David T. Little News

Michael Egel, General and Artistic Director of Des Moines Metro Opera, has announced the repertory for the 2017 Summer Festival Season and 2nd Stages Series.

Fort Worth Opera (FWOpera) announced today the successful finale to their 90-day, million dollar gift match challenge, Million Dollar Summer. FWOpera's patrons united to support the local arts community throughout the campaign. The conclusion of this challenge coincides with the end of the company's fiscal year, August 31, and solidifies FWOpera's future to pioneer new operatic works that reflect the city's unique cultural mosaic.

On Monday, September 12, 2016, Works & Process at the Guggenheim presents discussion with the creators and excerpts of Opera Philadelphia's upcoming world premiere of Breaking the Waves by composer Missy Mazzoli and librettist Royce Vavrek.

This fall, contemporary opera producer AMERICAN OPERA PROJECTS (AOP) will present COMPOSERS & THE VOICE: SIX SCENES 2016, a concert of opera scenes from ten artists emerging in the world of contemporary opera. Audiences will get a first look at six wildly different new works that range from imagining moments in the lives of famous people such as Sigmund Freud and Mabel Dodge Luhan or events taking place in a spaceship, an asylum, and a uterus. The composers Matthew Barnson, Carlos R. Carrillo, Nell Shaw Cohen, Marc LeMay, Cecilia Livingston, and Sky Macklay and librettists Edward Einhorn, Duncan McFarlane, Emily Roller, and Mark Sonnenblick, were chosen by AOP to spend a year creating new works in its bi-annual fellowship program Composers & the Voice (C&V).

Washington National Opera (WNO) today announced full programming details for the fifth season of the American Opera Initiative, its comprehensive commissioning program that brings contemporary American stories to the stage while fostering the talents of rising American composers and librettists. For the first time, all of the program's world premiere operas will be presented during an American Opera Initiative Festival weekend, January 13-15, 2017 in the Kennedy Center Family Theater.

The GRAMMY Award-winning Brooklyn Youth Chorus has announced that Silent Voices, a multimedia, multi-composer stage work conceived, co-commissioned, produced and performed by the Chorus, will be the centerpiece of the Chorus' 25th anniversary season.

2016-17 Programming Expands the Chorus' Pioneering Role as a Powerful Lead Performer, a Bold Commissioner of New Music and a Producer of Innovative Stage Works.

21C MEDIA GROUP just released its season preview of opera, vocal and choral music for 2016-17. Scroll down for details!

Lincoln Center and Ehrenkranz Artistic Director Jane Moss announced today the 50th Mostly Mozart Festival, one of the world's major music festivals and a beloved summer New York tradition, with events taking place across Lincoln Center July 22-August 27, 2016.

The fourth and penultimate week of the 50th anniversary season of Lincoln Center's Mostly Mozart Festival presents nine performances featuring the best of Mozart's operatic and choral repertoire as well as a highly-anticipated New York premiere.

HERE has announced its 2016-2017 producing season, featuring three HERE Resident Artist world premieres, two international presentations from HERE's renowned Dream Music Puppetry Program, the fifth annual PROTOTYPE: Opera/Theatre/Now festival, and HERE's yearly CULTUREMART festival, where HERE serves up a first look at new work in process from artists in the HERE Artist Residency Program (HARP).

The San Francisco Symphony (SFS) and Music Director Michael Tilson Thomas (MTT) celebrate the 80th birthday of Steve Reich with a diverse week of concerts highlighting the seminal composer's works September 7-11, 2016 at Davies Symphony Hall.

Lincoln Center announces an artist update for the 50th season's opening program on July 25 and 26. Due to pregnancy, mezzo-soprano Sasha Cooke has withdrawn from these performances and will be replaced by Daniela Mack, who makes her New York and Mostly Mozart Festival debuts.

FORT WORTH, TX – Fort Worth Opera (FWOpera) announced today that the submission deadline has been extended for its fifth annual Frontiers showcase. Applications will now be accepted through midnight, July 19, 2016. The company's innovative program will be held during the final week of the 2017 Fort Worth Opera Festival – April 15, 2017 – May 7, 2017 and coincides with the 2017 Opera America Conference in Dallas/Fort Worth. Launched during the company's 2012-2013 season, Frontiers remains one of the only programs world-wide that seeks out unproduced works by the finest up-and-coming composers and librettists from North, South, and Central America, and has been acclaimed for the opportunities it provides its winners. Composers and librettists whose works are selected as part of the Frontiers showcase gain valuable exposure for their works in a live performance environment while also taking part in unparalleled networking opportunities with industry professionals including artistic directors of other established opera companies, artist managers, classical music publishers, funding organizations, and conductors.

Opera Saratoga's Artistic and General Director Lawrence Edelson announced today the three exciting new productions that will comprise the company's 2017 Summer Festival, which will build on the company's commitment to producing masterpieces from the operatic cannon, important American works, and works in which dance plays an integral role.

Rite of Summer Music Festival continues its sixth stellar season with cellist Jeffrey Zeigler and percussionist Ian David Rosenbaum performing two free shows at 1 & 3pm today, June 25th.

Rite of Summer Music Festival continues its sixth stellar season with cellist Jeffrey Zeigler and percussionist Ian David Rosenbaum performing two free shows at 1 & 3pm on Saturday, June 25th.

In its tenth anniversary season, THE CROSSING -- the extraordinary chamber choir from Philadelphia, dedicated to new music and conducted by Donald Nally -- has commissioned seven of the world's foremost composers to compose fifteen-minute musical responses to Dietrich Buxtehude's Membra Jesu Nostri (translated as 'The Limbs of our Jesus'), a monumental seven-part cantata cycle composed in 1680 and known as the first Lutheran oratorio.

In its tenth anniversary season, THE CROSSING -- the extraordinary chamber choir from Philadelphia, dedicated to new music and conducted by Donald Nally -- comes to New York beginning today, June 16, 2016 to perform the NY premiere of THE FIFTH CENTURY, a large-scale work for the rare combination of choir and saxophone quartet by the iconic avant-garde English composer GAVIN BRYARS. The event, which will also feature the brilliant sax quartet PRISM and will have Bryars in the audience, takes place at7:00 p.m. at Trinity Church, Wall Street (75 Broadway).