“LEGENDARY” Opera Scene Chosen From AOP Composer Training Program For Staged Performance

MANHATTAN SCHOOL OF MUSIC WILL PRESENT MUSIC AT ANNUAL “PAGE TO STAGE” PROGRAM IN MARCH 2015

Following its appearance in AOP’s Composers & the Voice training program, scenes from an opera-in-progress Legendary, music by Joseph Rubinstein, libretto by Jason Kim, have been selected by the Manhattan School of Music (MSM) to receive a staged performance at the music conservatory’s Greenfield Hall next Spring.

In Legendary, famed drag performer Dee Legendary embarks on a passionate love affair with (police) Officer John, whose fascination with Dee takes an unexpected and dangerous turn. Inspired by a true story, Legendary is an opera about double lives and destructive desires set in the glory days of New York City’s underground drag culture.

Legendary was developed during Rubinstein and Kim’s 2013-14 fellowship in AOP’s long running Composers & the Voice program (C&V). Along with five other composers, they received training for nine months with professional composers, librettists, and singers on creating opera and writing for the voice. A scene from Legendary was first presented to the public in September’s C&V Six Scenes concert.

The first two scenes of Legendary will be presented in March by AOP First Chance, public presentations of operas-in-progress, as part of MSM’s annual Opera Index series “New American Opera Previews, From Page to Stage.” Legendary will be the 11th AOP-developed work to appear in Page to Stage at MSM. Previous C&V works at MSM have included Jack Perla’s Love Hate (2012 premiere, ODC Theater with San Francisco Opera), Gregory Spears’ Paul’s Case (World premiere, UrbanArias (2013) and PROTOtype Festival (Jan 2014)), and Daniel Sonenberg’s The Summer King (concert premiere, PortlandOvations, May 2014). Composers & the Voice holds a long-established partnership with The Manhattan School of Music, as well as a new affiliation with the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music, as a way of introducing contemporary opera to students.