Entertainment Weekly published an article yesterday highlighting ten operas based on popular culture. Guerilla Opera's 2009 world premiere production of "Say It Ain't So, Joe!" by Boston-based composer Curtis K. Hughes with stage direction by Nathan Troup is mentioned along side iconic modern-day operas as "Brokeback Mountain" by Charles Wuorinen, "Anna Nicole" by Mark-Anthony Turnage, and "Lost Highway" by Olga Neuwirth.
Curtis Hughes writes: "Sarah Palin and Joe Biden is used as a point of departure for a musical and dramatic exploration of tragic and comic aspects of both characters. Yet, the opera isn't about Palin and Biden as real individuals so much as it is about their public identities as constructed in the imagination of American citizens. Similarly, the depiction of the debate itself isn't so much an attempt to recreate what actually transpired as it is an evocation of the subjective experience of watching the debate, one in which a viewer's attention sometime wanders, perhaps certain ideas and utterances stand out while others recede, and time itself doesn't necessarily progress in a straightforward manner."
Read the full article online at
http://popwatch.ew.com/2014/01/27/brokeback-mountain-opera/.
For more information on "Say It Ain't So, Joe!" visit Guerilla Opera online at
www.guerillaopera.com. Like Guerilla Opera on Facebook at
www.facebook.com/guerillaopera, follow on Twitter at
www.twitter.com/guerillaopera, and follow on Instagram at
www.instagram.com/guerillaopera.
ABOUT GUERILLA OPERA
Guerilla Opera is a collaborative performing ensemble, and independent 501(c)3 organization, whose mission is to commission new chamber operas written specifically for their ensemble of artists, to perform in intimate theatrical settings, and to perform in a highly collaborative environment resulting from the direct communication between performers without a conductor or formal music director. The ensemble envisions a national community where serious new chamber opera and ensemble performance are valued and enjoyed. They will bring exciting new works to Boston and beyond, connect with communities nation-wide, and reinvigorate the concert-going public's love for new opera. (www.guerillaopera.com)
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