Works in Development
Get Stuffed
Alexis Diamond, librettist / Richard Payne, composer
In development with the Canadian Diabetes Association and Words in Motion
This new work engages children in making wholesome dietary choices. Our ‘next Elijah’s Kite’, Get Stuffed is written for 5 singing actors and 3 musicians and intended for family audiences and school tours. Set in a school cafeteria it includes a food fight! The libretto includes foods representative of Canada’s ethnic diversity. Our unique artistic process is creating an engaging, interactive performance experience for young people to promote healthy eating practices, and empower them with memorable tools to put their learning into practice.
Get Stuffed will have its world premiere in October 2008 during the Canadian Diabetes Association's national convention.
Shelter
Julie Salverson, librettist / Juliet Palmer, composer
Shelter is composed by Juliet Palmer with libretto by Julie Salverson. Inspired by Peter van Wyck’s research on Canada's role in "The Highway of the Atom", Shelter combines dark clown with opera in the story of a nuclear family adrift in the post-atomic age: a father obsessed with protecting his family, a mother hungry for danger and a daughter who glows.
The opera is haunted by the presence of nuclear physicist Lise Meitner, an overlooked figure in the history of nuclear fission. Travelling along the Highway is the Pilot, whose obsession finally leads him to enter the story and history itself.
“This is a personal story, about love, loss, unresolved grief, haunting—a story that carries the uncontainable event in a story that perhaps shatters itself in the telling.”
...Julie Salverson, librettist
Shelter will be presented in workshop with a post-peformance discussion as part of the Celebrate Canada! program at the Department of Canadian Heritage.
Saturday June 21 from 1pm - 3pm
in the Ernest Balmer Studio
Click here for more details
Shelter News
Charlotte Gowdy (clown consultant for the June 2008 Shelter Workshop) talks about clowning and opera in this article from Guelph Mercury. To read the article, just click on the link below!
Shelter Photos
All photos are taken by Peter Van Wyck.
Porthole #15, Mackenzie River, 66.43N
Back Bay, Port Radium, Great Bear Lake
Dene Grave site, Cameron Bay, Great Bear Lake
Airfield, Sawmill Bay, Great Bear Lake
Port Radium
Monument at Port Radium, Summer 2003, Great Bear Lake
The Shadow
Alex Poch-Goldin, librettist / Omar Daniel, composer
The Shadow, set in Barcelona circa 1900, weaves a web of intrigue and desire, complicated by unpaid debts. In 2007 Tapestry presented the opera as a ‘workshop production’, which used a full chamber orchestra in an intimate studio setting. For the workshop, renowned Canadian counter tenor Daniel Taylor made his contemporary opera debut in the title role. The Shadow is slated for full production in 2009-10.
What price would you pay for love? A humble postman assumes a complex identity to win the love of a wealthy young woman. A cautionary tale of desire and deception this intriguing original drama investigates the perils of romantic obsession, unmanageable debt, and pretending to be someone that you are not.
"This is the kind of show that should have a full production. And soon."
...Jon Kaplan, NOW Magazine Blog
Ruth
Michael Lewis MacLennan, librettist / Jeffrey Ryan, composer
In development with the Vancouver Cantata Singers
With a cast of 5 principals, chorus and chamber orchestra, Ruth takes the basic story from the smallest book in the Old Testament and applies the “moral” to contemporary Canadian society and our immigrant experiences: “For your people shall be my people.”
Ruth is in development in preparation for a Vancouver premiere during the 2010 Olympics.
Dark Star Requiem
Jill Battson, librettist / Andrew Staniland, composer
In development with the Elmer Iseler Singers
“Among the major issues facing humanity in the present day are two unprecedented crises: the depletion and destruction of the biosphere, and history’s most deadly epidemic to date: AIDS. Dark Star Requiem will explore these issues through text and music, comparing the relatively short history of AIDS with the awareness of man-made climate change. The poetry will be crafted into five broad categories. Within these categories the themes of Ecology, Myth, Class, Culture, Politics, and Family are explored. “
…Jill Battson, librettist
Netsuke
Jill Battson, librettist / Rose Bolton, composer
This team is currently writing the full-length opera version of this intriguing short story by Jill Battson. Tapestry originally commissioned and produced a scene as part of Opera to Go 2006 which proved Netsuke as a gripping drama about those things that opera shows best - lust and murder.
"Jessica, an American gallery owner becomes obsessed with collecting the tiny perfect carved objects “Netsuke” that traditionally were used as counterweights in the Obi or sash of the kimono. Her obsession leads her to an illicit affair with a married member of the Japanese mafia, with disastrous and ghoulish results."
...Jill Battson, librettist
The Enslavement and Liberation of Oksana G.
Colleen Murphy, librettist / Aaron Gervais, composer
Tapestry commissioned and produced a scene of Oskana G. at Opera to Go 2006 and audience response was a compelling reason to engage the writing team to realize the full work.
“Oksana G. is a very large canvas, spanning three countries and many years in the lives of three protagonists. It is an original story of a young Ukrainian girl, Oksana, lured into the world of sex trafficking by Konstantin, a recruiter who unexpectedly falls in love with her. Oksana escapes his grip and finds her way to an Italian safe house run by Father Alessandro, a Canadian priest. Recovering from her ordeal, she finds herself drawn to the priest. Meanwhile, Konstantin waits for his chance to pounce. This dangerous “ménage à trois” can only end in tragedy. “
…Colleen Murphy, librettist