PROTOTYPE – OPERA/THEATRE/NOW is an annual festival of visionary opera-theatre and music-theatre works by pioneering contemporary artists from New York City and around the world. PROTOTYPE is a co-production of Beth Morrison Projects and HERE, two leaders in the creation and presentation of contemporary, post-classical, multi-disciplinary opera-theatre and music-theatre work. The festival is the only of its kind in New York City – presenting both complete performances as well as works-in-progress through partnerships with local performing arts venues.
Join the festival January 6-17, 2016 as Beth Morrison Projects and HERE bring you another dazzling showcase of daring opera-theatre and music-theatre works from the most exciting 21st-century artists: the world premiere of Angel’s Bone by Du Yun & Royce Vavrek; the New York premiere of Dog Days by David T. Little & Royce Vavrek; a first-look presentation of The Good Swimmer by Heidi Rodewald & Donna Di Novelli; the American premiere of The Last Hotel by Irish artists Donnacha Dennehy & Enda Walsh; the U.S. premiere/Multi-media concert of Sága by Flemish artists Dez Mona & B.O.X.; a concert reading of La Reina by Mexican artists Jorge Sosa & Laura Sosa Pedroza; and an opera-cabaret presentation by Bombay Rickey.
Historically, the marriage of music and drama has been something composers tackled further along in their careers. Fast forward to today: serious young composers are now creating new works of opera-theatre/music-theatre, and we are in a second golden age of creation for the art form. It is poised to become the most exciting live arts medium in the 21st century, embodying a modern day notion of Wagner’s gesamtkunstwerk.
PROTOTYPE gives voice to these composers whose works would generally be categorized as “contemporary classical” or “post-classical” rather than the more commercial musical theatre idiom that is being explored by other producers in New York and elsewhere. The festival provides a recurring showcase of these visionary chamber-sized opera-theatre and music-theatre pieces that are currently flooding the New York scene and are ready to explode at the national and international levels. The festival also presents exciting new works by international artists, and hopes to be a global reference of artistic excellence in the field of opera and music-theatre.
PROTOTYPE is proud to be a part of January in NYC, where more than 45,000 people converge at performing arts festivals and industry gatherings as a dozen leading U.S. and global performing arts organizations present a concurrence of events.
After just three years on the scene, PROTOTYPE: Opera/Theatre/Now has been deemed “suddenly indispensable” by The New Yorker. And The New York Times called the 2015 festival “bracingly innovative…a point of reference.” Most recently, Anne Midgette of The Washington Post proclaimed, “The best news in opera in New York these days is the PROTOTYPE Festival, an intense annual burst of new and cutting-edge opera that’s presenting and generating some of the most interesting work around.”
PROTOTYPE has produced and presented 91 performances, shared the work of more than 275 local, national, and international artists, exposed visionary work to more that 9,000 people, and filled 19 stages across multiple boroughs of New York City. It has unleashed a powerful wave of opera-theatre and music-theatre from a new generation of classical and post-classical composers and librettists, and as Opera News proclaimed, “has become a major leader in opera theatre for the twenty-first century.”