Center for Contemporary Opera and National Sawdust to Present WE, THE INNUMERABLE Workshop

The Center for Contemporary Opera's (CCO) Fortieth Season will continue with We, The Innumerable by the Iranian composer Niloufar Nourbakhsh and the librettist Lisa Flanagan. The workshop premiere of this one-act opera in concert form, takes place on Friday, October 21 at 7:30pm at National Sawdust.

Set during Iran's Green Movement - a precursor to the Arab Spring - We, The Innumerable explores one woman's courage to demand freedom in the face of the state-sanctioned violence and resist the distorted reality of authoritarianism in the Islamic Republic. We, The Innumerable considers lessons about political violence and revolt learned from the Iranian Green Movement including the fragility of democracy, the poison of propaganda, and the collective will of the people. The October 21 performance comes at a time when thousands of Iranian women are at the forefront of the anti-government uprising following Mahsa Amini's death, removing their headscarves on the streets and burning them in protest of the compulsory Hijab.

Grammy-nominated conductor Sara Jobin conducts a chamber ensemble comprised of piano, violin, cello, clarinet, percussion, Persian santour, and electronic effects. The music merges classical Iranian modes with classical instruments, integrating authentic Iranian instruments into a European-derived form.

The stage direction is by Harris Doran. We, The Innumerable will be sung in English that includes Persian lyrics and dialogue with English surtitle.

The cast features several artists making CCO debuts: soprano Cristina Bakhoum Sanchez in the role of Roya; tenor Morgan Manifacier portraying Siavash; lyric soprano Mary-Hollis Hundley is Maryam; and bass Joseph Trumbo sings the role of the Chief Interrogator.

Niloufar Nourbakhsh was a 2019 recipient of National Sawdust's Hildegard Commission, which supports women, trans, and non-binary composers in the early stages of their careers. Nourbakhsh composed We, The Innumerable with the mentorship and support the prize provides.

By staging We, The Innumerable, CCO and the entire cast unite with women and men around the world to share the name and story of Mahsa Amini and stand in solidarity with the women of Iran fighting for their rights.

Produced by the Center for Contemporary Opera and co-presented by National Sawdust, We, the Innumerable received the Discovery Grant from Opera America for the female composers program in 2019.

Tickets

Tickets are available at nationalsawdust.org. National Sawdust is located at 80 North 6th Street in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

About the Artists

The work of Niloufar Nourbakhsh has been described as "darkly lyrical" by The New York Times, and "stark" by WNPR. She won National Sawdust's Hildegard Commission, Opera America's Discovery Grant in 2019, and has won Beth Morrison Projects Next Generation competition. Nourbakhsh's music has been performed at festivals and venues including Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, and at The Kennedy Center; and commissioned and performed by the Nashville Symphony, International Contemporary Ensemble, the Library of Congress, and the Shriver Hall Series, among many others. A founding member and co-director of Iranian Female Composers Association, she is a strong advocate of music education and equal opportunities. Nourbakhsh is currently an adjunct faculty member at Molloy College and co-director of Peabody Conservatory Laptop Orchestra. She is a music graduate and a Global Citizen Scholarship recipient of Goucher College as well as a Mahoney and Caplan Scholar from University of Oxford. She holds a doctoral degree from Stony Brook University and regularly performs with her Ensemble Decipher.

Librettist Lisa Flanagan is an award-winning narrator, voice actor, director, improviser and classical soprano. She spent many years on-stage singing opera and classical music, performing improve comedy and directing theater. She is also the librettist for Niloufar Noubakhsh's award-winning opera Threshold of Brightness (Beth Morrison's Projects' Next Gen). Her voice-over work incudes animation, video games and commercials. Lisa received multiple Audio-File Earphones Awards and Voice Arts Awards, including Best Audiobook Narration-Children's for Disney Pixar's WALL-E and the 2019 Audie Award for Best Fantasy, Spinning Silver.

Sara Jobin is a Grammy-nominated conductor with extensive experience in opera. In 2004, she broke the glass podium at several companies including at San Francisco Opera with her debut. Ms. Jobin has been principal conductor for the Center for Contemporary Opera since 2011. Among other opera companies she has conducted include: LA Opera, Arizona Opera, Baltimore Lyric Opera, OperaDelaware, Toledo Opera and the Armel Opera Festival in Hungary and France. For three years she was Resident Conductor of the Toledo Symphony with more than 35 concerts a year. From Anchorage to Avignon and Szeged to Shanghai, she has championed American composers and worked with singers at all levels, from community choruses to Wagnerian soprano Nina Stemme. During covid Jobin morphed into a digital producer, hosting various international musical events online. In September 2020, she produced the zoom cinematic premiere of Noor Inayat Khan's Aède of the Ocean and Land with an international cast performing live five countries across ten time zones. In November she made her virtual Carnegie Hall debut during the Carnegie Hall Live tribute to Ruth Bader Ginsburg, conducting the duet "We are different, we are one" from Derrick Wang's comedy Scalia/Ginsburg. Sara Jobin resides in Richmond, Virginia, home to the Inayatiyya, a Sufi organization founded on the teachings of Hazrat Inayat Khan. Her talent is in service to projects that increase the peace, respect the planet, open people's minds, and bring us together.

Harris Doran, stage director, wrote and directed the multi-award winning film F^¢K '€M R!GHT B@¢K which premiered this year in the Sundance Film Festival (Grand Jury Prize nomination) and won Aspen Shortsfest making the film Oscar-qualified. His feature film Beauty Mark earned the Breakout Performance Jury Prize for lead actress in its LA Film Festival premiere, among other awards. Among other accomplishments include his writing, directing and adapting the film/hybrid I See You and You See Me for Queens Theatre which premiered on PBS/WNET. His short film The Story of Milo & Annie featuring Cathy Moriarty won the Indie Memphis Film Festival. In addition, Harris he has written and directed the stage musicals Wasp Women, Salvage and Bleeding Love, the latter being released as a podcast musical, directed and edited by him, and was one of the top Performing Arts pod casts in the country. Harris trained on The Juilliard Drama Department, and has been an acting coach for 5 years, and is an adjunct professor in the MFA Arts Department at Columbia University where he teaches Directing the Actor.

The Center for Contemporary Opera

Founded in 1982, the Center for Contemporary Opera is the world's oldest organization entirely devoted to contemporary opera. CCO is committed to developing, producing and promoting new opera and music-theatre works. CCO believes that opera must be sustainable in its creation and production. CCO strives to hear and to amplify the voices and stories that are too seldom heard.

National Sawdust

National Sawdust believes the artistic expression empowers us all to create a more joyful and just world. The organization curates and produces music and artistic works rooted in curiosity, experimentation, innovation, and inclusivity. National Sawdust presents its work by engaging communities of artists and audiences at its state-of-the-art Williamsburg home and on its digital stage.

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