THE AMERICAN OPERA PROJECT PRESENTS THE SECOND SEASON OF EMMY AWARD-WINNING SOPRANO ADRIENNE DANRICH’S “MUSIC AS THE MESSAGE” WITH “FALL IN ❤️ WITH LOVE!”
October 21, 2021
Fall in ❤️ with Love ushers in this season of renewal, reopening and reflection, celebrating the greatest four letter word ever created — LOVE! The audience will be led through an immersive program of multi-genre, family friendly songs, operatic arias and spoken word. As we commune through music, attendees are encouraged to sing and speak along, whether in the Zoom room or in the Sanctuary, with strong and joyous voices!
Music as the Message is an interactive, free virtual event, available to all. To register for the free Zoom concert, visit http://www.aopopera.org/music-message. Goodwill offerings are accepted and donors at the $30 level or above may receive a personal invitation to join members of our community in the live studio audience, as space allows. Proof of vaccination with photo ID will be required for all attendees and studio audience members will be required to wear masks at all times.
Joining Danrich and the Music as the Message Ensemble (Victoria A. Davis, Patrice P. Eaton, Cameo Humes, Scott Tomlinson) will be guest artists Marsha Thompson, Blythe Gaissert, Andrew Garland, James Moore, Violetta Zabbi, Brian Shankar Adler, Dwight Howard, Peter Siedenberg, and Broadway Presbyterian pastor, Chris Shelton. The episode will also see the premiere of the newly-commissioned song Muse of Memory by Adrienne Danrich and Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Paul Moravec (Sanctuary Road, The Shining).
For this episode of Music as the Message, AOP is giving 50% of all donations raised on November 14th to Broadway Community, a non-profit agency located at Broadway Presbyterian Church that provides food, shelter, health-care, and many other services for neighbors in need. Broadway Community sets an abundant table, believing that everyone deserves justice, dignity, health, and wholeness. Your gifts provide more than food — they provide an open door to community for many folks who feel all-too-alone in this world.
Pastor Chris Shelton says, “Broadway Presbyterian Church is delighted to be in partnership with Adrienne Danrich and Music as the Message. We share a common vision -- that music is a fundamental facet of self-expression as human beings, and therefore a fundamental part of building community. Music has the capacity to bring people together across our many lines of difference. Music helps us hear what harmony sounds and feels like, and if we can hear it, maybe we can learn to live it."
Created and hosted by Emmy Award-winning soprano Adrienne Danrich, Music as the Message (MaM) is an interactive, virtual series. Streamed live, MaM celebrates the power of music to unify and to inspire healing, joy, laughter, love and most importantly, community. Adrienne, along with guest artists, the MaM Ensemble and commissioned composers, leads a program of uplifting songs and spoken word. Attendees are encouraged to join in and lift their voices, as well. Following this musical catharsis, the audience is welcome to speak with the artists, and reflect or listen in support of their fellow participants.
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Guest Artists:
Chris Shelton, Broadway Presbyterian pastor
MaM Ensemble:
Cameo Humes, tenor
Scott Tomlinson, bass
Instrumentalists:
Dwight Howard, arranger
Creative Team:
Alex B. West, associate producer
Creative Content Producers:
Creative Consultants:
Production:
Patrick Mahaney, technical director
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As an award-winning singer, writer, composer, and educator, Adrienne Danrich is redefining what it means to be a creative performer. The voice of EMMY® award winning soprano Adrienne Danrich has been described as “fresh liquid-silver”, “radiant”, and having a “sensual timbre and dramatic truth” by Opera News. She has performed, covered, and workshopped leading roles with Lyric Opera Chicago, San Francisco Opera, The Metropolitan Opera, Cincinnati Opera, Tulsa Opera, Opera Pacific, Sarasota Opera, Dayton Opera, Kentucky Opera, Annapolis Opera, Opera Delaware, Baltimore Concert Opera and Fort Worth Opera. She has also performed at the Kennedy Center, Carnegie Hall & Alice Tully Hall. Danrich also appeared in the NBC broadcast of The Sound of Music, Live! In addition to singing operas, concerts and recitals around the country, Danrich performs her one-woman show, This Little Light of Mine: The Stories of Marian Anderson and Leontyne Price, which she wrote under a commission from Cincinnati Opera. This Little Light of Mine was nominated for an EMMY®, and, additionally, Ms. Danrich was personally nominated and subsequently won an EMMY® for on-camera talent as performer and narrator. Recently, Ms. Danrich debuted her new concert From Aretha to Aida, An Autobiographical Musical Journey. Distinctive in her talent and charisma, Adrienne is known for going places other artists have not yet ventured.
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Opera on Tap (OOT) was born in 2005 in Brooklyn and operates with the vision of making the drama, beauty and exhilaration of opera truly accessible to new communities everywhere. What began as a small monthly gathering of ambitious, classically trained singers looking for more performance opportunities, has grown into a producing and community-based organization that has gained a broad audience base and national recognition as an innovative force on the classical music scene. Through its Chapter program, which now has twenty-eight vibrant national (and international) chapters, OOT has created a large network of performers, creators, and supporters. A predominantly women-led organization, OOT's mission is to engage and enrich communities through culture and the arts, and to empower singers, instrumentalists, composers and other artists through opportunities for paid performance, commissions, leadership, and safe creative practices.
Opera on Tap continues to be headquartered as a national organization in Brooklyn and in NYC presents four programs intended to adhere to our practice of community engagement through opera:
BAR SHOWS/ NEW BREW: Our core community engagement program that places opera performers in alternative spaces to concert halls, this is replicated across all of our Chapters. New Brew is our bar show concert series dedicated to presenting works by living composers.
PLAYGROUND OPERA: The program, accessible through our web portal, consists of Live teaching artists (2) zoomed into their space(s) OR pre-recorded lessons by Opera on Tap’s teaching artists, pre-teaching materials, 8 sessions, and a final video including every student singing and dancing, that will be live-streamed for their community. With a strong STEAM integration, Virtual Playground Opera builds lasting relationships with educators and students and presents creativity as a life skill essential for success. Our curriculum immerses students in every aspect of the creation, production and performance of an opera. Virtual Playground Opera is an active learning video production education program in an innovative, interactive web series hosted on a comprehensive learning portal.
OPERACADES: Inspired by the Zoltar machine at Coney Island, our OPERACADES are designed to pay tribute to our many opera and classical music artists who are currently (and for the foreseeable future) unable to perform for live audiences. Designed as fully operational one-person theatres in collaboration with our partners New Orleans Opera, OPERACADES create a unique public performance venue and mobile public art installation.
THE IMMERSIVE OPERA PROJECT (IOP): Our commissioning/development/full production program. The project is a collaboration of Opera on Tap and regional opera companies across the globe to develop and showcase new immersive works of opera utilizing immersive technologies (VR/AR/MR/XR), and also inclusive of live immersive and site-specific opera performance.
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ABOUT BROADWAY PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH |
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Broadway Presbyterian Church is a progressive community that welcomes all people regardless of ethnic heritage, national origin, age, gender, marital status, sexual orientation, or socio-economic standing. Though we may read the Bible with different eyes than our ancestors, we continue to believe that it is the foundation of our faith. Guided by the Spirit, our encounter with Scripture calls us to be people of justice, loving-kindness, humility, and joy in all that we do. We are a part of “the Church reformed, always reforming” – and we look forward to all the ways God will continue to lead the Broadway Presbyterian Church.
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The seeds that would become Broadway Community were planted in 1982 with the creation of the Community Lunch program – a combined effort of volunteers from Broadway Presbyterian Church, Union Theological Seminary, Columbia University, and other neighboring organizations. Meals were prepared and provided to the hungry three times a week. In 1992, the organization formally incorporated so that it might expand its reach. For the next decade “BCI” developed as an addiction recovery program, with a variety of companion programs, including support groups, a women’s shelter, arts education, and more. All the while, the soup kitchen continued, serving lunch on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Thousands of people have been fed and nourished at Broadway Community – in body, mind, and spirit.
More information can be found at http://broadwaycommunity.org
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ABOUT THE AMERICAN OPERA PROJECT |
Founded in 1988, The American Opera Project (AOP) has been at the forefront of contemporary opera for over 30 years. The Brooklyn-based producing organization commissions, develops and produces music-theatre projects, trains emerging composers and librettists, and creates personal connections within its community. Its works have received critical acclaim at opera companies and venues around the world, establishing a new musical canon that recognizes the operatic story in every life. AOP further expands the operatic field through its training programs The NYU Opera Lab, in partnership with NYU and for students and alumni in The NYU Tisch Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program, and Composers & the Voice, AOP’s in-house, two-year fellowship program for emerging composers and librettists.
Press for AOP:
"known for bringing cutting-edge vocal productions to the masses" — New York Magazine
"a perfect first exposure to opera." — Time Out NY
"Bravo to AOP for supporting such controversial and ultimately important work." — Opera Today
"The future of American opera is in good hands." — Opera News
Media Contact: Meagan Brus, Director of Marketing and Communications
email: mbrus@aopopera.org
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