A thought experiment: From these cherry-picked occasions by the town’s finest opera and dance corporations, select two—one from every class—for a double invoice. (Ignore precise present dates and occasions.) For instance, try Gelsey Bell’s trickily titled mɔɹnɪŋ [morning//mourning], then head over to BAM for Invoice T. Jones’s Nonetheless/Right here. Each works look at mortality: cosmic and deeply particular person. Ink is a Taiwanese multimedia piece that turns an ideal calligrapher’s work into motion; Indra’s Internet transforms a Buddhist legend into music-theater. There’s a brand new opera about drone warfare (Grounded) whose topicality and politics might distinction properly with an immersive dance expertise about wraiths from one other dimension (R.O.S.E.). Go forward and play this recreation at dwelling, however finally, you’re going to have to go away the condo!
OPERA
mɔɹnɪŋ [morning//mourning] at Inexperienced Wooden Cemetery Catacomb (September 12–14)
Are you able to think about the top of humanity—after which a billion years after that? No must; the ethereal composer-vocalist Gelsey Bell already has. Bell’s 2023 opera is without delay apocalyptic, transcendent and quirky—an in depth description of the top of the Earth as we all know it. Tickets to this Demise of Classical occasion embody a reception with drinks. The ridiculously apt venue? Underground tombs at Inexperienced Wooden Cemetery in Brooklyn.
Grounded on the Metropolitan Opera (September 23–October 19)
Jeanine Tesori (Kimberly Akimbo) is extra acquainted to Broadway followers than opera goers, however she’s been going backwards and forwards for years. Now the composer makes her Metropolitan Opera debut with a recent army story. Mezzo-soprano Emily D’Angelo performs a military officer assigned to distant piloting of drones. Half a world away, these machines of destruction rain demise from the skies. What’s the psychic price of killing folks by distant management?
Indra’s Internet on the Park Avenue Armory (September 23–October 6)
As a composer, director, performer and innovator within the subject of vocal arts, Meredith Monk has redefined experimental music-theater for many years. Her 80-minute multidisciplinary work is greater than merely an “opera,” however them’s the classes. The story? An historic Buddhist legend about an enlightened king who unfurls a bejeweled internet throughout the universe, symbolizing life’s interconnectedness. Monk performs along with her vocal ensemble, accompanied by a sixteen-piece chamber orchestra and refrain.
Silent Gentle at Nationwide Sawdust (September 26–29)
The common-or-garden lives and torturous passions of Mennonites are the topic of composer Paola Prestini’s new music-drama, set to a libretto by Royce Vavrek (Breaking the Waves). Based mostly on the 2007 movie written and directed by Carlos Reygadas, the story considerations a Mennonite married man having an affair with one other girl, a betrayal that destroys his spouse.
Ainadamar on the Metropolitan Opera (October 15–November 9)
First seen in 2003 (and once more in 2005 after revisions) Argentinian composer Osvaldo Golijov’s first opera is in regards to the lifetime of the nice Spanish playwright Federico García Lorca, murdered by fascist forces at the beginning of the Spanish Civil Warfare for being a socialist and a homosexual man. Playwright David Henry Hwang supplies the reverse-chronology libretto, through which Lorca’s life is seen by means of the lens of his muse, Catalan actress Margarita Xirgu. Angel Blue performs Xirgu and, as Lorca himself, mezzo-soprano Daniela Mack takes on the “trouser function.”
Lucidity on the Abrons Arts Heart (November 14–16)
The mysterious and highly effective relationship of music to reminiscence is the topic Laura Kaminsky (As One) tackles in her new opera with a libretto (full disclosure) by this author. Introduced at Abrons Arts Heart by On Web site Opera, the viewers will sit on the stage and gaze right into a theater of the thoughts. Legendary soprano Lucy Shelton performs a retired singer and composer within the early levels of dementia participating in a music-therapy trial to enhance her cognition. Director Sarah Meyers levels a forged that features Blythe Gaissert, Cristina María Castro and Eric McKeever.
DANCE
R.O.S.E. at Park Avenue Armory (September 5–12)
Choreographer Sharon Eyal and her corps of fearless dancers don skintight torn-lace physique fits (courtesy of Dior designer Maria Grazia Chiuri), smear their faces with make-up, and execute strikes round viewers members within the huge Wade Thompson Drill Corridor. Half rave, half alien invasion, half kinesthetic immersion, the present was created in collaboration with stage director Gai Behar, DJ Ben UFO and Caius Pawson. In a manner, every viewers physique is a collaborator, too.
Fall for Dance at New York Metropolis Heart (September 18–29)
New York Metropolis Heart’s world tasting menu of dance corporations returns. The pageant lineup consists of Nationwide Ballet of Ukraine, Dutch Nationwide Ballet and Gandini Juggling from the UK. Legendary dancer Herman Cornejo reimagines Fokine’s beloved Le Spectre de la Rose and Cameron sinkʷə Fraser-Monroe (a member of the Tla’amin First Nation) creates a brand new work for Canada’s Royal Winnipeg Ballet, co-commissioned by the Bard Heart for Indigenous Research.
Prisma on the Baryshnikov Arts Heart (November 14–16)
The place will we come from? Simple to ask, however arduous to reply. Via vignettes, this devised piece combines dance, dwell music and beatboxing blended with classical strings to discover “genesis moments” of the performers. Will probably be fascinating to see how the forged unpack themselves over the course of an hour. Don’t neglect: gentle goes right into a prism white and comes out a rainbow.
Nonetheless/Right here at BAM Howard Gilman Opera Home (October 30–November 2)
When it debuted 30 years in the past, Invoice T. Jones’s meditation on sickness, mortality and survival sparked criticism as as to whether or not it was “sufferer artwork” and the way critics have been supposed to reply to it. Such arguments over aesthetics and ethics rage much more as we speak. Jones derived this mixture of pure dance, multimedia and authentic music from 10 months of “survival workshops,” through which he talked to folks residing with life-threatening circumstances. Life could fade, however artwork endures.
Ink on the Rose Theater (November 2 & 3)
Taiwanese choreographer Huang Yi has danced with a robotic; now he’s making hand-applied ink shimmy in three dimensions. Partnering with audiovisual designer Ryoichi Kurokawa, Ink brings to life the work of one in every of Taiwan’s foremost calligraphers Tong Yang-Tze (born in 1942). Performers’ our bodies turn out to be brushes that splash ink throughout screens in actual time. The attention-popping design consists of deft use of holographic projection. Historical craft meets futuristic tech.
Limón Dance Firm on the Joyce Theater (November 5–10)
The troupe celebrates its 78th season by trying again at foundational works. There’s Doris Humphrey’s solo Two Ecstatic Themes (1931) adopted by José Limón’s stirring retelling of Gethsemane, The Traitor. The lightness of a drumming quartet in Scherzo offers method to great gravity in Limón’s Missa Brevis (1958), a tribute to survivors of warfare. And there’s one thing new: a world premiere by choreographer Kayla Farrish that reimagines two Nineteen Fifties Limón works, one a meditation on collective labor, the opposite about social awakening.