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| The NANOWorks crew |
"Newcomers are mistaken if they think grand opera is the only true opera." I agree with Alex Ross, and he proceeds to point out that quite a few chamber opera companies have sprung up in New York City. There have also been a couple other chamber opera companies that have been popping up throughout the country, and I am quite encouraged by these small upstarts. I think there comes a point when creative people (whether they be composers, writers, performers, et cetera) realize that they need to take performance opportunities into their own hands and create them. For me personally, this is always what I try to do because (1) Joan Tower told me and my fellow composers over a decade ago to do just this and (2) I realized my performance opportunities weren't going to necessarily happen via winning composition competitions.
On this note, I want to mention New Fangled Opera again because they are doing more or less what I am doing: starting their own opera company because they want to create performance opportunities for composers and singers and whomever else is involved in creating Gesamtkunstwerk. They have their first 2013 Festival on June 7th and 8th in New Orleans, and they're trying to raise money for the show. Please contribute if you can: they are not only performing my infamous opera about Paula Deen and the afterlife, but they're also performing Timothy Brown's An Accidental Affair (which was literally written the same time I was writing Krispy Kremes and Butter Queens in the room next to mine), and Charles Halka's Layover, an opera that NANOWorks has produced and will perform one more time at the 2013 Cincinnati Fringe Festival.
And speaking of the Fringe Show...you had better come if you can make it! I promise it will be a good show. I'm not saying this because, yes, this is probably the last time you will see and hear Paula choke on a doughnut and die onstage in Cincinnati, but also because the performers are working their butts off. I want to thank Tyler Catlin and Liz Remizowski, our musical director and piano maven for conducing rehearsals *for every show* and the tireless singers and performers who have come along for the ride.
Wednesday, May 29 at 8:45 p.m.
Friday, May 31 at 7:00 p.m.
Sunday, June 2 at 7:30 p.m.
Tuesday, June 4 at 8:15 p.m.
Thursday, June 6 at 7:00 p.m.