Encompass New Opera Theatre is a professional

opera company Opera is a form of Western theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a lib ...

located in

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

which specializes in premiering new productions, and reviving 20th century operas by American and international composers. A member of

Opera America __NOTOC__ Opera America (stylized as OPERA America) is a New York–based service organization promoting the creation, presentation, and enjoyment of opera in the United States. Almost all professional opera company, opera companies and some semi-pr ...

, Encompass was founded in 1975 by Nancy Rhodes who remains the company's Artistic Director. Since its founding, Encompass has produced over 50 fully mounted operas with orchestra as well as staged readings of more than 150 new works. The company's first production was

Virgil Thomson Virgil Thomson (November 25, 1896 – September 30, 1989) was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music. He has been described as a modernist, a neoromantic, a neoclassic ...

's 1947 opera, '' The Mother of Us All''. Other past productions have included: *World premiere of

Ricky Ian Gordon Ricky Ian Gordon (born May 15, 1956) is an American composer of art song, opera and musical theatre. Life Gordon was born in Oceanside, New York. He was raised by his mother, Eve, and father, Sam, and he grew up on Long Island with his three sist ...

's ''Only Heaven'', set to poems by

Langston Hughes James Mercer Langston Hughes (February 1, 1901 – May 22, 1967) was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist from Joplin, Missouri. An early innovator of jazz poetry, Hughes is best known as a leader of the Harl ...

. (1995, reprised 2001) *New York premiere of Grigory Frid's 1969 opera, '' The Diary of Anne Frank'', set to excerpts from

Anne Frank Annelies Marie Frank (, ; 12 June 1929 – February or March 1945)Research by The Anne Frank House in 2015 revealed that Frank may have died in February 1945 rather than in March, as Dutch authorities had long assumed"New research sheds new li ...

's diary (2002) *

Hans Werner Henze Hans Werner Henze (1 July 1926 – 27 October 2012) was a German composer. His large List of compositions by Hans Werner Henze, oeuvre is extremely varied in style, having been influenced by serialism, atonality, Igor Stravinsky, Stravinsky, Mu ...

's ''End of a World'' (an early work originally written as a

radio opera Radio opera (German: 'Funkoper' or 'Radiooper') is a genre of opera. It refers to operas which were specifically composed to be performed on the radio and is not to be confused with broadcasts of operas which were originally written for the stage. ...

) and John Harbison's ''A Full Moon in March'', a setting of the play by

William Butler Yeats William Butler Yeats (, 13 June 186528 January 1939), popularly known as W. B. Yeats, was an Irish poet, dramatist, writer, and literary critic who was one of the foremost figures of 20th century in literature, 20th-century literature. He was ...

(2003) *World premiere of ''Gertrude Stein Invents a Jump Early On'', an opera of based on the life of

Gertrude Stein Gertrude Stein (February 3, 1874 – July 27, 1946) was an American novelist, poet, playwright, and art collector. Born in Allegheny, Pennsylvania (now part of Pittsburgh), and raised in Oakland, California, Stein moved to Paris in 1903, and ...

composed by William C. Banfield to a

libretto A libretto (From the Italian word , ) is the text used in, or intended for, an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata or Musical theatre, musical. The term ''libretto'' is also sometimes used to refer to th ...

by the poet Karren LaLonde Alenier (performed with two other operas based on texts by Stein, Virgil Thomson's 1927 ''Capital Capitals'' and

Ned Rorem Ned Miller Rorem (October 23, 1923 – November 18, 2022) was an American composer of contemporary classical music and a writer. Best known for his art songs, which number over 500, Rorem was considered the leading American of his time writing i ...

's 1968 ''Three Sisters Who Are Not Sisters'', 2005) *New York premiere of

Philip Hagemann Philip Hagemann (born 21 December 1932) is an American composer and conductor. Hagemann was born in Mount Vernon, Indiana, the son of Harry Philip and Lorene (Knight) Hagemann. He learned to play the piano and the saxophone and took music degrees ...

's ''Shaw Sings!'', two one-act operas based on the writings of

George Bernard Shaw George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950), known at his insistence as Bernard Shaw, was an Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist. His influence on Western theatre, culture and politics extended from the 188 ...

(2008) In 2009 the company received an "Access to Artistic Excellence" from

The National Endowment for the Arts The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created in 1965 as an independent agency of the feder ...

to fund the world premiere production of ''The Theory of Everything'' by compose
John David Earnest
and librettist, Nancy Rhodes.

2009 Grant Awards: Access to Artistic Excellence
. Retrieved 4 May 2009. Excerpts from the work in progress were presented at

New York City Opera The New York City Opera (NYCO) is an American opera company located in Manhattan in New York City. The company has been active from 1943 through its 2013 bankruptcy, and again since 2016 when it was revived. The opera company, dubbed "the peopl ...

's VOX 2007 Festival. Encompass has had three music directors in its history, Jack Gaughan (1975-1993)
John Yaffé
(1993-2008), and Mara Waldman (2008-present).

References

External links

Encompass New Opera Theatre
official web site

''Scene4 Magazine'', April 2006. {{authority control New York City opera companies Musical groups established in 1975 1975 establishments in New York City