COR
Operas
A businessman is waiting for a streetcar, with his back to an unhoused woman. The two silently judge each other. The man is annoyed at seeing someone who wants something for nothing, and the woman is feeling judged for a situation she has no control over. The two finally acknowledge each other, and we discover their shared experience.
Composer: Iman Habibi
Librettist: Michael Pollard
Content warning: misgendering, intersex discrimination
A meditation on the discrimination intersex athletes face from their peers. A woman wins a gold medal, but her struggles to get there mean nothing to the organization and the other athletes. She’s disqualified and shamed.
A meditation on the discrimination intersex athletes face from their peers. A woman wins a gold medal, but her struggles to get there mean nothing to the organization and the other athletes. She’s disqualified and shamed.
Composer: John Harris
Librettist: Anna Chatterton
The night before her birthday, an aging Queen Elizabeth I catches an intruder in her boudoir. It turns out to be none other than her arch-nemesis Grace O’Malley, Irish pirate and chieftain, come to reclaim her seized ship and her trampled rights. A comedic opera about power and politics, destiny and desire, and how hard it is to be a woman at th...
Composer: Sean Ferguson
Librettist: Alexis Diamond
Content warning: death, incarceration, interrogation, suicide, torture
A translator at a secret prison for suspected terrorists witnesses extreme torture and death of detainees. She leaks the information to news broadcasters, but the government covers it up as a hoax. Her supervisor begs her to say nothing more about the things she has seen -...
A translator at a secret prison for suspected terrorists witnesses extreme torture and death of detainees. She leaks the information to news broadcasters, but the government covers it up as a hoax. Her supervisor begs her to say nothing more about the things she has seen -...
Composer: David Ogborn
Librettist: Leanna Brodie
Content warning: sexual violence, incarceration, religious abuse, homophobia, conversion therapy
Through several vignettes, Forbidden examines the idea of rules and taboos. Do they protect people, or do they control them? Are they of any value, or do they simply exploit the powerless?
A young girl, punished with repetition of religious tex...
Through several vignettes, Forbidden examines the idea of rules and taboos. Do they protect people, or do they control them? Are they of any value, or do they simply exploit the powerless?
A young girl, punished with repetition of religious tex...
Composer: Afarin Mansouri
Librettist: Donna-Michelle St. Bernard
COR
Excerpts
Lucifer is enraged at the unfairness put upon him. The Child sees, and has an idea. Perhaps the system should be broken. When Lucifer realizes the Child has seen his truth, he tries to hide his emotions.
A businessman is waiting for a streetcar, with his back to an unhoused woman. The two silently judge each other. The man is annoyed at seeing someone who wants something for nothing, and the woman is feeling judged for a situation she has no control over. The two finally acknowledge each other, and we discover their shared experience.
An intersex woman wins a gold medal, but her struggles to get there mean nothing to the organization and the other athletes. She’s disqualified and shamed.
Irish pirate Chieftain Grace O'Malley sneaks into the bedroom of Queen Elizabeth I of England, and convinces the Queen to give her back her ship and free her lover. In return Grace will attend the Queen's birthday celebration and cause a sensation - which delights Liz.
Queen Liz imagines what it would be like to be free.
2003: After leaking torture photos to the internet, American army translator Alessandra Jenson refuses to be hushed up, and live streams her suicide in protest.
Colonel Crane, Alessandra's supervisor, tersely tells her to lose what her perceives as her naive sense of morality: "We are just here to win."
Traumatized by her experiences, Alessandra reflects on her work as a translator in an American military prison.
The Child creates her own book from pages of other books. She hands out her new rules to the audience.
A watcher looks over a group of faithful. His irritation turns to hatred as he accuses them of subversion. He claims to have proof hidden in some papers, but the Child has destroyed them. The Child proclaims “I know what to do,” and the tension between authority and people escalates. The Child begins taking pages and notes from all the surroundi...
A distraught woman is trying to report her sexual assault to a policeman. She admits she’s had some alcohol. Instead of pursuing justice, the policeman arrests her for illegal possession of alcohol. The Child witnesses all of it.
The Child questions Lucifer’s role as tempter, while he tempts with growing intensity. He chastises the Child for bowing to authority. She erupts in anger, pushing the books aside and leaving the cage.
Lucifer jangles an entrancing key in front of the Child and a young boy. This key promises to open the gates of heaven, but the boy has his own doubts about that. Nevertheless, he zips up his vest...
The Child is led back to the book cage, and performers take their places.
The Child is allowed out of her cage, with a warning she can have anyting she wants except for one thing. She asks what it might be, and in a Kafka-esque reply they say, “you know.”
As Lucifer tries again to get the Child to go with him, the Child finds out who Lucifer is in one of the books of the cell.
A book pleads with the audience to be read. A rhythmic chorus rises. A tribute to the banned, the burned, and the hidden.
The Child is bored. She reads several books in an effort to learn all the things she shouldn’t do, say, feel, or see. Lucifer simply asks her why, attempting to get her attention on him instead of books. She finds a name, Iblis, and taunts him.
A cleric prepares for confessional. Someone enters the booth. The cleric realizes it’s a man with whom he shared a mutual attraction. The man has recently finished gay conversion therapy and wishes to resume some kind of a relationship.
Lucifer taunts the Child in a cell. She doesn't understand what she's done wrong.
An interrogator turns his lurid eyes on an imprisoned female activist. Purposefully misunderstanding her movements as seduction, he convinces himself of something horrid.
The Child is taught a lesson. She attempted to speak her truth, but was met with discipline.
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