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  • About COR
    • About COR
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    • FAQ – For Users
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    Canadian Opera Resource
    Canadian Opera Resource
    COR
    Operas
    The Cellar Door
    Content warning: child sexual abuse, incest, death, murder

    Judith and Daniel, long estranged siblings, are brought together by the passing of their father. Time has passed, but it seems like Judith hasn't changed at all. Daniel kills his sister when she wants to resume their childhood sexual relationship.
    Composer: Melissa Hui
    Librettist: Jovanni Sy

    The Cellar Door
    The Cellar Door
    TAP:EX Metallurgy
    Punk and operatic virtuosity collide in Tapestry’s third installment of the Tapestry Explorations (TAP:EX) series. Metallurgy is a collaboration between Jonah Falco and Mike Haliechuk of F*cked Up, the Polaris Prize-winning punk provocateurs, and two of Canada’s most masterful and versatile opera singers, mezzo-soprano Krisztina Szabó and tenor ...
    Composers: Ivan Barbotin, Jonah Falco, Mike Haliechuk
    Librettist: David James Brock

    TAP:EX Metallurgy
    TAP:EX Metallurgy
    TAP:EX Metallurgy
    TAP:EX Metallurgy
    My Mother’s Ring
    Content warning: murder, violence, mental illness

    The story begins with a distressed Paul being interviewed about his missing parents. It switches to two weeks earlier with Harold and Julia in the airport after sending him off. Julia worries that something is wrong with their son. Harold is sure that he'll be back to his old self after the tr...
    Composer: Stephen Andrew Taylor
    Librettist: Marcia Johnson

    My Mother’s Ring
    My Mother’s Ring
    Nigredo Hotel
    A ‘Hitchcock-style thriller’ for baritone and soprano, Nigredo Hotel is “the story of a neurosurgeon, a man of science, who has lost his soul. One night he thinks he has hit a child on the road and hides out in a decrepit, Hitchcockian motel run by a monstrous concierge called Sophie. The terrifying crone — his anima — locks him into his room an...
    Composer: Nic Gotham
    Librettist: Ann-Marie MacDonald

    Nigredo Hotel
    The Enslavement and Liberation of Oksana G.
    Content warning: captivity, sex trafficking, sex work, sexual violence, violence, death

    The Enslavement and Liberation of Oksana G. is a fictional dramatic opera built on extensive factual research. Set in Ukraine in 1997, it is the story of Oksana, a young woman lured into the world of sex trafficking by a Russian recruiter, Konstantin, who ...
    Composer: Aaron Gervais
    Librettist: Colleen Murphy

    The Enslavement and Liberation of Oksana G.
    Playing Ball
    An estranged father and daughter re-establish their relationship after he has suffered a stroke and can no longer speak. He tries to convey to her that he loves her and is sorry for the harm he caused her. She is still too hurt from their past to see what he is trying to say. Instead, she passes the time by reading a book. He finds another way o...
    Composer: Norbert Palej
    Librettist: Marcia Johnson

    Playing Ball
    Playing Ball
    Black Blood
    Content warning: war

    In a shack surrounded by barren fields, a dying father and his son drink their last bowl of water. They need oil for the machines that will keep them alive and purify their water. A truck rolls past with a huge barrel of oil in the back. The son flags it down, only to discover the person driving the truck is a monstrous c...
    Composer: Christiaan Venter
    Librettist: Norman Yeung

    Black Blood
    Black Blood
    Rip
    The piece opens in the middle of a reverse custody battle, with each party demanding the other take their son, Simon.  Carla believes her son will grow up dysfunctional without a father, and Peter claims he’ll do nothing but cry for her.  Interspersed with their fighting is the occasional instruction to Simon, indicating he’s in the room, a witn...
    Composer: Gareth Williams
    Librettist: Anna Chatterton

    Rip
    Rip
    Rosa
    Content warning: death, sex work

    After the tragic death of her first child, a baby daughter, Isabelle has run away to another town in Spain to escape the grief, leaving her husband Hector with a double loss. They are a working-class couple. The scene opens with Isabelle expecting a client in a seedy bordello. Hector has found her. He entreats...
    Composer: James Rolfe
    Librettist: Camyar Chai

    Rosa
    Rosa
    She is Me
    Content warning: fire, death

    Janna and her grandpa are in Toronto’s distillery district. Before she has to leave, Janna asks him to tell the story of how he and Grandma met. Both were fighting a fire, and met as part of the bucket brigade. Janna proudly reminds him he saved everyone that night, but this isn’t true. Grandpa confesses that a wo...
    Composer: Lembit Beecher
    Librettist: Katherine Koller

    She is Me
    Shelter
    Content warning: birth

    A nuclear family adrift in the atomic age. Since Prometheus stole fire from the gods, we have flirted with the dangerous beauty of science. In this cartoon fable, a father protects his family at any cost.

    Thomas and Claire fall madly in love at a fundraising party. Thomas has decided to “find a wife, get a life,” whi...
    Composer: Juliet Palmer
    Librettist: Julie Salverson

    Shelter
    Sleep, Sleep
    A woman and her grown son are leaving their home. It’s time for bed, but the boy insists they play his favourite game one last time. Begrudgingly, the mother agrees. They make up ways of killing an unnamed woman.

    When the game is over, the boy asks what would happen if they killed the woman “for real,” if it would make his father love them ag...
    Composer: John Harris
    Librettist: Marjorie Chan

    Sleep, Sleep
    Sleep, Sleep
    Pub Operas (The Sloans Project)
    Content warning: murder, death, corpse

    Composer Gareth Williams and librettist David James Brock created a site-specific promenade opera inspired by Glasgow's oldest pub, Sloans. The audience moves through the 250-year-old pub and encounters a series of scenes telling stories of love, loss, revenge and forgiveness.
    Composer: Gareth Williams
    Librettist: David James Brock

    Pub Operas (The Sloans Project)
    Pub Operas (The Sloans Project)
    The Golden Boy
    The scene is divided into two sections: a tense argument between mother and child, and a tender aria for the mother as she finally reveals a painful truth to her son about the prolonged absence of his father.
    Composer: Darren J
    Librettist: Anusree Roy

    The Golden Boy
    The Golden Boy
    The Leaving
    As the waves crash against the shore, two religious brothers go for a walk. The conversation is dominated by the older brother, and heavy with implication. The younger one announces his wish to leave the order, and is asked if his father’s death has something to do with this decision. The younger brother is furious; he could have spoken to his f...
    Composer: Stephen Andrew Taylor
    Librettist: Bernard MacLaverty

    The Leaving
    The Leaving
    The Shadow
    Barcelona, 1900. Against the backdrop of Gaudi’s surrealist Parc Guell, Raoul, a humble postman, falls for the beautiful Allegra, whose father is a wealthy aristocrat on his mail route. To impress Allegra, Raoul disguises himself as Hernando, a “wealthy suitor,” and borrows money from the local mafia to impress the girl. Raoul goes deeply into d...
    Composer: Omar Daniel
    Librettist: Alex Poch-Goldin

    The Shadow
    The Shadow
    The Telegram
    Content warning: death, war

    During a war, two women talk over the phone. They panic as they watch the town elder march down the street, telegram in hand. His message always carries horrible news: the death of someone’s son. Both of the women almost unwillingly hope some other family gets the telegram. Anyone but them.

    In truth, the telegra...
    Composer: Gareth Williams
    Librettist: Bernard MacLaverty

    The Telegram
    The Telegram
    Where is Ava
    Chloe and Eddie are in the throes of love when they’re interrupted by Matt, Chloe’s athlete ex-husband. Matt asks where their daughter Ava is, and criticizes Chloe for abandoning Ava for some man.
    Composer: Ivan Barbotin
    Librettist: Katherine Koller

    Where is Ava
    Where is Ava
    Of the Sea
    Content warning: descriptions of enslavement, violence, sexual violence, death

    A father will do anything to save his daughter. Of the Sea follows the story of Maduka, his daughter Binyelum, and fellow Africans thrown overboard during the Middle Passage who now populate mythical underwater kingdoms that span the ocean floor. Amidst the waves, ...
    Composer: Ian Cusson
    Librettist: Kanika Ambrose

    Of the Sea
    Dragon’s Tale
    Content warning: death, suicide

    Dragon’s Tale is the story of a young Chinese-Canadian woman (Xiao Lian) and her ailing father, both living in Toronto. Xiao Lian wakes up in the ancient past and witnesses the last days of one of China’s greatest poets, Qu Yuan. In doing so, she begins to understand her father and herself as she returns to a c...
    Composer: Ka Nin Chan
    Librettist: Mark Brownell

    Dragon’s Tale
    Medusa’s Children
    Content warning: misgendering, mentions of sexual assault, and implied violence

    Chrysaor and Pegasus, children of the gorgon Medusa, have been living with their aunts Euryale and Stheno. They receive a message from their dead mother telling the story of her assault and murder by their father Poseidon. Rejecting his mother’s family, Chrysaor g...
    Composer: Colin McMahon
    Librettist: Charlie Petch

    Medusa’s Children
    The Waterfall (LIBLAB)
    Content warning: death, infanticide, murder

    A rumble of hooves. A family is fleeing, but the baby is slowing them down. The mother is forced to choose between her husband and her child. She chooses the husband and tries to get the baby to sleep before letting it go over a waterfall. At the last minute, the baby awakes, and the mother’s grief ...
    Composer: Norbert Palej
    Librettist: Maja Ardal

    The Waterfall (LIBLAB)
    The Waterfall (LIBLAB)
    Sooner Than Later
    Content warning: gun violence, strong language, terminal illness, attempted assisted suicide

    A father and son argue in a dark alley.  The father, sick with a tumour "the size of a fig" in his brain, begs his son to end his life.  When the gun they're using fails and the son panics, the father offers comfort and encouragement in the form of a ...
    Composer: Cecilia Livingston
    Librettist: David Yee

    Sooner Than Later
    Sooner Than Later
    YES
    Mark stands with his friends Maryanne and Bob, ready to play a game of baseball. They see their other friend, Kenny, and Carley, Mark's ex-girlfriend, in the distance. Kenny proposes to Carley, and runs to the group to announce triumphantly "She said yes!" Inspired by Maryanne's encouragement, Mark calls his estranged son, who lives far away wit...
    Composer: Jana Skarecky
    Librettist: Sheldon Rosen

    YES
    YES
    Hook Up
    Content warning: explicit language, sexual violence, sexual content, alcohol, blackout drinking

    Hook Up tells the story of three friends who have made it to university, each with their own unique desires and inner conflicts. Mindy is just excited to keep her high school friend circle together and finally get some privacy with her boyfriend. T...
    Composer: Chris Thornborrow
    Librettist: Julie Tepperman

    Hook Up
    Facing South
    Content warning: illness, death, colonialism

    Facing South is inspired by the life story of American Arctic explorer, Rear Admiral Robert Edwin Peary, and his contested discovery of the North Pole in 1909. The opera takes place in the inner landscape of Peary’s mind during the last hours of his life in February 1920, as he lies dying of pernic...
    Composer: Linda Catlin Smith
    Librettist: Don Hannah

    Facing South
    M’dea Undone
    Content warning: death, murder, suicide, xenophobia

    Jason, an army captain and now war-hero, is returning home after years of war and an uncertain future. His interpreter and lover M’dea and their son Chase accompany him to a new life in the West. Jason begins a political career, working alongside the President and Dahlia, the President’s bea...
    Composer: John Harris
    Librettist: Marjorie Chan

    M’dea Undone
    Iron Road
    Content warning: racism, colonialism, violence, death

    In 1880’s China, Lai Gwan, a young impoverished woman, stands on the brink of momentous change. Her dying mother urges her to respect and honour the memory of her father, Manli, whose disappearance to the New World haunts them both.

    Armed with the hope that she will find her father aliv...
    Composer: Ka Nin Chan
    Librettist: Mark Brownell

    Iron Road
    COR
    Excerpts
    The Shadow – Scene 2

    Disguised as Hernando, Raoul asks out Allegra.

    Hook Up – Section 1, Scene 1: “Opening Montage Overture”

    Cindy, Mindy, and Tyler revel in the newfound freedom of university life. Cindy delights in being single, Mindy says goodbye to her parents, and is excited for more privacy and time with Tyler... who is looking forward to playing more Fortnite.

    Hook Up – Section 5, Scene 1: “Mindy’s Spiral”

    Mindy tries to understand if she was raped at the party. She can't make herself contact anyone, but seeks information online; Cindy slips a morning after pill under the door.

    Where is Ava – Where is Ava

    Chloe and Eddie are in the throes of love when they’re interrupted by Matt, Chloe’s athlete ex-husband. Matt asks where their daughter Ava is, and criticizes Chloe for abandoning Ava for a man.

    The Telegram – The Telegram

    Two women watch and worry as the church elder walks through town with a telegram carrying news of a soldier son's death.

    Iron Road – Manli’s Aria

    Filled with regret over his life, Manli sings of an abandoned love.

    Medusa’s Aria

    Medusa sings from beyond the grave, reaching out to her children and her two sisters. She tells the story of her rape by the god Poseidon and murder by the hero Perseus. 

    The Shadow – Scene 1

    Raoul the mailman is in love with Allegra. He arrives at her house and they flirt, but are interrupted by Allegra's father. Raoul vows that he will win over Allegra by disgusing himself as a wealthy merchant named Hernando.

    Iron Road – Act 1, Prologue: The Old World

    Before dying, Ama tells Lai Gwan of her father, gives her a wedding dress, and urges her to go to North America to find her father - but always remember Chinese traditions.

    The Leaving – The Leaving

    A young religous brother tells an older brother that he is planning to leave the order. The older brother advises caution and obedience.

    Iron Road – Act 1, Scene 3: The Mountain

    The Chinese workers are led in and a disguised Lai Gwan challenges Manli the Bookman’s authority. He seeks revenge by assigning Lai Gwan to the most dangerous work in the camp: planting dynamite on the mountain face while suspended in a basket.

    The Golden Boy – The Golden Boy

    After a painful argument, a mother tells her son the truth of his father's absence and tries to comfort him.

    Iron Road – Act 1, Scene 4: The Stream

    While she is bathing in a stream, Nichol disovers Lai Gwan is a woman - she asks for his help to find her father and to keep her secret. Manli interrupts them before Nichol decides what to do.

    The Cellar Door – “That’s all you have to say?” (aria)

    Judith sings angrily at her brother when he expresses his desire to leave their childhood home after their father has died.

    Facing South – Scene 8: “Constellations”

    Henson helps Minik reach the land of the dead; Peary and Josephine argue about Peary's Inuit children.

    Dragon’s Tale – Dragon’s Tale – Scene 1

    A young Chinese/Canadian woman (Xiao Lian) faces a difficult choice: Honour her family’s traditional past or embrace a more modern future. Her father dwells on the memory of his deceased wife and honours her by performing the Qingming funeral tradition. Meanwhile, Xiao Lian’s two friends want her to get out and be more social. Her ...

    Dragon’s Tale – Dragon’s Tale – Scene 2

    Xiao Lian’s father bitterly reveals that he will die soon. Xiao Lian’s mother appears in spirit form and asks her to forgive her father. She speaks of their happiness together as a family in earlier times. As a child, Xiao Lian had a close connection with the Dragon Boat Festival, known as Duanwu and its hero, the ancient poet Qu Y...

    Dragon’s Tale – Dragon’s Tale – Scene 3

    Xiao Lian vows to look to the past and summons the great spirit of Qu Yuan. His spirit rises and assumes the form of Xiao Lian’s father.

    Dragon’s Tale – Dragon’s Tale – Scene 5

    Qu Yuan wanders into the southern wilderness. As he travels, he composes a lament for himself and his lost position in court. In the present, Xiao Lian’s Father senses his end is near. Summoning up his strength, he joins with the spirit of Qu Yuan to tell the final chapter.

    Dragon’s Tale – Dragon’s Tale – Scene 7

    All hope is lost as the villagers return and collect Qu Yuan’s possessions. They take the scrolls containing his famous poetry to the Daoist temple, where they will be preserved forever. Xiao Lian returns to the present at the bedside of her dying father. With his encouragement and love, she finally recognizes the value of honourin...

    Dragon’s Tale – Dragon’s Tale – Scene 8

    Xiao Lian performs the Qingming ceremony to honour the spirit of her departed father and mother. Love and fellowship combine in the running of a dragon boat race. Xiao Lian joins her friends and crosses into her future.

    Dragon’s Tale – Dragon’s Tale – Scene 9

    The combined spirits of Qu Yuan and Father return and ask the audience to release them from their servitude. That freedom granted, they ascend into the heavens triumphantly.

    My Mother’s Ring – My Mother’s Ring

    Paul is being interviewed about his missing parents. Is Paul a suspect? Is the interrogator a police officer or a psychiatrist? Who were the people who were in his parents' house when Paul returned from his trip? All is not as it seems.

    She is Me – She is Me

    Janna and her grandpa are in Toronto’s distillery district. Before she has to leave, Janna asks him to tell the story of how he and Grandma met.

    Sleep, Sleep – Sleep, Sleep

    A boy and his mother make up ways of killing an unnamed woman.  When the game is over, the boy asks what would happen if they killed the woman “for real,” if it would make his father love them again.

    Sooner Than Later – Close your eyes, son
    A father comforts his son as he encourages him to end his life, rather than waiting for him to die of a terminal illness.
    Black Blood – Black Blood

    A dying father and his son drink their last bowl of water. They need oil for the machines that will keep them alive and purify their water. A truck rolls past with a huge barrel of oil in the back. The son flags it down, only to discover the person driving the truck is a monstrous creature from the nation they’re at war with.

    The Enslavement and Liberation of Oksana G. – Act 3, Scene 5

    Sofiya and Yuri consult Asa when Oksana has not arrived as her lettered promised. They are interrupted by Pavlo with news that the priest from Italy is on the phone, and wants to talk to Oksana's parents.

    M’dea Undone – Act 2, Scene 3: Fountain

    M'dea has a breakdown and brings Chase to the fountain at Jason and Dahlia's, where she sees the ghost of her mother. She is discovered by Jason and Dahlia, and a fight ensues.

    M’dea Undone – Act 2, Scene 11: The Beach

    Pursued by Jason and the guards, M'dea and Chase climb a cliff by the ocean. When they reach the top, they play a version of their make-believe game, and jump off.

    M’dea Undone – Act 1, Scene 10: Dahlia’s Bedroom (duet)

    Dahlia's father encourages her to seduce Jason, and promises her she can have anything she wants.

    TAP:EX Metallurgy – Metallurgy A – second movement

    A couple is trying to come to terms with the loss of their daughter. They grieve, and fight with one another.

    TAP:EX Metallurgy – Metallurgy A – third movement

    The couple continues to mourn.

    M’dea Undone – Act 1, Scene 8 – A Dinner Party

    The President invites Jason to be his running mate, and begins to remake him. This process sidelines M'dea and Chase. Dahlia and Jason are attracted to one other.

    M’dea Undone – Act 1, Scene 6: The Beach

    A family outing to the beach turns into a photo op for the paparazzi.

    Nigredo Hotel – “When I was small” (aria)

    Ray sings of the ambivalence his parents felt towards him as a child.

    M’dea Undone – Act 1, Scene 5: President Calling

    At the President's office, Jason and the President discuss family, how to be a good father, and a possible future for Jason in politics.

    The Enslavement and Liberation of Oksana G. – Prologue

    Sofiya and Yuri take their infant daughter Oksana to have her horoscope read by Asa, who predicts that "freedom invades her future."

    The Enslavement and Liberation of Oksana G. – Act 1, Scene 1

    Though others are at first suspicious, Russian Konstantin convinces Ukranian teenagers Nataliya and Oksana to come work for him at a hotel in Romania for the summer.

    The Enslavement and Liberation of Oksana G. – Act 1, Scene 5

    Pavlo checks in with Sofyia and Yuri for news; Sofiya and Yuri argue & blame each other for letting Oksana go.

    The Enslavement and Liberation of Oksana G. – Act 2, Scene 2

    Asa and Sofiya are checking the cards. Pavlo arrives with the news that a priest called from Italy to say that Oksana is alive, but there is no sign of Natalyia.

    The Enslavement and Liberation of Oksana G. – Act 3, Scene 1

    Pavlo reads Oksana's letter to her parents telling them she'll be home on November 8, her birthday. They are thrilled, and get carried away planning a party for her.

    The Cellar Door – The Cellar Door

    Back in his childhood home after the death of this father, Daniel kills his sister when she wants to resume their childhood sexual relationship.

    M’dea Undone – Act 1, Scene 10 (duet)

    Dahlia's father encourages her to seduce Jason, and promises her she can have anything she wants.

    Playing Ball – Playing Ball

    Tabitha helps her father Ken, who has had a stroke. She combs his hair and helps him with his therapy ball, retrieving it each time he drops it.

    Pub Operas (The Sloans Project) – Charm

    A father befriends the man who murdered his daughter but eluded the police, plotting revenge in the process.

    Iron Road – Act 2, Scene 5: Remember the Dead

    Manli and Lai Gwan decided to make a life together in Canada. As they collect and bury the bones of Chinese workers they remember all the dead, including Ama and Nichol.

    Rip – Rip

    Peter is leaving Carla for another woman. Carla, sensing she will have a breakdown if he leaves, insists that he take their son to live with him.

    Iron Road – Act 2, Scene 4: The Last Spike

    Whites celebrate the finishing of the railway and officially dismiss the Chinese, who blame Manli for abandoning them.

    Rosa – “Every day I blistered my hands…” (duet)

    Hector and Isabelle express their resentment towards each other for the sacrifices they each made.

    Iron Road – Act 2, Scene 2: The Cave

    In the explosion rubble, Lai Gwan and Nichol declare their love depsite Ama's warnings. Nichol dies as the workers rescue Lai Gwan and Manli, who declares his renewed love for his daughter.

    Iron Road – Act 2, Scene 1: The Fight

    As Manli and Lai Gwan argue about their situation, Lai Gwan tells of Ama's death, which crushes Manli. He decides to set the next explosive charge himself. Nichol and Lai Gwan recognise their love and follow Manli into the tunnel.

    Shelter – Scene 6: Trinity (aria)

    Hope introduces the pilot to her family. He leaves, and Hope argues with her parents about going with him.

    Iron Road – Act 2, Prologue: The Dream

    Lai Gwan dreams of the conflicting desires of her mother, father, Nichol and herself.

    Iron Road – Act 1, Scene 5: The Camp

    The Chinese workers decide to strike, led by Lai Gwan, after another death with no proper funeral. The strike is put down and Nichol stops Lai Gwan from being hung by Manli. She discovers Manli is her father.

    The Cellar Door – “Down there I won’t go” (aria)

    Daniel sings of his fear at the prospect of going down into the cellar of his childhood home, after his father has died.

    M’dea Undone – Act 2, Scene 2: The President’s Office

    The President threatens M'dea with prison or the loss of her son if she doesn't do as he wants. He warns her not to cause trouble for Jason.

    COR

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