the Arts and BFA from Massachusetts College of Art, Sandra has contributed her creative expertise to iconic animated series such as Nickelodeon’s "Legend of Korra" and Disney’s "Elena of Avalor." Her short film "Still Life After Death" premiered at the Sharjah Film Festival in 2021 and is now available for streaming on Amazon Prime. Her debut short, "Autumn," was distributed by Ouat Media and screened at many prominent festivals including Festival Images Contre Nature (France), Wimbledon Shorts Film Festival (England) and EXiS Film Festival (South Korea). In 2023, Sandra art directed the Grammy®-nominated opera film "Black Lodge" for Opera Philadelphia and made her stage directorial debut with "The Great Soviet Bucket," produced by Beth Morrison Projects and funded by the National Performance Network for Miami Light Project. She also conceived and directed "BARDO," an immersive theatrical experience hailed by the LA Times as “full of wonder” produced by Beth Morrison Projects with CAP UCLA. Showcasing her distinctive vision across mediums, Sandra has also directed over fifteen music videos for many bands, including Grammy®-nominated DeVotchKa and Timur and the Dime Museum.

sandrapowers.com

Described by LA times as "dangerous and seductive", Timur (Creator) creates "romantic, smashing, noisy" (LA Weekly) songs for a variety of eclectic projects. Known for theatrical flair and dynamic live performances, the band blurs the lines between many styles. Equally at home in clubs as well as theatrical venues, Timur and the Dime Museum performed at the ALOUD series; America's Got Talent with Kristian Hoffman; Joe's Pub in NYC; World Café in Philadelphia; Hotel Cafe in LA; REDCAT Gala with Jack featured in LA Weekly's BEST OF LA PEOPLE ISSUE 2011, the band made its NYC debut in 2013 as part of the PROTOTYPE festival. The band has closely collaborated with Beth Morrison Projects on COLLAPSE, a glam-rock Requiem by Daniel Corral with fashion designer Victor Wilde and video artist Jesse Gilbert. Premiered at REDCAT Theater in 2014, the show toured to Miami Light Project, Operadagen Rotterdam and BAM 2015 Next Wave Festival. Upcoming new projects: Black Lodge by David T. Little and Nueva Canción: Songs of Protests and Resistance.

theoperaoftimur.com

BETH MORRISON PROJECTS supports the work of emerging and established composers and their multi-media collaborators through the commission, development, and production of contemporary music-theatre work. Established in 2006, the company’s critically acclaimed work has been seen throughout the United States, Europe, and Asia in some of the world’s premier venues, including Lincoln Center, Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Next Wave Festival, The Kitchen, Performance Space 122, the Estates National Theater of Prague, The Seoul Performing Arts Festival, New York Public Library Live!, Le Poisson Rouge, Music on McDougal, and The Walker Art Center. BMP has garnered support from the Department of Cultural Affairs, New York State Council for theArts, The Map Fund, the Puffin Foundation, and the Anna Sosenko AssistTrust.

Jennifer Harrison Newman (Stage and Movement Director) is a New York based theater artist that works extensively with artists across disciplines pushing the boundaries of dance, opera, and theater. Recent site-specific and theatrical work includes numerous Broadway and regional dance and theatrical productions including The Lion King, The Radio City Rockettes, and a momentous anniversary performance with the original cast of West Side Story. Associate Director and Movement Director: Triptych( Eyes of One on Another) (BAM/Next Wave 2019, International Tour); Place (BAM/Next Wave Festival 2018, LA Opera 2020), Angel’s Bone (New Visions Festival Hong Kong 2018, Beijing Music Festival 2019, Los Angeles 2020); October in the Chair (ARACA Group 2014). Choreography and performance: Land of Broken Dreams (Park Avenue Armory 2021); AFROFEMONONOMY (PSNY 2021); when you walk through fire, hold your breath (Little Island NY 2021); Black Lodge (Beth Morrison Projects film 2021, stage premiere 2022); We Were Everywhere (Princeton University 2019); Infinite Hotel (Prototype Festival 2019); within the sand and sea (Chale Wote Festival, Accra Ghana 2018); The Geneva Project (JACK, BAAD!, Yale University, International Festival of Arts & Ideas, Central Station Festival Seoul Korea), Bread of Heaven (LABA LIVE), Woman Bomb (Baryshnikov Art Center), If Pretty Hurts Ugly Must be a Motherfucker ( Yale School of Drama), The Children (Yale School of Drama), Bulrusher (New Georges); David Rousseve/Reality (company member; Lula Washington Contemporary Dance Theater (company member).