Mark Campbell News

New York Festival of Song's contemporary song series NYFOS Next -- dubbed 'invaluable' by The New Yorker and The New York Times -- enters its sixth season and continues its new format: a three-concert February mini-festival in the intimate state-of-the-art recital hall at OPERA America's National Opera Center. The Thursday concerts take place February 4, 11, and 18, 2016 at 7:00 p.m.

San Francisco, CA, December 18, 2015 – San Francisco's Opera Parallèle (OP) has announced its first main stage opera commission, the creation of a new opera by American composer Laura Kaminsky inspired by the life of Georgia O'Keeffe at the time she left New York to embark on her iconic and influential experiences in New Mexico. The company has been awarded a prestigious Repertoire Development Grant from Opera America in the amount of $35,000 to support the work's initial stages of creation and workshopping, and is set for an April 2019 premiere. The opera will feature a libretto by Mark Campbell and Kimberly Reed. The production team will be led by Opera Parallèle Creative Director Brian Staufenbiel, will be conducted by OP Artistic Director and founder Nicole Paiement and will feature a cast of ten, details will be announced. The production is being undertaken by Opera Parallèle in consortium with American Opera Projects and Cornish College of the Arts, and all three co-commissioners will present performances and other activities to be announced. For more information about Opera Parallèle, visit www.operaparallele.org 

Producers Al Corley ('Dynasty') and Marty Kaplan have announced the world premiere of PHALARIS'S BULL: SOLVING THE RIDDLE OF THE GREAT BIG WORLD, conceived and performed by Steven Friedman and directed by David Schweizer, will play a strictly limited 5 week engagement from tonight, December 12, 2015 to January 16, 2016 at The Beckett Theater at Theatre Row, 410 West 42nd Street.

The New York Festival of Song marks its eleventh annual co-presentation with Juilliard's Ellen and James S. Marcus Institute for Vocal Arts with a new program titled HARRY, HOAGY, and HAROLD.

Mercy Street Theatre kicks off its second season with the world premiere of MERRY CHRISTMAS, MULCH PILE!, written by resident playwright Dakota Parobek.  The show runs tonight, December 3 - 6, 2015 at Hairpin Arts Center, 2810 N Milwaukee Ave. in Chicago.

(WASHINGTON)—Washington National Opera (WNO) today announced complete details and casting for the fourth 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. Three pairings of new opera composers and librettists— Sarah Hutchings and Mark Sonnenblick (Twenty Minutes or Less), David Clay Mettens and Joshua McGuire (Alexandra), and Christopher Weiss and John de los Santos (Service Provider)—will premiere new one-act operas, each based on a contemporary American story, in semi-staged concert performances on December 2, 2015 in the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater. The 7 p.m. performance is sold out; a second performance at 9 p.m. has just been added to accommodate demand.

CSz Theater Chicago announces upcoming special holiday/winter programming in its 28th anniversary season - please add/update listings, and call for photos, media comps, and additional information:

New York Festival of Song brings back its much-anticipated program 'A Goyishe Christmas to You!' on Monday, December 14, 2015 at 10:00 p.m. at HENRY's Restaurant as part of NYFOS's 'After Hours' cabaret series.

In what has become an annual ritual, a total of 36 established and emerging composers, lyricists, and librettists will converge on the Goodspeed campus from mid-January through mid-February 2016 to participate in the Johnny Mercer Foundation Writers Colony at Goodspeed Musicals. The writing teams, representing 19 new musicals, will populate the campus, creating a truly exciting environment for discovery and inspiration. BroadwayWorld is excited to report that Goodspeed has announced its 2016 participants. Scroll down for details!

(WASHINGTON)-Washington National Opera (WNO) today announced complete details and casting for the fourth 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. Three pairings of new opera composers and librettists- Sarah Hutchings and Mark Sonnenblick (Twenty Minutes or Less), David Clay Mettens and Joshua McGuire (Alexandra), and Christopher Weiss and John de los Santos (Service Provider)-will premiere new one-act operas, each based on a contemporary American story, in semi-staged concert performances on December 2, 2015 in the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater. The 7 p.m. performance is sold out; a second performance at 9 p.m. has just been added to accommodate demand.

Producers Al Corley ("Dynasty") and Marty Kaplan have announced the world premiere of PHALARIS'S BULL: SOLVING THE RIDDLE OF THE GREAT BIG WORLD, conceived and performed by Steven Friedman and directed by David Schweizer, will play a strictly limited 5 week engagement from December 12, 2015 to January 16, 2016 at The Beckett Theater at Theatre Row, 410 West 42nd Street.

Mercy Street Theatre kicks off its second season with the world premiere of MERRY CHRISTMAS, MULCH PILE!, written by resident playwright Dakota Parobek.  The show runs December 3 - 6, 2015 at Hairpin Arts Center, 2810 N Milwaukee Ave. in Chicago.

New York Festival of Song opens a new season of NYFOS Mainstage with 'From Russia to Riverside Drive: Rachmaninoff & Friends,' featuring Rachmaninoff's ravishing romanticism and his American contemporaries - songs by Rachmaninoff, Ellington, Gershwin, Schillinger.

?New York Festival of Song premieres SCHUBERT|BEATLES on Tuesday, December 8, 2015 at 8:00 p.m. at Merkin Concert Hall, as part of NYFOS's classic long-running Mainstage series.

The magic begins again when one of L.A.'s most beloved and longest running shows, SMOKE AND MIRRORS returns to the Odyssey Theatre tonight, Oct. 24 through Dec. 20.

Twelve days, seven operatic happenings, six venues across the city, three world premieres, and one superstar Festival Artist: set to launch in September 2017, O – Opera Philadelphia's new annual season-opening festival – represents a radical new way to experience opera. As Daniel K. Meyer, M.D., Chairman of the Board of Opera Philadelphia, David B. Devan, General Director & President, and Annie Burridge, Managing Director, announced today, the new festival will open the company's season each fall, drawing together some of opera's most sought-after creative and performing artists for an immersion in the new American opera and innovative stagings of the classics for which Opera Philadelphia – the only American finalist for the 2015 International Opera Award for Accessibility – is fast becoming known. Opera Philadelphia will also continue to present three additional productions each spring, making it the only U.S. opera company to open an annual season with a dynamic festival.

Perhaps the best news of all, a 30 th anniversary reissue of the original Back to the Future: Music from the Motion Picture soundtrack will be reissued as a special, double-vinyl picture disc by Universal Music Enterprises (UMe) today, October 21.

The magic begins again when one of L.A.'s most beloved and longest running shows, SMOKE AND MIRRORS returns to the Odyssey Theatre on Oct. 24 through Dec. 20.

WASHINGTON)—Washington National Opera (WNO) today announced details for the fourth 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. Three pairings of new opera composers and librettists—Christopher Weiss and John de los Santos, David Clay Mettens and Joshua McGuire, and Sarah Hutchings and Mark Sonnenblick—will premiere new one-act operas, each based on a contemporary American story, in a semi-staged concert performance on December 2, 2015 in the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater. Composer Luna Pearl Woolf and librettist Caitlin Vincent, an alumnus of the program's second season, will present their new hour-long work Better Gods—based on the life of Queen Lili'uokalani, the last monarch of Hawaii—on January 8 and 9, 2016 in the Terrace Theater.