Forsyth County Is Flooding (with the Joy of Lake Lanier)
Saturday, June 15, 2024 @ 8pm – World Premiere
Ray Charles Performing Arts Center at Morehouse College
96-Hour Opera Festival Showcase
Monday, June 17, 2024 @ 7pm
Ray Charles Performing Arts Center at Morehouse College
The Antinori Foundation Grand Prize
The Rich Foundation
The Antinori Foundation Grand Prize
Thank you, for supporting the 96-Hour Opera Festival.
Hello and welcome to The Atlanta Opera.
Atlanta is an amazing place to live right now. It is not a coincidence that it is one of the fastest-growing metros in the U.S. It has recently surpassed Washington, D.C. and Philadelphia to become the 6th largest metro in the U.S., and it is clearly emerging as the capital of the new South. There are 15 Fortune 500 companies with their headquarters in Atlanta and thousands of businesses that are thriving here. Our community is a richly diverse melting pot. This is a place where I regularly hear dozens of languages spoken and see families from all over the world come together to pursue the American Dream. It is clear to me that Atlanta is as Black, Asian, and Latino as much as it is White.
Despite the diversity of our city and country, we know that opera has a long way to go to become a fully inclusive art form. We have been focused in the past few years on a partnership with Morehouse College that allowed us to build a program that offers a safe, creative space for emerging talent from diverse backgrounds, especially from
underrecognized communities. Our mission is to identify these talented artists, amplify their voices, and nurture them as they make steps toward realizing a fully-staged opera.
The premise of this project is simple: the participating composers and librettists were selected from dozens of applicants and hail from all over the United States. They represent the incredible diversity of this country. Each wrote original 10-minute works that are all premiered at this event. These are voices and perspectives are inspired by imagining the future through the lens of cultural traditions and heritage. We’re excited to share these works with you. In past years, the creative teams have explored stories based in Atlanta or with Georgia connections. Thanks to our powerhouse non-profit partners at Morehouse, the Oakland Cemetery, and the Atlanta History Center, we have told stories of literally unsung heroes like Carrie Steele Logan, and now look at a mysterious side of Lake Lanier.
The program has grown rapidly over the past few years from a competition to identify talent to a full festival that includes the annual competition, the workshop of the piece in development – the winner from last year, and our first world premiere as we present Forsyth County is Flooding (with the Joy of Lake Lanier), created by the team that won two years ago.
It’s my great pleasure to share the 96-Hour Opera Festival with you.
Enjoy!
Tomer Zvulun
Carl W. Knobloch, Jr. General & Artistic Director
Welcome to opera’s transformative and amazing
When the 96-Hour Opera Project was launched in 2022, its vision was to open doors to composers and librettists from traditionally underrepresented communities. The Project invited creative teams to craft mini-operas drawn from Atlanta’s history, and to present their pieces for a panel of distinguished judges. While each composer-librettist pair collaborated, they were mentored by the judges who are notables in the field.
Under the inspired leadership of Tomer Zvulun, Atlanta Opera General and Artistic Director, the response to the Project was immediately embraced by the opera community and praised for its crucial impact. In just two years, the Project has forged a vibrant pipeline for diverse talent.
Now in its third season, the 96-Hour Opera Project has grown to become the 96-Hour Opera Festival, an expanded celebration of new voices who are bringing a revolutionary presence to new opera’s frontier.
This is an especially exciting year as the Festival presents the world premiere of Norris & Ebo’s Forsyth
County is Flooding (with the Joy of Lake Lanier), the first of the one-act operas developed from the competition.
It’s been an honor to serve as a competition judge and mentor since the project’s inception—to witness the innovation of emerging creators who are blazing a trail through the sky.
While the artists come from historically under represented perspectives, they possess an overabundance of talent, skill, commitment, and brilliance. This is the soul of creative expression—letting the world know: We. Are. Here.
The 2024 showcase signifies Atlanta Opera’s unwavering commitment to honoring inclusivity. This season takes a bold step in a dynamic direction.
Each of the five teams has been given an exciting challenge—to create stories that explore the intersection of art and artificial intelligence. The composers and librettists will show us what it means to affirm identity. Their operas will express how we celebrate our inherent freedom; what it takes to protect against silencing and erasure; where we find the strength to embark on new dimensions with power and joy. At the same time, their creations will seek to reach the depths of our common humanity.
These groundbreaking ideas illustrate the 96-Hour Opera Festival’s ongoing mission of amplifying new voices.
Together, we open a world of possible. Our rocket is ready!
Andrea Davis Pinkney Librettist and New York Times bestselling author
World Premiere Performance
Saturday, June 15, 2024
8:00pm
Ray Charles Performing Arts Center at Morehouse College
music & lyrics Marcus Norris book & story Adamma Ebo
commissioned by The Atlanta Opera conductor Chaowen Ting director Tinashe Kajese-Bolden choreographer Dell Howlett
scenic & props designer Kat Conley
costume designer Jarrod Barnes
lighting & projections designer Bradley Bergeron
assistant conductor Timothy Verville
assistant choreographer Zachary Orr
musical preparation Nyle Matsuoka
stage manager Cristine Reynolds
assistant stage manager Jonesia Williams production assistant Lesh’In Edwards production intern Qaden Daise
CAST (in order of appearance)
Oscar AC Wilson
Jane Sakinah Bennett
Odella Syrus Minka Wiltz
County Mayor John Johns Andrew Gilstrap
Bully Marnie Breckenridge
Butter Ronnita Miller
Church Jenkins Kevin Thompson
Eight people died in Lake Lanier in 2023. This is an increase from the six that died in 2022 and double the four that died in 2021. In fact, we know of more than 500 people who have died in the lake, with 200 of those deaths being between 1994 and 2022 alone. What the numbers show is that not only are more people dying; they’re dying more often.
Perhaps driven by the evolutionary instinct for self-preservation that requires us to investigate death, — the same instinct that makes us stare at car accidents as we drive by or makes us binge-watch true crime shows, — we might feel an innate need to know why all this is happening.
For many Georgians, the explanation is simple yet profound: Lake Lanier is haunted. In our modern society, this is easy to dismiss. For example, a little research quickly reveals that Lake Lanier is the most popular lake in Southeast Georgia. You could explain away the
deaths by pointing out that with the sheer volume of visitors each summer, it makes sense there would be a higher number of accidents or drownings.
Except you’d be mistaken. We can look at Lake Allatoona for useful context. Allatoona is a neighboring lake about 40 miles away that receives a similar number of visitors each year, but statically you’re three times more likely to die during a visit to Lake Lanier than you would be at Lake Allatoona. What’s even more perplexing is that although most of the deaths are from swimming-related drownings, a good number are from other, often stranger, circumstances.
For example, there’s the 2012 case of the woman who was woken up at 4am in bed by her boyfriend, — a healthy 25-year-old man, — coughing and sneezing. He then goes to the couch and plays video games in the living room so as to not disturb her,
while she settles back in and goes to sleep. When she wakes up again a few hours later, he’s inexplicably nowhere to be found. His truck, wallet, and cell phone are all still there, but he is not. She never saw him again until a month later when his body was found drowned in Lake Lanier, still in his pajamas.
In fact, the deadliest day at Lake Lanier happened in the winter, at a time when no one was swimming at all. It wasn’t a deceptively sweet, warm summer beach day in which people let their guard down. On the contrary, it was Christmas Day of all days, 1964, around 1pm, in broad daylight. A man was driving across a bridge near his home when he happened upon what appeared to be the aftermath of a car accident. Those previously mentioned self-preservation instincts made him turn and look. He saw what he thought was a doll floating in the water. His stomach must have sunk when he realized it was the body of an actual child.
Apparently, a station wagon packed with two families that were headed
to pick apples for Christmas dinner had clipped a guard rail. The car was moving so fast that when it hit a power pole, it split it clean in two then flipped into Lake Lanier, plunging 30 feet below. The man and others jumped in and tried to save all they could. The local fire department also sent divers, but they reported near-zero visibility. Seven people died that day: two adults and five children.
Then there’s other bizarre cases like the 24-year-old man that jumped into the lake in 2023 and was immediately electrocuted. Or the boat fires that officials haven’t been able to find an explanation for, such as the five that occurred between May 2021 and July 2022. “We’ve never had a problem with this boat before,” said one man who almost lost his daughter, “I tried it one more time, and it just BAM.”
Again, this is saying nothing of the hundreds of drownings. Lake Lanier has killed old people, young people, swimming people, boating people, driving people, jogging people, sleeping people. The only thing they all have in common? Lake Lanier.
It feels strange to vilify a body of water. This same lake provides drinking water for 5 million people, after all, and creates $5 billion in income for Georgia. But with so many seemingly unrelated tragedies happening in the same place, a skeptic could be forgiven if at this point they started to open their mind to the possibility there may be larger, even supernatural, forces at play. One could even think of these deaths through the lens of some type of ‘Old Testament Divine Wrath’ or force of nature... Unfortunately, I think you’d be wrong again.
The problem with this theory is that God and nature had nothing to do with this. Lake Lanier is entirely manmade. We’re to blame here. What’s more, the lake was only formed in 1912. For context, Atlanta staple Coca-Cola is 20 years older. That’s not very ‘Old Testament.’
Officials can’t explain these mysterious deaths, and it also doesn’t seem to be God’s doing … So then what’s happening here? Perhaps it’s time we revisit the theory that the lake may really be haunted. After all, we can only imagine that the man who saw the child floating doll-like in the dark water that Christmas afternoon will be forever haunted by the experience. It’s likely the same for the woman who will never know how her boyfriend went from sitting on the couch to floating in the lake.
All we know for certain is that there’s something happening here that we don’t quite understand, — and it’s deadly. So, when the water starts popping up all over town in Forsyth County is Flooding, our characters must get to the bottom of this mystery. Their lives depend on it. Maybe ours do too.
— Dr. Marcus Norris, March 2024
Adamma Ebo wrote and directed the feature film Honk For Jesus. Save Your Soul, starring Regina Hall and Sterling K. Brown, which sold to Focus Features and Monkeypaw at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival, and had a wide theatrical release. In 2022, she also entered into a TV overall deal with 20th Television Studios with Adanne Ebo, her twin sister/writing partner. With her sister, their TV writing credits include the Amazon series Mr. & Mrs. Smith and Batman: Caped Crusader. They’ve also set up their original pilot spec Supply, 404 with Gloria Sanchez Productions, and MRC. Adamma has also directed an episode of FX’s Atlanta Season 4 and three episodes (including the finale) of Amazon’s and Donald Glover’s Swarm. Adamma is a Spelman College and UCLA Film School graduate, and is a lover of all things video games, fashion, anime, naps, and daydreaming about the perfect Keyblade design.
Dr. Marcus Norris’s childhood foray into music came through producing rap beats on pirated software, installed on a Windows 98 computer that he Macgyvered together from spare parts. He came to composing concert music later and transferred that same imagination to writing music of all kinds. This cross-genre mastery resulted in Beyoncé asking Marcus to orchestrate several songs for her and 50-piece orchestra as part of her surprise 2023 Dubai return to live performance. Miss Tina Knowles-Lawson chose Marcus as Music Director for the 2022 Wearable Art Gala, with South Side Symphony accompanying Chloe & Halle Bailey and Andra Day. Marcus founded South Side Symphony in 2020, which he describes as “like a younger, more ratchet version of The Roots, plus lush live strings & horns.” In the short time since, with Marcus composing and conducting, they’ve performed for thousands of people at iconic LA venues such as the Music Center and the Crypto.com Arena, as well as recorded for major albums, films, and TV shows. Marcus most recently composed the score for the highly anticipated AppleTV+ drama miniseries Lady in the Lake starring Natalie Portman and directed by Alma Har’el, which premieres July 19 th along with the original soundtrack album. He is composer-in-residence for Juilliard’s Music Advancement Program 23-24, and his newest opera premieres with The Atlanta Opera in 2024, in collaboration with Adamma Ebo.
Dell Howlett is a New York-based Virginia-born Choreographer/Director. Selected Choreography/ Directing credits: (Upcoming), Jelly’s Last Jam (Pasadena Playhouse, Los Angeles), Malvolio (Classical Theatre of Harlem, NY), Billy Strayhorn: Something to Live For (World Premiere, Pittsburgh Public Theatre), Sonnets & Soul–World Premiere Musical (Howard University, Washington, DC), Toni Stone (Alliance Theatre, GA and Milwaukee Repertory) It Came From Outer Space (Chicago Shakespeare Theater, and TheatreSquared, AK), R&H Cinderella (Alabama Shakespeare Festival), Guys and Dolls (Ford’s Theatre, Washingto,n DC), Paradise Square (Associate to Bill T. Jones, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, CA), Guys and Dolls (Guthrie Theater, MN), The Wiz (Ford’s Theater, Washington, DC), WigOut (Studio Theater, Washington, DC), CA Lyons Project (Alliance Theater, Suzi Bass Award Winner), The Legend of Georgia McBride (Marin Theater Company, SF), Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court (The Acting Company NY), Broadway Inspirational Voices (Foxwoods Theater, NY), Is Anybody Listening? (Sheen Center, NY). Howlett is Head of Dance at NYU/Tisch School of the Arts in the Department of Drama’s New Studio on Broadway. SDCFA
Tinashe Kajese-Bolden is the Jennings Hertz Artistic Director at The Alliance Theatre. Select directing credits: The Preacher’s Wife, a new musical by Tituss Burgess and Azie Dungey with Michael Arden and currently running through June 16th . World Premieres of Furlough’s Paradise, Nick’s Flamingo Grill, Ghost (Alliance Theatre), Toni Stone (Milwaukee Rep and Alliance Theatre), School Girls, Or the African Mean Girls Play (Kenny Leon’s True Colors Theatre), Native Gardens (Virginia Stage Company), Pipeline (Horizon Theater), Eclipsed (Synchronicity Theatre) among others. As a director and actor, on and off Broadway credits include The Imperial Theatre, Primary Stages, 59E59 Theatre, Classical Theatre of Harlem; and regionally at Yale Rep, Woolly Mammoth Theater Co, Cincinnati Playhouse, Geva Theatre Centre, Kirk Douglas Theatre. Recurring roles on TV/Film: Strays, Guardians of the Galaxy: Xmas Special, Suicide Squad, Marvel’s Hawkeye, CW’s Valor, Dynasty, HBO’s Henrietta Lacks, Ava Duverney’s Cherish the Day among others. Directing awards include the Princess Grace Award, Zelda Fichandler Finalist, Suzi Bass Award and Map Fund Award. “My mission is the pursuit of what connects our different communities and how we create art that liberates us to imagine a more inclusive future.”
Chaowen Ting is an Atlanta-based Taiwan native and conducts the Georgia Tech Symphony Orchestra and also serves as Music Director of the North America New Chamber Opera Festival in Ohio. Ting has been cited for her “enlightening and engaging” (Earrelevant) guidance and “stylish and clear” musical direction (ConcertoNet) in performances of opera, orchestral and chamber works. She made her company debut with Opera Orlando, leading a production Die Zauberflöte, and with the South Carolina Philharmonic Orchestra. In 2023, Ting joined the Allentown Symphony Orchestra as a Conducting Fellow. She also served as assistant conductor for The Atlanta Opera’s production of Don Giovanni. In August 2024, she joins Staatsorchester Rheinische Philharmonie and Maestro Sergi Gili Solé as assistant conductor for the performance of Verdi’s Requiem at the Philharmonie Berlin and a chorus of more than 900 participants of the CHORALSPACE Summer Festival.
Sakinah Bennett was born and raised in Douglasville, GA, and discovered her passion for dance at age five. She honed her skills in ballet, jazz, contemporary, tap, and hip-hop at A.D. West Dance Company, moving on to the prestigious Debbie Allen Dance Academy Summer Intensive in Los Angeles by 2012. Following her return, she joined Southern Dance Precision for two years before entering New Manchester High School’s Fine Arts Magnet Education Program. Excelling academically, she graduated in 2017 at the top of her class with a major in dance and a minor in theater. During her sophomore year, she joined the Axam Dance Theatre Experience as an apprentice and remains an associate member. Bennett also earned a full tuition scholarship from the Posse Foundation to Bard College, where she pursued dance and historical studies with a concentration in Africana Studies. Co-founder of the mentorship program Sister to Sister, she aims to empower young women of color through the arts. Her professional performances span various prestigious platforms and productions. Recently, Sakinah has embraced motherhood, welcoming her son Sol, while continuing her work in dance, modeling, and running her branding agency, Simple Solutions.
Marnie Breckenridge, soprano, is captivating international audiences by performing roles ranging from Baroque to bel canto and modern on opera and symphony stages in the U.S., Europe, and Asia. She is a leading figure in contemporary opera and known for her deeply poignant character portrayals, intelligent musicianship, “lovely soprano” voice (The New York Times), and “lyrical poignancy and dramatic power” (The Chicago Tribune). A favorite among some of the most gifted composers of our time, she has sung lead roles in eight world premieres of award-winning new operas and countless art songs/recordings. Breckenridge’s versatility in the theatre and acting realm have brought her into film and cross-over projects including the role of Kathie in Gordon Getty’s opera movie, Goodbye, Mr. Chips and her European and Asian debuts as Cunegonde in Bernstein’s Candide for the Prague State Opera, followed by Robert Carsen’s production with the English National Opera and on tour in Japan. Recent performances included the title role of Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor (Orlando Opera) and an upcoming debut in Jacqueline (WestEdge Opera, CA) in August 2024.
Andrew Gilstrap, baritone, is quickly establishing himself as a versatile artist known for his musical sophistication and stage presence with his “imposing bass-baritone” (Opera Today) and “perfect timing” (Washington Classical Review). He is an alumnus of the respective apprentice programs of the Bayerische Staatsoper, Des Moines Metro Opera, Minnesota Opera, and Wolf Trap Opera. Career highlights include roles in Don Giovanni (Leporello) with Wolf Trap Opera, Le nozze di Figaro (Antonio) and L’infedeltà delusa (Il padre di Nencio) with the Bayerische Staatsoper, and Il barbiere di siviglia and Flight with Minnesota Opera. This season, he performed the roles of Horace Derwent in The Shining and Starveling in A Midsummer Night’s Dream with The Atlanta Opera, as well as a feature role in Frankenstein: The Movie Opera. He also made house and role debuts in Arizona Opera’s Il barbiere di Siviglia (Don Bartolo). Gilstrap holds degrees from the University of Houston’s Moores School of Music where he graduated with his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music.
Ronnita Miller, mezzo-soprano, has triumphed in recent returns to Lyric Opera of Chicago in La fille du régiment (Marquise de Birkenfeld) and with Seattle Opera in X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X (Ella). She is acclaimed for her performance as Erda in The Atlanta Opera production of Das Rheingold. On the concert stage, she joined the Rotterdam Philharmonic on tour for Die Walküre (Grimgerde) under the baton of Yannick Nézet-Séguin. Additionally, she joined the New World Symphony for Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9, and the Tucson Symphony for Verdi’s Requiem. A Grammy Award-nominated artist, Miller has appeared on the stages of The Metropolitan Opera, the Boston Modern Opera Project, Detroit Opera, Opera Omaha, and the Lyric Opera of Chicago. Miller’s performance highlights at Deutsche Oper Berlin include Aribert Reimann’s L’Invisible (Handmaiden), Nabucco (Fenena), and Le nozze di Figaro (Marcellina), as well as appearing in revival performances of some of the roles that brought her the admiration of Berlin audiences such as Marthe Schwertlein in Faust Her international guest appearances have included concerts with the London Symphony Orchestra, the Berlin Philharmonic, and Staatsoper Hannover.
Kevin Thompson, bass, made his house debuts last season with Washington National Opera in Electra (as both Der Pfleger des Orest and Ein alter Diener), with Fort Worth Opera in Aida (Il Re), and with Utah Opera in Rigoletto (Sparafucile). In concert, Thompson returned to Opera Omaha for an Opera Outdoors Concert and sang Verdi’s Requiem with the Eureka Symphony. He performed with the Odyssey Opera in a concert of three one-act operas by Rachmaninoff known as Troika in the long-overdue U.S. premiere of the works. Thompson also joined Bard Music Festival for two rarely heard works, singing in Saint-Saëns’ Henry VIII (Canterbury) and Vaughan-Williams’ Sir John in Love (Pistol). Upcoming appearances include featured roles with Opera Colorado, Dallas Opera, Opera Grand Rapids, Utah Opera, Fargo Moorhead Opera and with the Mobile Symphony’s annual Christmas Concert. Acclaimed by The New York Times as a “stentorian bass,” Thompson “possesses a voice with extraordinary range, depth, [and] color combined with a commanding stage presence.” (San Francisco Classical Voice).
AC Wilson is a native of Minneapolis, MN, and has been training in tap, ballet, and musical theater for nearly seven years. Wilson began his dance journey as an actor who just respected and loved the art of dance, eventually leading to a more in-depth relationship with that discipline. He found himself in Atlanta, GA, by way of Clark Atlanta University, persuing a degree in public relations. While in school he has been fortunate enough to work and study under creatives such as Anthony Burrell, Debbie Allen, Dyllon Burnside, as well as Tyler Perry. He plans to be a full-time writer, actor, and artistic director, and Forsyth County is Flooding has given him the space to peruse those outlets simultaneously. He looks forward to his first show with The Atlanta Opera and his first-ever opera in general. He is more excited to participate in something so eclectic.
Minka Wiltz, mezzo-soprano, is a singer, actor, writer, and producer who was reared in Southwest Atlanta. After performing in the Atlanta theater community for more than 20 years, Wiltz moved to Bloomington, IN, with her husband and their infant daughter. Wiltz enjoys using her creative voice to explore themes of identity, race, and community. She returns to The Atlanta Opera for this performance after engagements in Porgy and Bess (2019 and 2005) and Madama Butterfly (2007). Her credits include work as a voiceover recording artist with Penguin Randomhouse and Earshot Audiospot Studio where she was included in the cast of the audiobook The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story. Her production company, Wiltz Productions, is in preproduction with her most recent piece TRANStrans.
Monday, June 17, 2024 @ 7pm
Ray Charles Performing Arts Center
Morehouse College
The Antinori Foundation Grand Prize
Welcome – Tomer Zvulun & Dr. Melvin Foster
Introductions – Andrea Davis Pinkney host
The Binya & The Comya
Lauren McCall composer
Mo Holmes librettist
The Binya MARIA CLARK, soprano
The Comya TIMOTHY D. PARROTT, tenor
music director & piano R. TIMOTHY McREYNOLDS
“A binya is an older person, a wiser person, versus a little child who’s a new person who’s just come here. I’ve been here so I know.”
- Cornelia Walker Bailey, Gullah-Geechee historian, Sapelo Island, GA.
Forced to turn away from old-timey technology as her sea island community slowly erodes, an expert basket weaver sets out to train an ambitious, young protégé—an AI-programmed humanoid—to carry her ancestral knowledge into the next millennia. In The Binya and The Comya, folkloric and technological worlds collide, inspired by the rich musical culture of the Gullah-Geechee communities.
Timothy Amukele composer
Jarrod Lee librettist
Teacher RANDALL PERKINS, baritone
Android BRIANNA SAMUELS, soprano music director & piano ERIC JENKINS
In a post-apocalyptic future after the great war, Andy the android must transmit all that has been lost to the new humans. Andy learns lessons via a hologram, from its creator who lived over 100 years ago. After thousands of lessons, Andy’s last and most important lesson is “love.” How do you teach love to an android?
David Davila librettist
Montalon PEDRO CARRERAS, Jr., tenor
Mimeo TRAVIS HALL, tenor music director & piano CHOO CHOO HU
The world is in shambles and Montalon has created a Mimeo of himself to ensure that his art and his people are remembered after the fall of humanity. Now there are only ten minutes left before an extinction-level event, and Mimeo is questioning if humanity, with its history of colonialism, racism, and imperialism even deserves to be remembered. Can the artist change Mimeo’s mind in time, or is it the artist who needs to change?
Evan Williams composer
Ashlee Haze librettist
Erika TIFFANY UZOIJE, soprano
AhLee EBONY COLLIER, mezzo-soprano
music director & piano ANDREW BAYLES
Amid an imminent apocalypse, Erika, an African-American poet from the American South has prematurely come to the end of her tenure as a keeper of the sacred tenets of humanity. Her only hope of having a legacy beyond her inevitable doom is an android named AhLee, designed to be her protégé. In this scene, they meet for the first time and must move quickly to transfer information before the clock runs out. Erika is not hopeful that AhLee is capable of such a feat. However, she proceeds with the lesson and the two embark on a unique endeavor.
Kitty Brazelton composer
Vaibu Mohan librettist
Janani XIAOHAN CHEN, mezzo-soprano
MPO HANAN DAVIS, mezzo-soprano
music director & piano ERIKA TAZAWA
Janani has begun exhibiting the first signs of dementia. Her children are concerned for her well-being and acquire a Memory Processing Operator (MPO) as home health aide for Janani. MPO learns from how Janani likes to live her life to become a bank for memories and important information as her memory fails. MPO replicates language patterns so stored information is exactly as Janani inputs it. Janani teaches MPO about her garden. As she begins to lose pieces of her memory, it is Janani who learns to trust MPO to be her aide and guide through this next chapter of life.
Dave Ragland composer
Selda Sahin librettist
Carrie Steele INDRA THOMAS, soprano
Ruth BRIANNA SAMUELS, soprano
Michael TYRONE WEBB, tenor
Raymond JACOB LAY, baritone
conductor GREGORY MCDANIEL
piano R. TIMOTHY M c REYNOLDS
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lighting & projections designer BRADLEY BERGERON
stage manager CRISTINE REYNOLDS
assistant stage manager JONESIA WILLIAMS
supertitles operator AMY WILLIAMS
new works producer ALEJANDRA MARTINEZ
production assistant LESH’IN EDWARDS
production intern QADEN DAISE
Lauren McCall is a composer and music educator from Atlanta, Georgia. She studied for her master’s degree in music composition at the Vermont College of Fine Arts, and she is a Ph.D. candidate studying music technology at the Georgia Institute of Technology. McCall has had compositions performed around North America and Europe. This includes her piece for open instrumentation titled To Cover You, which was performed at the Fresh Inc. Festival, and Continuum, which was performed by the Georgia Institute of Technology’s Laptop Orchestra. She enjoys collaborating with technologists, musicians, and artists. Along with composing, Lauren enjoys playing classical music and jazz on the clarinet and piano, spending time in nature, spending time with family and friends, and traveling.
Mo Holmes is a black queer Southern playwright and dramaturg, born in San Antonio and raised on the long stretch from Texas to Alabama. Her works include We So Short (honors: 2022 O’Neill National Playwrights Conference semi-finalist; development: 2019-2020 Playwrights’ Center Many Voices Mentorship), Amanda (development: 2024 Tennessee Williams Clarksdale Workshop with Lucy Thurber), Yr God My God (production: 2021 Minnesota Opera MNiatures), and Grwm (development: 2021 Everwood Farmstead Retreat; 2019 Center for Performing Arts New Works Artist-in-Residence in Minneapolis). As a dramaturg, she has supported the development of several new works, including Lynn Nottage’s CLYDE’S (fka FLOYD’S) at the Guthrie Theatre and Brittany K. Allen’s Redwood at the Jungle Theatre in Minneapolis; and Brian Grandison’s Diesel Heart at the History Theatre in St. Paul. Currently, Holmes is an MFA candidate in playwriting at Columbia University.
Dr. Timothy Amukele is a Jack of two trades: a working physician, and a composer and arranger of vocal music. Most recently he served as the Minister of Music at the historic St. James Episcopal church in Baltimore Maryland while on faculty at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Amukele has worked closely with the librettist Jarrod Lee on several commissions including a 2021 song cycle Journey to you based on the photography of William Christenberry (1936–2016), and Spirit Moves, a 2022 community opera for the IN Series opera company in DC. Jarrod Lee and Tim Amukele are currently working on Kandake. His other commissions have included I Will Rise by the New York Chapter of the National Association of Negro Musicians; Composer-in-residence for the Grady-Rayam Spirituals Foundation in 2011; and What Sweeter Music, a Christmas Cantata by the Queen Anne Methodist Church. His 2021 commissions include the American Spiritual Ensemble; and Madman, a song cycle based on the parables of the Lebanese American poet Khalil Gibran that premiered at the Fort Worth Opera in January 2024. Dr. Amukele graduated from City College of the City University of New York, where he majored in Music Theory and Biochemistry.
Jarrod Lee, librettist, hails from Sylacauga, Alabama and presently resides in Baltimore, Maryland. Lee’s collaborations include Oshun and Two Corners with composer B.E. Boykin, Voices of Zion and the art song “See your Equal,” which placed third in the composition category of the George Shirley Vocal Competition, with composer Ronald “Trey” Walton, and collaborations with composer, Timothy Amukele called Journey to You and a community opera called Spirit Moves. Lee has received commissions from the Alliance for New Music Theater, IN Series, Finger Lakes Opera, and the Washington National Opera. In addition to original stories, he has worked in translating a deconstruction of Die Zauberflӧte (The Magic Flute) called Black Flute with playwright Sybil Roberts. In concert with writing and performing, Lee is the Education Associate for Maryland Opera, volunteers as the Director of Project Managers with the Coalition for African Americans in the Performing Arts (CAAPA) and serves on the board of Baltimore Musicales. As an opera singer, Jarrod draws from his performance experiences when creating new stories for fellow artists. His works are rooted in his experience of being Black, gay, and American; adding to the canon of stories written by Black Americans that are rarely seen on the operatic stage.
Hong Kong-born composer George Tsz-Kwan Lam grew up in Hong Kong and Massachusetts. Lam’s recent works focus on connecting audiences with stories from their local communities through contemporary music. Such projects include his recent work Family Association (2022), co-commissioned by University Settlement and Music At The Anthology. Family Association is a geolocation-enabled soundwalk in Manhattan’s Chinatown that combines oral history recordings with music inspired by the recorded speech. Another musical placemaking work titled The Emigrants (2018), commissioned by the cello-percussion duo New Morse Code, tells the stories of seven musicians who emigrated to Queens, New York City and combines oral history recordings with live music. Lam recently launched a new geolocation-based work titled Passage, supported by a grant from the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong toward a new oral history and geolocation-enabled app highlighting the stories of minoritized communities of Hong Kong. Current projects include Kiyoshi Kuromiya: Critical Path for solo clarinet and fixed media playback (commissioned by clarinetist Shawn Copeland) and a new collaborative theatrical work with choreographer Jeff Docimo and toy pianist Dorothy Chan. George Tsz-Kwan Lam is a founding member of the NYC-based new opera ensemble Rhymes With Opera.
David Davila is a multi-hyphenate theatre maker from the border of South Texas. Winner of the 2022 Smith Prize for Political Theatre and the 2021 New American Voices Playwriting Award, his work stands at the intersection of queer-culture and mestizaje. An alumnus of The Second City Training Center in Chicago and the Primary Stages Playwriting School in Manhattan, he is a proud charter member of Musical Theatre Factory, the Latinx Playwright Circle, the Latine Musical theatre Lab, the PlayGround Experiment, Lone Star Theatre, and the son of a preacher man. His theatre works include Manuel Versus The Statue Of Liberty: An Undocumented Musical Comedy (Dramatic Question Theatre, Princeton Univ, Gallery Players), Hotel Puerto Vallarta: A Legitimate Work Of Dramatic Theatre (Houston Stages), and more. Davila is a Playwrights Horizons Artist Grant Recipient, a Roundabout Theatre Company SpaceJam Resident, a Primary Stages Rockwell Scholar, and a 2022 Disney TV Fellowship Finalist. Most recently, his streaming series Most Likely To premiered at the Warner Bros New York Latino Film Festival and won a prestigious Silver Telly award for excellence in film. In 2021 his song “Like a River” written with Jaime Lozano was recorded by Tejano superstar, Bobby Pulido, and released on Broadway Records. In 2024 his MFA thesis production Vox Pop! A Post-Democratic Musical (Book, Music, & Lyrics) premiered at Indiana University.
Evan Williams explores the thin lines between beauty and disquieting, joy and sorrow, and simple and complex, while often tackling important social and political issues. Williams’ catalogue contains a broad range of work, from vocal and operatic offerings to instrumental works, along with electronic music. His work has also been featured at festivals such as MATA, RED NOTE, Strange Beautiful Music, SEAMUS, the New Music Gathering, the Electroacoustic Barn Dance, the New York City Electronic Music Festival, and the New Music Festival at Bowling Green State University. Williams’ work can be heard on multiple commercial releases, including soprano Katherine Jolly’s critically acclaimed debut album Preach Sister, Preach. Williams has received awards and recognition from the American Prize, the National Federation of Music Clubs, ASCAP, Fellowships from the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and in 2018, was chosen as the Detroit Symphony’s inaugural African American Classical Roots Composer-in-Residence. He currently serves as the Steven R. Gerber Composer-in-Residence for the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia.
Kiera “Ashlee Haze” Nelson is a poet and spoken word artist from Atlanta by way of Chicago. She has been a part of the Atlanta Poetry circuit for over a decade and has been writing for over 15 years. In 2023, she won a Silver Telly Award for original copywriting and voiceover. Ashlee Haze has brought poetry to unexpected spaces, including New York Fashion Week, Atlanta United Soccer, THINX, The Healthcare Businesswomen’s Association, The Atlanta Dream, H&M, Blavity, and more. She appeared on NPR’s Tiny Desk series alongside Queen & Slim composer Blood Orange. After her poem “For Colored Girls who Don’t Need Katy Perry when Missy Elliott is Enough” went viral, Missy Elliott was so moved she showed up at the poet’s house. Ashlee is the host of Moderne Renaissance, an educational podcast for creatives. Her sophomore book Smoke was released April 20, 2020, with a second edition released May 2023. In 2006, she was the grand prize winner of V-103’s “Got Word” Youth Poetry Slam and in 2009 made her first trip to the National Poetry Slam, placing fifth in the nation, and has since become a regular competitor and coach for that program. After earning her Bachelor of Arts degree from Georgia State University, she established a boutique media production agency in Atlanta and collaborates regularly to produce film and audio stories.
Kitty Brazelton, a NYC-based composer, bandleader, and multi-instrumentalist, has been recognized with two Opera America awards, The Aaron Copland Fund for Music and an NPR-broadcast choral commission with Garrison Keillor. The irrepressible Brazelton has always championed music’s power to unite—across genre, across tradition, across language. Brazelton’s recording project the world is not ending—we’ve been here before brings six works into immersive audio, with over 75 singers and instrumentalists recorded worldwide. Other milestone works include I am not my Photograph (you cannot erase me) premiered by the L.A.-based Isaura String Quartet, and Essential Prayers Project—an a cappella work that revisits the tradition of prayer in intimate house concert settings. Most recently, after leaving her professorship to compose full time, Brazelton teamed with digital multimedia MASARY Studios to create Recursion and Release —four hours of live a cappella choral music digitally transformed for FirstWorks Providence RI’s street festival. Brazelton’s vocal quintet sang newly composed polyphony, with text from Jack Kornfield’s guided “Meditation on Letting Go,” while attendees embarked on a physical journey through spatialized choral clouds of sound and light in the dark garden, chapel, and sanctuary of an 1847 church.
Vaibu Mohan is a writer, musician, dancer, director, and producer specializing in bringing South Asian forms of storytelling and theater making into the Western sphere. She founded the series Work In Progress at 54 Below that gives early career writers a place to present their work. New York City premieres include: Life Of A Lemon (NYU/AOP Opera Labs), Keep It Cheery (Brooklyn Children’s Theater), and the concert presentation of Sati: Goddess Incarnate at 54 Below in July 2023. Mohan debuted off-Broadway songwriting of Village Songs at Rattlestick Theater (Spring 2022) and is a writing consultant on White Rose (off-Broadway January 2024). As a Bharatnatyam performer and creator, Mohan creates pieces that stretch the genre and explore connections between disparate artforms. Mohan has performed at 54 Below, Greenroom 42, La Mama Theater, Lincoln Center, and Midnight Theater. She is a graduate of the NYU Tisch Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program.
Dave Ragland is a four-time Emmy-nominated composer, conductor, vocalist, and educator. Based in Nashville, TN, Ragland has received the 2022 Adams-Owens Composition Award by the African American Art Song Alliance, the 2021 American Prize in Composition, two Telly Awards, and two Midsouth Regional Emmy nominations, in addition to his first prize award of the 96-Hour Opera competition in 2023. While collaborating with Selda Sahin, Ragland is also developing projects with Damon Davis, Ted Hearne, Alarm Will Sound, and Inversion Vocal Ensemble on Davis’ concept opera Ligeia Mare. Now available for production, his operas Charlie and the Wolf (with librettist Mary McCallum) and Beatrice were written for children and have been performed by the Cedar Rapids Opera and Oregon’s Portland Opera, respectively. Additional composition credits include LA Opera, Nashville Ballet, Washington National Opera, The America/Beautiful Project, Intersection Contemporary Ensemble, chatterbird, and the Alias Chamber Ensemble.
Selda Sahin wrote original songs for the feature film American Reject in collaboration with Derek Gregor, her long-time writing partner. Additionally, their musical Modern, about a group of Amish teens on their Rumspringa was developed in 2019 at The Village Theatre’s Festival of New Musicals, the ASCAP Grow a Show Workshop, and the NYC Stephen Schwartz ASCAP workshop. The work received further development at the Bloomington Playwrights Project in February 2022. With Autumn Reeser and Derek Gregor, Sahin developed a new musical titled Particle, which saw its original development at the Imagen program at Michigan State University in 2021. Sahin wrote the lyrics to the musical short film Grind starring Anthony Rapp. Her musical All Fall Down (music and lyrics) was developed at the New York Musical Theatre Festival, Penn State NuMusicals, and TheatreLab. She was selected for the ASCAP Songwriters Collective and received an Emmy for her work on “Passion” at Lincoln Center.
In 1887 Atlanta, a 50-something Carrie Steele Logan stands in Central Railroad Station holding a baby. Michael, a man in his 20’s in modern-day clothes exits a train, and we transition to present day Oakland Graveyard, and as Michael stands at Carrie’s grave, we realize that he is a descendant of one of the many abandoned babies Carrie saved and cared for long ago. In a nebulous, abstract merging of time and place, we learn that the baby Carrie holds is Michael’s.
Now under development, Steele Roots was awarded the grand prize in the 96-Hour Opera competition in June 2023. Written by Dave Ragland and Selda Sahin, Steele Roots explores the impact of the life of Carrie Steele Logan, who founded Atlanta’s Carrie Steele-Pitts Home in 1892 as an orphanage and children’s home.
The creative team of Ragland and Sahin are currently developing their one-act opera, which is scheduled to premiere at the 96-Hour Opera Festival in 2025.
For more than 36 years, Carrie Steele Logan (c. 1829-1900) worked in public, first as a matron at the Macon, GA, train depot, then as a maid at Atlanta’s Union Station depot. As a formerly enslaved woman, she had learned to read and write early in her life and is described as a “noble Christian.” Her compassion moved her to help the children she saw wandering the streets by sheltering them in her home and in an abandoned boxcar. She raised money to build a home for the children by writing a small autobiography and selling it. The book sold well, and in total, she raised $5,000.
She built a three-story brick orphanage that was dedicated on June 20, 1892, and brought in 50 children. The orphans attended school, were taught domestic and farm skills, and were trained in Bible studies. An updated and relocated facility, now called the Carrie Steele-Pitts Home, continues to provide shelter and services to children.
Paul Cremo (Dramaturg/Director of Opera Commissioning, The Metropolitan Opera) has overseen projects developed through the Met / Lincoln Center Theater New Works Program, as well as full commissions for the Met stage. These include revised versions of Fire Shut Up in My Bones by Terence Blanchard and Kasi Lemons, and Champion by Terence Blanchard and Michael Cristoffer, Jeremy Sams’s The Enchanted Island and his English-language version of The Merry Widow, and Kelley Rourke’s English-language adaptation of Cinderella. He is currently supervising development of The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Mason Bates and Gene Scheer, Lincoln in the Bardo by Missy Mazzoli and Royce Vavrek, as well as upcoming works by Valerie Coleman, Maxim Kolomiiets, David T. Little, Jessie Montgomery, Joshua Schmidt, Joel Thompson, and Carlos Simon. He is also working with librettists George Brant, Lynn Nottage and Ruby Aiyo Gerber, Dick Scanlan, and Gene Scheer. He has served on the Tony Awards Nominating Committee and the jury for the Pulitzer Prize for Music and served as an advisor to the Sundance Theater Lab.
Throughout his career, Doug Hooker has worked for public and private sector organizations for the betterment of Atlanta. He “retired” in March 2022, after having led the Atlanta Regional Commission for many years. Currently, he serves as the board chairman of the Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta and on the boards of the Atlanta Housing Authority, the Latin American Association, the Fox Theatre, the Clayton State University Foundation, and St. Vincent de Paul. He is a Special Fellow and Professor of Practice with the Urban Studies Institute, of Georgia State University, where he teaches urban and regional governance. He is also on the board of directors of Barge Design Solutions, a privately-held engineering and architecture firm. Hooker has undergraduate and graduate degrees from Georgia Tech, and an MBA from Emory University. With a lifelong passion for music, he studies oboe, sings in a semi-professional community chorus (The Trey Clegg Singers), and composes music. Several of his compositions have been publicly performed, including his second symphony, Without Regard to Sex, Race or Color (2022) and his string quartet, Pandemic Elegy (2023), and two of his choral works, Standin’ My Ground (2022) and Fear Not (2023).
Andrea Davis Pinkney (author and librettist) is the acclaimed librettist for the Houston Grand Opera’s The Snowy Day, with composer Joel Thompson, a work based on the beloved classic by Ezra Jack Keats. As the The New York Times bestselling and award-winning author of numerous books, Pinkney’s work has garnered multiple Coretta Scott King Book Awards, the Boston Globe/Horn Book Honor, and the Parenting Publications gold medal. She is a four-time NAACP Image award nominee, and has been inducted into the New York Writers Hall of Fame. She and her work are the subject of the Emmy-nominated short film, Andrea Davis Pinkney: National Author Engagement. As a producing partner, Pinkney has served as the creator of numerous theatrical and audio works, based on her bestselling books. She has served in executive and creative leadership roles at the Walt Disney Company, Essence magazine, the CBS Magazines Group, and Simon & Schuster.Since 2005 Pinkney has served as Vice President of Trade Publishing at Scholastic.
Carlos Simon is a multi-faceted GRAMMY-nominated composer and curator. His music ranges from concert music to film scores with influences of jazz, gospel, and neo-romanticism. Simon is the current Composerin-Residence for the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and inaugural Composer Chair for the Boston Symphony Orchestra. The 2023-24 season saw premieres with San Diego Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra, The Washington Chorus, and LA Master Chorale, following other commissions from Minnesota Orchestra, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Washington National Opera (with Mo Willems), Brooklyn Art Song Society, New York Philharmonic, Bravo Vail, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Glimmerglass Festival, Sphinx Organization, Music Academy of the West, and San Francisco Chamber Orchestra. Simon’s work takes great inspiration from writers such as Terrance Hayes, Isabel Wilkerson, Ruby Aiyo Gerber, and Courtney Lett, and the art of Romare Bearden.
Tazewell Thompson is an award-winning director of opera and theatre and is also a playwright, librettist, lecturer, teacher, and actor. His opera, Blue, with composer Jeanine Tesori, won the Music Critics Association of North America Award for Best New Opera in 2020. The New York Times and Washington Post listed Blue as Best in Classical Music for 2019. Blue has had subsequent productions at Washington National Opera, Dutch National Opera, English National Opera, in Seattle, Pittsburgh, and upcoming at Chicago Lyric in November. His new opera, Jubilee, about The Fisk Jubilee Singers, will premiere in October at Seattle Opera. At Lincoln Center, his newly commissioned libretto for the world premiere of The March to Liberation, was part of the reopening ceremonies for the New York Philharmonic at David Geffen Hall. His poem Ghostlight, covered the entire page of The New York Times opinion page. He has received many awards, and EMMY Award nominations.
General and Artistic Director of The Atlanta Opera since 2013, Israeli born Tomer Zvulun is also one of opera’s most exciting stage directors, earning consistent praise for his creative vision, often described as cinematic and fresh. His work has been presented by prestigious opera houses around the world, including The Metropolitan Opera, the opera companies of Israel, Buenos Aires, Los Angeles, Montreal, Wexford, Glimmerglass, Houston, Washington National Opera, Seattle, Dallas, Detroit, San Diego, Minnesota, Boston, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, New Orleans and Wolf Trap, as well as leading educational institutes and universities such as The Juilliard School, Indiana University, Boston University, and IVAI in Tel Aviv. Since taking the leadership in Atlanta one decade ago, he personally directed thirty of the company’s productions. He increased the operations of the company from three to six productions per season, while stabilizing the financials and in the course of his first decade tenure, secured Atlanta’s position as one of the top 10 opera companies in the US. He leads a creative team in mounting the first new production of all four operas of The Ring which continues next season in Atlanta with Siegfried. In addition, next season his production of Rigoletto travels to Los Angeles Opera, his La bohème returns to The Dallas Opera, and his acclaimed production of The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs will make its Kennedy Center debut at the Washington National Opera.
Carl W. Knobloch, Jr. General & Artistic Director Tomer Zvulun
Managing Director
Executive Assistant & Board Liason
Special Projects Manager
ARTISTIC / MUSIC
Carl & Sally Gable Music Director
Director of Artistic Administration
Artistic & Operations Manager
Chorus & Orchestra Manager
Orchestra Librarian
Artistic Services Coordinator
Director of Production
Assoc. Director of Production
Production Manager
Technical Director
Associate Technical Director
Lighting Supervisor
Props Supervisor & Artisan
Assistant Stage Manager
Assistant Stage Manger
Costume Director
Show Manager
Costume Stock Manager/Wardrobe Supervisor
Costume Communications Coordinator
Master Draper/Tailor
First Hand
Lead Stitcher
Stitcher
Micah Fortson
Misty Reid
Nancy Kritikos
Arthur Fagen
Meredith Wallace
Megan Bennett
Chris Bragg
Phil Parsons
Elizabeth Graiser
Robert Reynolds
Meggie Roseborough
Amy Smith
Rick Combs
Rodney Barge
Matthew Peddie
Paige Steffens
Caitlin Denny-Turner
Aletha Saunders
Sarah Burch Gordon
Paula Peasley-Ninestein
Jenn Rogers
Allison Hines
Mary Torres
Gibron Sheppard
Maggie Tennant
Michelle Lee
Development Managing Director
Director of Development—Individual Giving
Jessica Langlois
Jonathan Blalock
Associate Director of Development Operations Katy Gardner
Individual Giving Manager
Luke MacMillan
Development Operations Manager Aaron Walker
Development Operations & Events Coordinator Erin Turner
Controller Inga V. Murro
Staff Accountant
Staff Accountant
COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT & EDUCATION
Director of Community Engagement & Education
Education Manager
Community Engagement & Education Coordinator
Camelia Johnson
David Tubbs, Jr.
Bookkeeper Ruth Strickland
Chief Administrative Officer
Kathy J. White
Director of Human Resources Kenneth R. Timmons
MARKETING, COMMUNICATIONS, & AUDIENCE DEVELOPMENT
Director of Sales & Marketing
Rebecca Brown
Creative Services Manager Matt Burkhalter
Marketing Project Manager Emily Crisp
Ticketing Services Coordinator
COMMUNICATIONS & PUBLIC RELATIONS
Chauncey Sims
Director of Communications & Public Relations Michelle Winters
Marketing & Communications Manager Ashley May King
THE ATLANTA OPERA FILM STUDIO
Director of The Atlanta Opera Film Studio Felipe Barral
Film Associate Amanda Sachtleben
Short-Form Video Editor
GLYNN STUDIO
Master Teacher
Jessica Kiger
Amy Williams
Jonesia Williams
Brittany Fontus
Laura Brooks Rice
Studio Artists Kameron Lopreore, Aubrey Odle, Amanda Sheriff, Nora Winsler, Jason Zacher
The Atlanta Opera would like to thank the following people and organizations for their help in making the 96-Hour Opera Festival possible:
Drs. Frank & Ann Critz
Elena Kholodova
Alejandra Martinez
Claudia Chapa
The Atlanta Ballet
The Alliance Theatre
Georgia Institute of Technology
Slumgullion Charitable Fund
