I came to Civitella to begin my fourth opera. My goal was simply that, to begin, to leave Italy with SOMETHING, anything. I am leaving with three completed scenes, but that is so obviously not the point of the last month. Maybe the point was to wander through the...
When I learned that the great Israeli poet Dorit Weisman would be in residence at the same time as a Director’s Guest, I decided to scrap a piece-in-progress and begin again at Civitella, setting her powerful words. The weeks that I spent here were intensely...
I am not someone who does residencies very often except in the context of specific productions, but my month at Civitella was a wonderful gift that came to me at the perfect moment. It was the chance to step back and think about my relationship with my music, removed...
My stay at Civitella allowed me to complete the project I had been working on for several months, a large ensemble, 35 min long work. The work, “Ziaboga”, could find its final tone and its ending thanks to the conditions of the studio I was offered, silent...
