One of the largest contemporary opera and theater festivals in the world has changed its format due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The ninth annual prototype festival opens Friday night with the world premiere of “Modulation,” a self-guided digital work for distant times by 13 composers exploring isolation, identity and fear.
Two other world premieres will be presented until January 16, including “Times3”, a digital audio collage by composer Pamela Z and theater artist Geoff Sobelle in Times Square in New York, and “Ocean Body,” an installation musical and multi-screen for an audience of four at a time at HERE Mainstage in lower Manhattan.
There will also be three digital premieres in the US: Ben Frost and Petter Ekmann “The Murder of Halit Yozgat”; “Wide Slumber for Lepidopterists” by Valgeir Sigurðsson; and by “The Planet – A Lament” by Septina Rosalina Laya.
Beth Morrison, former administrator of the Tanglewood Institute at Boston University and producer of the contemporary showcase VOX at the New York Opera, leads the festival with Kristin Marting of HERE, dedicated to live hybrid performances in theater, dance , music and the visual arts, and with Jecca Barry, the executive director of Beth Morrison Projects.
“In the midst of a pandemic, we’ve significantly under-budgeted ticket revenue for this festival because most of the offers are free,” Barry said.
Recent festivals have included Pulitzer Prize-winning Ellen Reid’s ‘Prism’ (2019) and Du Yun’s ‘Angel’s Bone’, and Missy Mazzoli’s famous ‘Breaking the Waves’.
Plans for the digital switchover began at the end of April.
About 10,000 had attended each recent festival. The budget has gone from just over $ 1 million to significantly less for this year.
Due to the pandemic, Barry said only one seasonal staff member was hired for the festival in addition to two full-time festival staff throughout the year, down from the usual five or six additions . While the festival hired around 500-600 artists last year, this year’s total is 150-180.
World premieres scheduled for 2021 have been postponed to 2022.
“We hope it picks up without skipping,” Morrison said, “But I think we’ve picked up the pieces in a pretty exciting way. We have 19 composers that we work with that we’re really excited to present, that we wouldn’t have had the opportunity to collaborate with otherwise.
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