page_title: American Opera Projects
hierarchical_section_title: American Opera Projects
caption_attribution_description: February 5, 2015 Harlem School of the Arts New York, NY Music by Sidney Marquez Boquiren; libretto by Daniel Neer. Photo by Steven Pisano.
context_page_description: The American Opera Project is a professional opera company based in Brooklyn, NY and is a member of OPERA America, the Fort Greene Association, the Downtown Brooklyn Arts Alliance, and the Alliance of Resident Theatres/New York. The company's primary mission is to develop and present new operatic and music theatre works and has gained a reputation for the "rarefied range" of the projects it fosters. AOP was founded in 1988 by Grethe Barrett Holby who served as Artistic Director of AOP from 1988 until 2001, at which point Charles Jarden became the company's Executive Director and Steven Osgood the company's Artistic Director. Steven Osgood left the post of Artistic Director in 2008 to pursue conducting full-time but remains the Artistic Director for AOP's "Composers & the Voice" program.
  AOP's year-long writing fellowship, "Composers & the Voice" was created in 2002 to bring emerging operatic composers and librettists together with singers, directors, and other artists to create a series of pieces exploring the potential of theatre and the voice.
context_section_description: The American Opera Project (AOP) is a professional opera company based in Brooklyn, NY and is a member of OPERA America, the Fort Greene Association, the Downtown Brooklyn Arts Alliance, and the Alliance of Resident Theatres/New York (A.R.T./NY). The company's primary mission is to develop and present new operatic and music theatre works and has gained a reputation for the "rarefied range" of the projects it fosters (Opera News, Dec 2008). AOP was founded in 1988 by Grethe Barrett Holby who served as Artistic Director of AOP from 1988 until 2001, at which point Charles Jarden became the company's Executive Director and Steven Osgood the company's Artistic Director. Steven Osgood left the post of Artistic Director in 2008 to pursue conducting full-time but remains the Artistic Director for AOP's "Composers & the Voice" program. 
  AOP's year-long writing fellowship, "Composers & the Voice" was created in 2002 to bring emerging operatic composers and librettists together with singers, directors, and other artists to create a series of pieces exploring the potential of theatre and the voice. Past and present mentors for the program include Mark Adamo, Mark Campbell, John Corigliano, Tan Dun, Daron Hagen, Jake Heggie, Libby Larsen, John Musto, Tobias Picker, Kaija Saariaho, and Stephen Schwartz. Past participants include Clint Borzoni, David Claman, Conrad Cummings, Randall Eng, Renée Favand, Vivian Fung, Kristin Kuster, Hannah Lash, Gilda Lyons, Robert Paterson, Jack Perla, Zach Redler & Sara Cooper, and Daniel Sonenberg.
  Amongst the venues and festivals where AOP productions have appeared are the Lincoln Center Festival, BAM's Next Wave Festival, the Guggenheim Museum, Symphony Space, Irondale Center, Philadelphia's Annenberg Center, Pittsburgh Opera, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, London's Royal Opera House, Berlin's Stükke Theater, Aleksander Fredro Teatr in Poland, the Trondheim Chamber Music Festival in Norway, and the Ensemble Theater am Petersplatz in Vienna. It has also given many out-of-doors performances sponsored by the City of New York Department of Parks and Recreation. AOP won a 2005 Encore award from the Arts & Business Council of NY for its innovative work.
  OPERAS AND OTHER WORKS DEVELOPED WITH AOP
  World Premieres
  As One by Laura Kaminsky, Mark Campbell, and Kimberly Reed (BAM Fisher Center, Sept 4, 2014) 
  Beauty Intolerable by Sheila Silver with texts by Edna St. Vincent Millay (Symphony Space, June 8, 2013)  
  Before Night Falls by Jorge Martin and Dolores M. Koch (Fort Worth Opera, May 29, 1010)  
   
  Brooklyn Bones by Alvin Singleton and Patricia Hampl (Nov 15, 2008) 
   
  Brooklyn Cinderella by Nkeiru Okoye (Dweck Auditorium, June 21, 2011)  
  Darkling by Stefan Weisman and Anna Rabinowitz (East 13th Street Theater, Feb 26, 2006) 
  Fade by Stefan Weisman and David Cote (NYC PREMIERE at Galapagos Art Space, July 17, 2009)  
   
  Fireworks by Kitty Brazelton and Billy Aronson (July 2, 2002) 
    
  Flurry Tale by Rusty Magee and Billy Aronson, with commissioned orchestrations by John Rinehimer (Clark Studio Theater, Dec 18, 1999) 
   
  Harriet Tubman: When I Crossed that Line to Freedom by Nkeiru Okoye (Irondale Center, Feb 21, 2014) 
  Heart of Darkness by Tarik O'Regan and Tom Phillips (Covent Garden, Nov 1, 2011)  
  Judgment of Midas by Kamran Ince and Miriam Seidel (Milwaukee Opera Theatre, Feb 12, 2013)  
  L'abbe Agathon by Arvo Pärt and Tarik O'Regan (Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Jan 11, 2009)  
  Love/Hate by Jack Perla and Rob Bailis (San Francisco Opera Center, April 2012)  
   
  Marina: A Captive Spirit by Deborah Drattell and Annie Finch (May 1, 2003) 
   
  Model Love by J. David Jackson based on poems by Henry Normal (Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse, Oct 2, 2011)  
  Nora, in the Great Outdoors by Daniel Felsenfeld and Will Eno (Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse, Oct 2, 2011)  
  Out Cold by Phil Kline (BAM Fisher, Oct 25, 2012)  
  Patience and Sarah by Paula M. Kimper and Wende Persons (John Jay College Theater, July 8, 1998)  
  Paul's Case by Gregory Spears and Kathryn Walat (Artisphere, Apr 20, 2013)  
  Romulus by Louis Karchin (Gug
caption: Scene from a performance of Independence Eve in 2015
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