Ted Huffman

The Faggots and Their Friends Between Revolutions has relocated to the Southbank Centre’s Queen Elizabeth Hall for its London premiere, having run at Manchester International Festival. The performance is billed as a ‘music theatre piece rewriting the history of the world through a joyful and utopian queer lens’ and is based on the 1977 cult fantasy novel on sexual liberation and radical revolutionary aphorisms by Larry Mitchell, illustrated by Ned Asta.

Building on the overwhelming success of last year's Expansive initiative, Opera Parallèle and The Transgender District have announced plans to renew their collaboration and present a showcase of transgender and non-binary classical artists for two performances at 7.30 p.m. on Thursday, August 3 and Friday, August 4 at A.C.T.'s intimate Strand Theater.

Factory International has announced the 2023 edition of Manchester International Festival (MIF) from 29 June to 16 July. Working with partners regionally and across the globe, the wide-ranging programme of original new work by an array of international artists will take place in venues and spaces around the city and at Factory International's much-anticipated new home, which opens its doors for the first time for the Festival, in advance of its official opening in October. 

The Opera Forward Festival surprises with everything opera can be. With work by established names and a new generation of makers, musical performances, video art and talks, OFF explores the art form that is opera. From the theme that is central to this sixth edition, 'New Beginnings', OFF invites the audience to discover that opera is also something for them. 

The Broad Stage presents Polish countertenor Jakub Józef Orliński, who has quickly emerged as one of the most vibrant performers on the international classical music scene, triumphing on stage, in concert and on recording.  He makes his Los Angeles and Broad Stage debut on March 10, 2022, at 7:30pm on the Main Stage with an eclectic program of baroque, romantic and 20th century songs.

The Ivors Academy today [1 December] revealed the winners of 14 Ivor Novello Awards as part of The Ivors Composer Awards 2020, celebrating exceptional new works by composers writing for classical, jazz and sound art. The winners of these prestigious Ivor Novello Awards were revealed earlier tonight as part of a two-hour ceremony broadcast exclusively on BBC Radio 3, hosted by Kate Molleson and Tom Service. 

The Ivors Academy today [3 November] announce the nominations for The Ivors Composer Awards 2020.

Over the last five years, Opera Philadelphia has presented an impressive group of new operas it has commissioned, along with some classics from the standard rep. Starting tomorrow, we'll get a look at some of the best of them, with the company's Digital Festival running through May 29, available on YouTube and the company's website.

Now that the Metropolitan Opera has had a major success with its At-Home Gala, there are other opera companies with similar ideas. The Florence May Festival, (Maggio Musicale Fiorentino), will offer its presentation on Friday, May 1, 2020, at noon. P.D.T. Since many opera lovers are working from home, the audience should be enormous. 

Over the past five years, Opera Philadelphia has presented no fewer than nine world premieres, scoring multiple awards and winning international audience and critical recognition. Now that the 2019-20 season has been cut short by the need for social distancing, the company is extending its season online with Digital Festival O.

On 15 November, 2016, Russian teenagers Katya Vlasova and Denis Muravyov ran away from home and barricaded themselves inside a cabin with whisky, guns and ammunition. After firing on family and at police the two 15-year-olds found themselves in a stand-off with Special Forces, which only ended when the men stormed the building. Both teenagers were subsequently found dead. The whole sequence of events was live-streamed by the pair on Periscope, turning them into a Romeo and Juliet or Bonnie and Clyde for the internet age.

a??a??a??a??a??a??a??Opera Philadelphia scored a hit at O19, a?oeits increasingly essential September festivala?? (New Yorker), with the world premiere of Denis & Katya. A timely and immersive multimedia chamber opera by composer Philip Venables and librettist-director Ted Huffman, the new work was recognized with the 2019 FEDORA-GENERALI Prize for Opera and by inclusion in the New York Times's a?oeBest Classical Music of 2019.a?? Commissioned and produced in collaboration with Music Theatre Wales and Opéra Orchestre National Montpellier, now Denis & Katya makes its European debut with a tour of Wales (Feb 27a?"March 27) and dates at London's Southbank Centre (March 13 & 14), underscoring Opera Philadelphia's role as a?oea hotbed of operatic innovationa?? (New York Times) that represents a?oeone of North America's premier generators of valid new operasa?? (Opera News).

I admit this is an absolutely personal, totally one-sided view of what gave one man opera thrills last year and what I will look back on with delight. Some are old works, some are new, some are individual performers, some are ensembles, some are complete productions, some are merely the highlight of an evening, most are domestic, a few are foreign. In any case, as the new decade begins, I recall that these are the vocal highlights that made my heart beat a little faster and made me look forward to the year ahead.

In 1874, a one-year-old organization called the Oratorio Society of New York performed Handel's Messiah on Christmas night at Steinway Hall, then on East 14th Street. Earlier that year, New York City made its first move to grow beyond Manhattan by annexing the 'West Bronx.'

It's easy to give yourself over to the music--and the musicians--that Lash has created (both music and libretto) from the very first notes of the devastatingly beautiful score. It is performed by three bold singers--the commanding mezzo Kirsten Sollek, the determined baritone Christopher Dylan Herbert and eerie yet forceful countertenor Daniel Moody. In addition--and very much integral to its success--there is the dazzling string quartet known as JACK (Christopher Otto and Justin Wulliman, violins; John Pickford Richards, viola; and Jay Campbell, cello). Surprisingly and successfully, there is no conductor.

Thomas Wolfe--famed for his novels including “Look Homeward, Angel”--is also remembered for the quotable title of one of his short stories: “Only the Dead Know Brooklyn.” Judging my weekend at Opera Philadelphia's O19 opera festival, and its two world premieres, DENIS & KATYA and LET ME DIE, he could have also written “Only the Dead Know Philadelphia” (though it might have missed the priceless Brooklyn accents used in the story by this southern writer).

Two teens. One livestream that resulted in their untimely deaths. Opera Philadelphia's Denis and Katya, a world premiere part of their annual opera festival, uses this true story to ask questions about life, death, voyeurism and entertainment in an innovative 70 minute opera.

O19, the third edition of Opera Philadelphia's annual season-opening festival, launches on September 18 with the world premiere of Denis & Katya at the Suzanne Roberts Theatre. Winner of the prestigious Fedora Generali Prize for Opera for 2019, this immersive new multimedia chamber opera is the work of composer Philip Venables and librettist-director Ted Huffman, the duo behind the award-winning Royal Opera House commission 4.48 Psychosis. 

Launching its past two annual seasons with the groundbreaking Festival O has firmly established Opera Philadelphia not only as "one of North America's premiere generators of valid new operas" (Opera News), but as "one of American opera's success stories" (New York Times). Now the company steps boldly into 2019-2020 with the third edition of its festival, O19, which comprises two world premieres, two company premieres, and a series of special presentations, events, and recitals at multiple venues across the city in September. Next, the season spotlights renowned Jack Mulroney Music Director Corrado Rovaris, who leads three productions at the Academy of Music to mark the 20th anniversary of his company debut. As the Washington Post observes: "Opera in Philadelphia really can claim to offer something for everyone."

Where are our Violettas, our Salomes, our Elektras--even our Lulus--for opera to move forward as an art form for the 21 century? They're all victims of stress and suffering of one sort or another, but still worth meeting up with--not only musically but dramatically--more than once. I began thinking about this while watching the three music-theatre/new opera pieces that I visited during the opening days of the current edition of PROTOTYPE:OPERA/THEATRE/NOW--The Infinite Hotel, 4.48 Psychosis and PRISM.