French Composer Pascal Dusapin's TO BE SUNG to Be Presented by the Center for Contemporary Opera

Pascal Dusapin's chamber opera in one act, To Be Sung, will be staged by the Center for Contemporary Opera on Thursday, May 17 and Saturday May 19, 2018, both performances at 8pm, in Brooklyn's Irondale Center (85 South Oxford Street). The libretto was adapted by the composer from Gertrude Stein's short story A Lyrical Opera Made By Two (To Be Sung). Stein conceived her sensual text To Be Sung as a declaration of love to her wife Alice written for their 20th anniversary. The piece is an erotic, exciting and intimate idyll that describes the love between two women.

CCO's presentation of To Be Sung will be a premiere of a new concept of the work. The rethinking of the opera, by stage director Jorinde Keesmaat, will include an all-female cast, with the original role of the male speaker now being performed by a contra-alto.

About his opera, Dusapin states, "this is my tribute to American literature," he continues, "To Be Sung is an ambitious piece. I wanted to write something amniotic, extremely sensitive, that situates listening within an almost metaphysical feeling of understanding through light that demands to be heard through the mystery of the eye."

Sarah Jobin conducts a chamber orchestra. The cast includes Kristina Bachrach, Danielle Buonaiuto, Judith Skinner and Anna Trombetta.