Happy Valentine’s Day! May your day be filled with love and happiness. Meanwhile in the news, changes at Opera Philadelphia, Forman Arts Initiative, Library Company of Philadelphia.
Read MoreDear readers, as we publish the cash prize and honorable mention winners in the 2019 Art Writing Challenge, we’d like to thank everyone who took the time to share their writing with us and congratulate all the winners!
Read MoreImani chats with poet, dancer and playwright, Marc Bamuthi Joseph, about his libretto for “We Shall Not Be Moved” — an Opera Philadelphia O17 festival world premier with music by Daniel Bernard Roumain and direction by Bill T. Jones. Brutal and poetic in equal measure, the story unfolds as a band of North Philly teens flee the violence and school closings of their neighborhood to take refuge at the abandoned Osage Avenue site of the 1985 MOVE bombing. Throughout the opera, dancing ghosts and a dense web of black cultural references, old and new, demonstrate the past is always with us.
Read MoreHaving seen all of the new operas presented by Opera Philadelphia in the past few years, Breaking The Waves is the best one out of the pack. It’s touching story, memorable score and libretto, and daring staging (the first opera I’ve ever seen with nude scenes!) make for a resounding contemporary American opera that will have a long life.
Read MoreCharles Frazier’s Cold Mountain is a book turned into a film and now, into an opera. WHYY’s Peter Crimmins has more.
Read MoreWhat happens when an artist’s art becomes more than just that? What are you to do when your art is now a manufactured brand? These are some of the questions that Opera Philadelphia and the Bearded Ladies Cabaret’s world premiere of ANDY: A Popera (also part of the 2015 Fringe Arts Festival) asks the audience head-on.
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