TRACKLIST, VOL. ONE
BREAKING THE WAVES: Missy Mazzoli, Royce Vavrek
THUMBPRINT: Kamala Sankaram, Susan Yankowitz
EYES: Du Yun, Michael VQ
Paola Prestini, Royce Vavrek
S
Ellen Reid, Roxie Perkins
HILDEGARD: Sarah Kirkland Snider
MAGDALENE: Molly Joyce
MARIMUKA: Tanyaradzwa Tawengwa-Nzou Mambano
SENSORIUM EX: Paola Prestini, Brenda Shaughnessy
ADORATION: Mary Kouyoumdjian, Royce Vavrek
TRADE: Emma O’Halloran, Mark O’Halloran
STAR SINGER: Juhi Bansal, Neil Aitken
01. HIS NAME IS JAN
(BREAKING THE WAVES)
Missy Mazzoli (composer), Royce Vavrek (librettist), Kiera Duffy (soprano), Kazem Abdullah (conductor), Contemporaneous Ensemble
Commissioned by Opera Philadelphia and Beth Morrison Projects.
Based on the Lars van Trier film of the same name and set in the Scottish Highlands in the early 1970s, Breaking the Waves, tells the story of Bess McNeill, a religious young woman with a deep love for her husband Jan, a handsome oil rig worker. Through the opera, the audience sees Bess’s increasing selflessness which leads to a finale of divine grace, but at great cost.
BESS McNEILL
His name is Jan You do not know him. He’s from the rig.
His name is Jan. Jan, Jan, Jan… Funny name for a man.
An outsider has wormed His way inside of me. Jan from the rig.
His name is Jan. He wants to marry me.
Holy matrimony:
when two people are joined in God.
I want to be his wife: Mrs. Jan from the rig.
And God will be witness To our covenant.
The whole community
Will know our love.
Jan’s love of me.
My love of Jan.
Jan is my shaggy-faced man.
Jan is my strange, beautiful music.
His name is Jan.
His name sounds like church bells,
Jan, Jan, Jan…
God has given me a man, You do not know him,
A Norwegian man
Jan, Jan, Jan…
A man that I’m to love forever.
With your permission.
02. THUMBPRINT
(THUMBPRINT)
Kamala Sankaram (composer), Susan Yankowitz (librettist), Kamala Sankaram (soprano), Margaret Lancaster (flute), Brian Shankar Adler (drum kit and Indian percussion), Mila Henry (piano/harmonium), Andie Tanning (violin), Philippa Thompson (viola), Greg Chudzik (bass)
LYRICS & CREDITS
Commissioned by Beth Morrison Projects and HERE Arts Center.
Thumbprint is inspired by the extraordinary transformation of Mukhtar Mai, a young woman whose world was shattered by an act of brutality that could have destroyed her. Instead, she discovers a weapon — her voice — and against all odds, to the astonishment of her country and herself, she seeks justice and finds it. Her journey resonates beyond borders in its implicit belief that even in the darkest times, one person, one voice, through a single act of courage, can change life for thousands.
MUKHTAR
I cannot write, I cannot read, I know nothing of the world.
Like all the women I was taught silence, I was taught fear, taught to hide my face and bow my head, like my mother and her mother and her mother before her.
Clean the lentils, boil the rice, feed the chickens, sweep the floor, hang the laundry out to dry.
We cannot write,
we cannot read, we know nothing of the world.
Use my thumbprint, use my thumbprint, use my thumbprint.
I cannot write, I cannot read, I know nothing of the world.
Like all the women I was taught silence, I was taught fear, taught to hide my face and bow my head.
Like my mother and her mother and her mother before her.
Use my thumbprint, use my thumbprint, use my thumbprint.
03. THE LAKE
(IN OUR DAUGHTER’S EYES)
Du Yun (composer), Michael VQ (librettist), Nathan Gunn (baritone), Kamna Gupta (conductor), Featuring: Aakash Mittal, Micah Killion, Shayna Dunkelman, Nadav Lev, Pauline Kim, Chris Gross, Oren Fader, Mory Ortman
Commissioned by Beth Morrison Projects, Trinity Church Wall Street, and Linda & Stuart Nelson.
Told through the perspective of a new father, In Our Daughter’s Eyes shows the journey of the protagonist as he wrestles with truly becoming a man that his daughter would be proud of. The story traces his wife’s joyful and fraught pregnancy, the legacy of the family’s past, and his personal demons that he vows to vanquish before assuming the role of a father.
MAN
Last night I had a dream
At a frozen lake
Your mother is there
And you should be too
But you are not Mom is crying
You are a little over a year old You have just begun to walk
“What is it?” I beg
You have fallen through the ice
I dive in after you
Into the dark wintery water
Burning pain everywhere I don’t see you
Looking up… there’s your mother
Through the break in the ice
I know I should continue my search but I am drowning
I head back up
Clawing for air Gasping, choking
I can see your mother’s face: Terrified shapes I have never seen before
A rush of shame makes the cold water sting less
And I go back under I know now
I’ll hold my breath forever If that’s what it takes to save you
04. FISHING (THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA)
Paola Prestini (composer), Royce Vavrek (librettist), Karmina Šilec (co-creator), Armando Contreras (baritone), Mila Henry (conductor), Jeffrey Zeigler (cello), Shayna Dunkelman (percussion)
Commissioned by ASU Gammage in association with Joan Cremin, Beth Morrison Projects, Carolina Performing Arts at the University of North Carolina, Krannert Center for the Performing Arts, VisionIntoArt, and Jill & Bill Steinberg.
Based on the novel by Ernest Hemingway, The Old Man and the Sea is an opera that presents a dual track of storytelling by combining the Hemingway text with original portraits of quotidian life to create a look at aging, legacy, and our relationship to oceans, ultimately shedding contemporary perspectives on this timeless tale.
SANTIAGO
The morning comes.
I can hear the trembling sound of flying fish, the hissing of their stiff wet wings soaring in the darkness. My principal friends on the ocean.
I’ve worked the deep wells, and nothing. Today I’ll work where there are schools of albacore and tuna.
Hail Mary, la mar, I will hook a big one.
At any moment the sun will rise.
All my life the early sun has hurt my eyes…
A man-of-war!
He’s got something… Long black wings circling in the sky above me.
Where he circles, I follow. I row, I follow.
Higher and higher, he circles again. He dives.
I follow.
Flying fish spurt out, sailing desperately over the surface. Long black wings. Dorsal fins.
Dolphins.
Cutting through the water below the flight of fish.
Big school of dolphin. Man-of-war has no chance, the flying fish too fast. Too fast for the both of us.
I row, I follow.
Hail Mary, la mar, I pray for a stray. My big fish must be somewhere.
The water, a dark blue. So dark, and the purple gelatinous bauble of a floating terror, its long deadly filaments trailing…
Agua mala…
You whore… and bow my head.
Like my mother and her mother and her mother before her.
05.
LUMEE’S DREAM (P R I S M)*
Ellen Reid (composer), Roxie Perkins (librettist), Rebecca Jo Loeb (mezzo-soprano), Choir of Trinity Wall Street, NOVUS NY
Commissioned by Beth Morrison Projects, Kiki & David Gindler, Linda & Stuart Nelson, Elizabeth & Justus Schlichting, and Nancy & Barry Sanders.
p r i s m tells the story of an ill girl, Bibi, and her doting mother, Lumee, who live in a pristine sanctuary. Locked away from the world, Bibi and Lumee try to protect each other from the dangerous illness that lurks outside their door and has already infected Bibi’s legs-leaving her unable to walk. p r i s m explores the elasticity of memory after trauma, and the lengths to which one will go to “feel better” — no matter the price.
LUMEE
I had my favorite dream last night, the one about us.
In the dream I’m a young golden maiden and your hair is dark like a crow. We live in a stone sanctuary on top of a hill, outside our window is a great sea. Dark, dark, dark blue water. Dark blue without a floor.
And I hear them outside waiting, wanting, and I know what I must do for you. Careful not to wake you I hurl myself out of the window. I am copper and feather slicing through the night and no one can see me. Down I sink like they want me to.
I stay there all night.
At dawn they are done with me. Exhausted, I pull my dripping body back to our window where I watch you sleep peacefully as I dry.
06. IN THIS DIRT, THIS SOIL (HILDEGARD)
Sarah Kirkland Snider (composer and librettist), Nola Richardson (soprano), Kazem Abdullah (conductor), Contemporaneous Ensemble
Commissioned by Beth Morrison Projects. Commissioned in part by the Aspen Music Festival and School.
Hildegard imagines three of the most pivotal events in the life of 12th-century German Benedictine visionary/composer/ polymath Hildegard von Bingen. The year is 1147, and Hildegard has begun transcribing her visions of God, and she enlists a young convalescent, Richardis von Stade, to help illustrate her visions. The two women quickly develop a transformative partnership that awakens them creatively, spiritually, and — much to each woman’s internal conflict — romantically. A tale of two gifted women struggling to find their voices in a time and place where female voices were forbidden.
HILDEGARD
A foaming sea before me.
High-peaked mountains, path of thorns and snakes. No way to cross.
O Mother of Zion, where are you?
I pour out my tears and sighs to you.
But loud waves crash, and you cannot hear my voice.
I am not dead enough, Mother. I still feel.
Please take my soul. I still feel.
Please take my soul.
And then, in this dirt, this soil, the sweetest odor: her warmth, her breath, her voice.
“O daughter, hurry,” she said.
“I have given you wings.
Find them, and fly home.
Fly over these mountains, this sea.
Find your wings, and fly home to me.”
Fly home. Fly home to me.
07. THORNS
MAGDALENE:
I pressed them through my hair into my head pressed them into my waistband and later into my palms,
a secret intimacy among those thorns and me
a love (from whom or to whom it mattered less than that it was) and that it was was the evidence of love:
and so a comfort in the small pain they brought.
08. ZARRURAYI NZIRA
personal journey to Marimuka–her ongoing rite of passage into Womanhood which began when she emigrated to the United States fourteen years ago.
CHIVANHU:
Tinofamba munzira
Tichitsvaga mawonero
Mapindiro
Mwari tizarurireyiwo nzira
Zarurayi!
Zarurayiwo masango!
CHINGEZI:
We embark on journeys
Looking for the right direction to travel
A way to enter
Oh Divine One, please open a way for us
Open a way!
Please open the wilderness and make a way for us!
09. BIRD SONG (MAGDALENE) (MARIMUKA) (SENSORIUM EX)
Molly Joyce (composer), Danielle Birrittella (soprano), Mila Henry (conductor), Michelle Sheehy and Jordan Warmath (violins), Tess Scott (viola), Joo Lee (cello), Liza Wallace (harp)
Commissioned by Beth Morrison Projects and HERE Arts Center.
Magdalene is a chamber opera: a wild meditation on transformation and desire scored by the collective voices of fourteen women. Set to Marie Howe’s Magdalene poems, the opera invites an audience into the interior world of Mary Magdalene — enlarging her to cross time and space, she appears as a woman alive now, who strives to heal the unyielding split between the sacred and the sexual.
Tanyaradzwa Tawengwa-Nzou Mambano (composer, solo voice, piano)
Commissioned by Beth Morrison Projects and Lynn Loacker.
Marimuka is an existential place that manifests in each person’s life. It is a hallowed, mysterious, vast expanse whose depths hold both unspeakable terrors and divine miracles. Every human spirit must travel through Marimuka in order to arrive at a deeper understanding of self, but the journey should only be embarked on when the spirit is ready to do so. Though tumultuous and frightening, this journey of Surrender, Death, and Re-Birth is what facilitates human spirits to realize their purpose, meaning, and power in a lifetime. This cycle tells the story of Tanyaradzwa Tawengwa’s
Paola Prestini (composer), Brenda Shaughnessy (librettist), Hailey McAvoy (mezzo-soprano), Elizabeth Askren (music director), National Sawdust Ensemble
Sensorium Ex was commissioned by VisionIntoArt, Beth Morrison Projects, Jill & Bill Steinberg, Allen R and Judy Brick Freedman.
Operating at the intersection of artificial intelligence (AI), disability, and the arts, Sensorium Ex explores the fundamental question of what it means to have voice, and the nature of voice beyond language. The plot tells a dystopian tale centered on a mother and her son, a nonverbal, nonambulatory child with multiple disabilities, as
they resist a villainous corporate entity’s attempts to destroy what it means to be human. Sensorium Ex creates an entirely new operatic world–one that redefines who gets to have a voice. Sen-so-rium refers to: 1. The parts of the brain or the mind concerned with the reception and interpretation of sensory stimuli; broadly: the entire sensory apparatus. 2. Constantly changing realm of the senses
MEM
You speak the way a bird walks, like you have another way you’re not using.
You’re choosing not to fly. You have no choice: raise your voice.
Deep and high, ground to the sky. Circle and square, full and spare, and really only air.
Only air, between the trees and me. Only air keeps you from me.
You sing the way a bird reads. I don’t know what you need if it’s not a song.
A bird is made to sing.
[Wordless bird-calls, trills, and vocalizations.]
Pah ah. Pah ah———nananana… kr…ah!
Kata kata kata kata ah!
Kata kata kata kata kata kata kata—
Kata kata kata kata kata kata kata! Ah—na na nanana na. Krrr…ah
10. MY FATHER (ADORATION)
Mary Kouyoumdjian (composer), Royce Vavrek (librettist), Omar Najmi (tenor), Alan Pierson (conductor), Silvana Quartet
Commissioned by Beth Morrison Projects, Trinity Church Wall Street, Justus & Elizabeth Schlichting, Charlotte Isaacs, and Susan Bienkowski.
An adaptation of Atom Egoyan’s film of the same name, Adoration follows Simon, an orphaned high school student. As part of a dramatic writing exercise, Simon’s teacher Sabine encourages him to appropriate details from a historical terrorist attack as an event perpetrated by his parents. When his story goes viral, Simon uses the hysteria within his community and on the internet to highlight the challenges of intolerance and racism in our society. Adoration tells two simultaneous stories — a fictional story of terrorism and betrayal juxtaposed with a real story of family strife and rejection of something foreign.
SIMON
What was going on through his head
As he talked my mother into his plan? Did he brainwash her? Did he have second thoughts? Was it difficult for him?
Was he only capable of doing this because he loved her?
The most innocent.
My mother would have had no idea
Of the political situation she was running into.
She would have had no idea
That Bethlehem at that time Was under Israeli control.
She would have had no idea Of the violence that marked that region. Or the history of persecution.
My mother was innocent.
My father… Wanted justice.
Justice for his rage.
His particular means of noble justice
Meant sacrifice:
My mother and me.
Most people view my father’s actions
As the most horrible, cynical thing imaginable.
How could a man do that to his family?
That’s not what I’ve come to understand.
My father… Was giving us a gift.
11. DREAM ARIA,
“I BEEN WORRIED ABOUT YOU, YA KNOW” (TRADE)
TRADE is the story of a rent boy and his closeted client in working-class Dublin, both trapped within their own lives. Meeting secretly in a cheap hotel, they wrestle with their own inner demons and their need for each other. The story centers around Older Man, a family man whose world is crumbling apart, and the young hustler, Younger Man, determined to take charge of his future.
OLDER MAN
I been worried about you, you know. (YOUNGER MAN: Why?)
I couldn’t stop. Not since the last time. Not since then. Not since we met. I was worried, I guess. Thinking if you were safe. Thinking if you were alright. Can I tell you this?
I dreamed about you last night. And I never dream. Not normally. No. Only boring dreams sometimes. Only work dreams sometimes. Now and again. Shit like this.
Shipping orders and packing containers or lists.
Shipping orders, packing containers and lists.
My mother was innocent. And what about me?
Unborn, resting in her belly. Did he think about me?
Emma O’Halloran (composer), Mark O’Halloran (librettist), John Molloy (bass), Elaine Kelly (conductor), Irish National Opera Orchestra
Commissioned by Beth Morrison Projects, Irish National Opera, Trinity Church Wall Street, and Nancy & Barry Sanders.
But this dream was different. In this dream we talked. And I was holding you too. Holding you tight. But then all changes. I don’t know why. The ground shifts. It gives way. And we’re falling.
Down into a lurch. Falling.
Down a set of steps. Down a set of stairs. Falling into the dark.
And I let you go.
Cause I can’t hold on.
I can’t hold on.
So I let you go.
And you disappear. Down this down. Headlong.
And I’m hardly falling now myself. I’m stopped and standing. Whilst you disappear.
Down into the dark.
And I want to help. I do. But I can’t.
I can’t reach out.
I can’t reach down.
And I try. I try.
But I’m awake.
I’m awake by now.
And crying.
Crying cause you’re gone.
Cause you’re dead maybe. Dead maybe. And that upsets me.
It does. No end.It’s stuck in my head. It’s why I wanted to see you again. To see that you were well.
That’s it.
That’s all.
12. THE STARS GO ON (STAR SINGER)
Juhi Bansal (composer), Neil Aitken (librettist), Graycen Gardner (soprano), Kazem Abdullah (conductor), Contemporaneous Ensemble
Commissioned by Beth Morrison Projects and Kiki & David Gindler.
mythology from Polynesian and various Asian and Inuit cultures, Star Singer follows Mina who traverses a frightening world of dying stars and spirits in search of hope and a song. As she walks unknowing in her departed mother’s footsteps, she learns about the nature of truth, history and memory; the irreplaceable loss of knowledge; the value of stories; and the interweaving journeys of mothers and daughters.
MINA
Even in the dark, the stars go on.
Even in the dark, the stars go on. Burning bright, the darkness fades, darkness fades.
In the dark, In the dark, The stars go on, Her words go on, Her song a fire in the night.
Even in the dark, the stars go on. Mothers, daughters, we carry our, We carry our song.
When darkness falls The stars go on, Her song goes on, Her words, a fire in the night…
The stars are dying one by one, fading into darkness held back only by the voice of a single star singer. Drawing on
Beth Morrison Projects (BMP) is the foremost creator and producer of new opera and music-theatre, with a fierce commitment to telling the stories of our time, cultivating a new generation of talent, and collaborating with them to lead the field into a more inclusive, innovative, and relevant future.
Founded in 2006 by “contemporary opera mastermind” (LA Times) Beth Morrison, who was honored as one of Musical America’s Artists of the Year/Agents of Change, BMP now operates across the US and internationally, with offices in Brooklyn and Los Angeles, and is “a driving force behind America’s thriving opera scene” (Financial Times), with Opera News declaring that the company, “more than any other… has helped propel the art form into the twenty-first century.”
BMP has commissioned, developed, produced, and toured over 65 works in 15 countries around the world, including the Pulitzer Prizewinning chamber operas Angel’s Bone (Du Yun/Royce Vavrek) and p r i s m (Ellen Reid/Roxie Perkins) and GRAMMYTM-nominated Black Lodge (David T. Little/Anne Waldman), with performances at prestigious venues and festivals such as Brooklyn Academy of Music, LA Opera, REDCAT, Edinburgh International Festival, Walt Disney Hall, The Barbican, Lincoln Center, The Walker Art Center, The Beijing Music Festival, New Visions Arts Festival, The Holland Festival, O Festival Rotterdam, and more.
BMP is committed to fostering the next generation of creatives through its inclusive and industry-shaping programs Producer Academy and NEXTGEN. BMP: Producer Academy is an 8-week course that supports early-career producers by providing mentorship, networking, and personal growth opportunities. It has served over 1100 students from 19 countries, welcoming applicants from diverse backgrounds and abilities to receive high-quality training without
financial barriers. BMP: NEXTGEN is a program which invites emerging composers to submit vocal works to a panel of music industry professionals, for a chance to have their work commissioned for a world premiere production in New York and Los Angeles.
In 2013, BMP co-founded the PROTO-TYPE Festival with HERE Arts Center, which has been called “utterly essential” (The New York Times), “indispensable” (The New Yorker), and “one of the world’s top festivals of contemporary opera and theater” (Associated Press). With the 2026 Festival, BMP assumed the role of sole curator and producer. Through PROTOTYPE and its broader work and programs, BMP is creating a vibrant, sustainable, and deeply relevant future for opera and music-theatre.
Beth Morrison, a Grammy-nominated producer and recipient of the Musical America Award for Artist of the Year/Agent of Change, is an acclaimed opera-theatre producer. She is the President and Creative Producer of Beth Morrison Projects and Artistic and co-Founding Director of the PROTOTYPE Festival. Hailed as a “contemporary opera mastermind” (LA Times), she founded BMP in 2006 to support living composers and transform the opera industry. BMP has commissioned, developed, produced and toured over 65 works worldwide, including two Pulitzer Prize-winning operas. Morrison holds degrees from Boston University, Arizona State University, and Yale University, and is a Lecturer at Yale’s David Geffen School of Drama.
BMP: BETH MORRISON PROJECTS
The works represented in the BMP: Songbook—Anthology, Albums, and Book—were born of partnership: shaped by the artistry of hundreds of composers, creative and production teams, and performers; guided by the vision of BMP staff and board members; and sustained by the steadfast support of co-producers, funders, donors, presenters, and venue partners. Their passion for creating bold, boundary-pushing, singular works of contemporary opera and music-theatre is the heartbeat of BMP—the spirit that has carried us to this moment. To have created these works together has been not only my passion, but my life’s work.
Every institutional partnership that has sustained BMP over the years has been deeply meaningful. Yet I must acknowledge three in particular—remembering always that “institutions” are, in truth, people. First, the Mellon Foundation. Under the visionary leadership of Susan Feder, and later through the continued support of Emil Kang and Stephanie Ybarra, Mellon’s commitment made possible the very existence of the PROTOTYPE Festival. Moreover, their nine-year investment in BMP’s capacity-building was transformative, allowing the company to grow in ways I could not have imagined. These initiatives were led by Susan Feder, whom I call my fairy godmother. My gratitude and love for her belief in me and my vision are boundless. Second, The Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation, guided with such care by Alex Sanger. The Toulmin Foundation has championed women creators across opera, symphony, theater, and ballet, reshaping the landscape of commissioning through its regranting program with Opera America. Their impact has been nothing short of revolutionary. Alex’s steadfast support of BMP and PROTOTYPE has allowed us to pursue our mission of uplifting women composers. His partnership has been transformative for BMP, and I remain deeply grateful for his faith in our vision. Finally, to the Howard Gilman Foundation—under
the leadership of Laura Aden, Anna Campbell, Kimberleigh Costanzo, and James Hirschfeld—you embody the model of what a foundation can and should be. Your responsiveness to grantees, your willingness to listen and allow flexibility, and your commitment to rewarding good citizenship within the field make you true thought partners.
For more than twenty years, the composers and librettists with whom I’ve had the privilege to collaborate have been a wellspring of inspiration. Their artistry and vision continue to expand my own, and I am endlessly thankful for their trust and brilliance.
The BMP: Songbook project owes special gratitude to Alexis Peart, whose tireless leadership, dedication, and extraordinary administrative gifts made this project possible.
To our brilliant producers at Soundmirror, Blanton Alspaugh and Mark Donahue—working with you has been a dream. And to our inspired designers at Morcos Key, thank you for bringing BMP’s aesthetic to life through your luminous designs for the book, album, and anthology.
Finally, I could not have built this company or believed in myself without the love and support of my parents, Jane and Chip, and my partner, André. They have always believed in me and my “impossible” dream, and have given me the wings to fly.
SPECIAL THANKS
Produced by Beth Morrison and Blanton Alspaugh. Engineered by Mark Donahue, Garth MacAleavey, Ryan Streber, Simon Cullen, and Nick Tipp. Assistant Engineer Frankie Price. Associate Producer Alexis Peart. Mastered by Mark Donahue. Adoration, recorded at Sheen Center for Thought and Culture (New York, 2024); Breaking the Waves, recorded at Power Station at BerkleeNYC (New York City, 2025); Hildegard, recorded at Power Station at BerkleeNYC (New York City, 2025); In Our Daughter’s Eyes, recorded at REDCAT (Los Angeles, 2022); Magdalene, recorded at REDCAT (Los Angeles, 2024); Marimuka, recorded at Harlem Stage (New York, 2022); p r i s m, recorded at La MaMa (New York, 2019); Sensorium Ex, recorded at University of Nebraska, Sapp Field House (Omaha, 2025); Star Singer, recorded at Power Station at BerkleeNYC (New York City, 2025); The Old Man and the Sea, recorded at Arizona State University Gammage (Tempe, 2024); Thumbprint, recorded at LA Opera (Los Angeles, 2019); and TRADE (Live), recorded at Watergate Theatre (Kilkenny, Ireland, 2024).
