Color photograph of a light skinned woman sitting on a multicolored staircase; she looks at the camera as she rests her head on her hand

Kate Soper

Frederic A. Juilliard/Walter Damrosch Rome Prize
5 febbraio–5 luglio 2024
Professione
Composer, Northampton, Massachusetts
Iva Dee Hiatt Professor of Music, Smith College
Codirector, Wet Ink Ensemble
Titolo del progetto
Orchestra Orpheus Opus Onus
Descrizione del progetto

My project is a one-act music theater piece for a solo soprano/actor and fixed media, for which I will write, compose, and star. The work presents Orpheus—part vaudevillian, part tragic icon, part composer nerd—alone in a bunker in the postapocalyptic future. Fragments of disembodied music weave around him as he shares his views on art, love, and fate with the audience, along with the tale of his exploits in the underworld—which may have happened differently than has been reported. Ultimately, I want to make a case for the future of music, even amid catastrophe, and in the enduring presence of the human voice. The electronic media will consist of processed orchestral and vocal recordings. In Rome I plan to complete a full draft to perform for the fellows by the end of the year.

The photograph of Kate Soper was taken by Maggie Shannon.