Category: Mabel’s Call

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Remembering Lois Rudnick

Photograph of Lois and Nell
Lois Rudnick with Nell at the Harwood Museum of Art, Taos, NM, August 2016

A very dear friend and mentor, Lois Rudnick, has passed away. I’d like to share a few memories of her here.

Lois was a true intellectual with a seemingly boundless appreciation for the arts, culture, and the natural world. Her fierce drive to build a more equitable society through teaching, advocacy, and activism was matched by her unfailing (and sometimes outrageous) sense of humor, as well as her affectionate and nurturing spirit. She had an impact on countless people, and I’m very grateful to be among them.

Lois was a scholar, writer, curator, and Professor Emerita in American Studies at University of Massachusetts Boston, who retired to Santa Fe. We met in 2016 when I approached her as a fan of her authoritative biographies of Mabel Dodge Luhan, about whom I was writing a chamber opera (Mabel’s Call). Lois’s writings, and our conversations, significantly shaped my opera. She subsequently became an enthusiastic supporter and advocate for my work, collaborating with me on several public presentations. Our mutual appreciation was the start of a wonderful friendship.

Even in the last few months of her life, Lois published yet another book about remarkable people whose stories reflect the complexities of the American experience (Eva Mirabal: Three Generations of Tradition and Modernity at Taos Pueblo).

Lois lived in wholehearted engagement with the world around her, and I will always remember her for that with love and admiration. Thank you, Lois.

"Eva Mirabal: Three Generations of Tradition and Modernity at Taos Pueblo," 2021

  • Obituary from the Santa Fe New Mexican.
  • Online presentation that Lois gave with her co-author Jonathan Warm Day Coming last month (May 2021) about their new book.
  • Essay by Lois from May 2020 about her journey with with multiple myeloma.

Here is a selection of Lois Rudnick’s works as an author and editor:

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Workshop Production of “Mabel’s Call” at University of New Mexico

Next month in New Mexico: My chamber opera Mabel’s Call will be given a staged workshop production, featuring the full 85-minute score with six principals, chorus, and chamber ensemble!

Mabel Dodge Luhan
Mabel Dodge Luhan

The accomplished faculty directors and student performers of the University of New Mexico Opera Theatre have spent the semester taking a deep dive into this opera and its historical inspiration: Mabel Dodge Luhan, the influential salon hostess, philanthropist, writer, and international icon of the avant-garde, and Taos, New Mexico in the 1910s and ’20s.

I’m incredibly honored by this collaboration and the invitation to work with the university as an artist in residence. After months of emails and video conferences, I arrive in Albuquerque next week to join rehearsals as the team prepares for their performances in UNM’s beautiful Keller Hall on November 2, 3, and 4.

Mabel’s Call has been developed over the past three years through workshops with American Opera Projects, Fort Worth Opera, and The Harwood Museum of Art, and two artist residencies at The Helene Wurlitzer Foundation of New Mexico.

Synopsis and recordings at mabelscall.com.

UNM Center for the Arts in Keller Hall
Albuquerque, New Mexico
November 2 & 3 at 7:30 pm
November 4 at 2:00 pm

Tickets available at the door or at unmtickets.com ($12, $10, $8).

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Warm Reception for “Mabel’s Call” on Fort Worth Opera’s Frontiers Showcase

“The most mysterious and probably most affecting of the three works was Mabel’s Call, an opera whose trio of excerpts were so subtle and arresting they exemplified a sort of waking-dream feeling [the] characters each seemed to be lost in…the composer most called to mind was Ives.” ,THE COLUMN

The cast of Mabel’s Call from the wings of Bass Performance Hall. Photo: Fort Worth Opera.

Excerpts from my chamber opera Mabel’s Call were beautifully performed last month on Fort Worth Opera’s Frontiers showcase. An aria and two scenes were given a piano-vocal reading in a showcase of new operas.

The performance received some lovely press: in addition to a glowing review in THE COLUMN, I was interviewed for a preview article in The Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

It was a great honor to have my work featured on this platform, to share the stage with highly accomplished artists, and to receive feedback from a jury of opera professionals, as part of this project’s development!

Performers Heather Weirich, Megan Koch, Sam Parkinson, and Emily Urbanek with Nell at Bass Performance Hall in Fort Worth, TX.
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“Mabel’s Call” Selected for Fort Worth Opera’s 2018 Frontiers Showcase

"Mabel's Call" Selected by Fort Worth Opera for 2018 Frontiers Showcase

I’m extremely honored that my chamber opera Mabel’s Call has been selected by Fort Worth Opera for their renowned 2018 Frontiers showcase! A 20-minute excerpt will be presented with piano accompaniment alongside other five other new operas-in-development during the Fort Worth Opera Festival at Bass Performance Hall in Fort Worth, Texas. Check out their press release for more information about each of the works selected for this year’s festival.

Mabel’s Call will be featured on Thursday, May 3, 2018. Tickets are $10 and may be purchased online.

Hailed as “one of the most significant music events of the year” by D Magazine, Fort Worth Opera’s Frontiers showcase has yielded numerous regional and world premieres since its inception. This program offers audiences a first look at the developmental processes for operas and gives emerging composers and librettists a platform to showcase their talents.

I’m incredibly fortunate to have Mabel’s Call continue its development as part of this amazing program. Learn more about this opera at mabelscall.com.

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“Mabel’s Call” at University of New Mexico in 2018

The University of New Mexico Logo

I’m very honored to announce that the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque will be presenting a full-length workshop of my opera Mabel’s Call,with the full score for six soloists, chorus, and seven-piece chamber ensemble, as UNM Opera Theatre’s Fall 2018 semester production! I can’t wait to work with stage director Leslie Umphrey, music director Kristin Ditlow, and their talented students, as UNM Opera Theatre Composer-in-Residence. Performance dates TBA.

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“Mabel’s Call” opera event on June 18 in Taos, NM

Ad for Mabel's Call: Celebrating a Remarkable Taos Woman through Music
On June 18, 2016, the Mayor of Taos, New Mexico declared the first annual “Mabel Dodge Luhan Day,” to occur on the third weekend of June. He noted that “Mabel Dodge Luhan was one of, if not the most prominent and globally known resident of our community from 1918 to 1962, serving as our unofficial ambassador, mentor and host to the arts, to the outside world and to many of the most talented, influential, and well known figures of her lifetime.”

In celebration of the second annual Mabel Dodge Luhan Day weekend, the Harwood Museum of Art and The Mabel Dodge Luhan House are presenting a behind-the-scenes look at Mabel’s Call: my new chamber opera that dramatizes Luhan’s self-reinvention in Taos.

I look forward to joining leading Luhan scholar Lois Rudnick in this public conversation and opera video screening, titled Mabel’s Call: Celebrating a Remarkable Taos Woman through Music. We will screen and discuss video clips excerpted from a concert workshop performance of the opera-in-progress, which was filmed live at the Harwood Museum in 2016. I’ll be shedding light on the process of interpreting Luhan’s life and historical context through music. Audience Q&A will follow.

The event will take place Sunday, June 18, 2017, 2:00pm in the Harwood Museum of Art’s Arthur Bell Auditorium in scenic Taos. Admission is free and open to the public. Seating is limited. For venue information, visit the Harwood Museum of Art.

ABOUT THE OPERA

Inspired by the life of Mabel Dodge Luhan, Mabel’s Call is a lyrical opera in one act scored for six soloists, chorus, and chamber ensemble, with music and libretto by Nell Shaw Cohen. A universal tale told on an intimate scale, this work probes themes of identity, love, home, spirituality, and the search for a meaningful life. The opera’s story will resonate with audiences everywhere, even while it is deeply rooted in the culture, history, and physical landscape of Taos, New Mexico in the 1910s and ”˜20s. The Harwood Museum of Art and American Opera Projects have presented workshops of Mabel’s Call in Taos and New York City, respectively. To hear clips from the opera and learn more about the project, visit mabelscall.com.

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Residency at The Helene Wurlitzer Foundation in Taos, NM

View of Taos Mountain and the Rio Grande Gorge. Photo by Nell Shaw Cohen, 2016.
Taos Mountain and the Rio Grande Gorge. Nell Shaw Cohen, 2016.

Last year I spent ten weeks as Artist-in-Residence at The Helene Wurlitzer Foundation, which supports artists and the creative process by providing housing and studio space in the heart of Taos, New Mexico. I’m delighted that the foundation has invited me back for a second residency.

I look forward to returning and continuing work on Mabel’s Call: my opera inspired by Mabel Dodge Luhan’s journey of self-reinvention in Taos during the 1910’s and ’20s. The Wurlitzer Foundation is located minutes away from Luhan’s historic home and all of the locales that were important to her life in Taos, and, consequently, my opera! It’s the perfect place to immerse myself in completing this opera-in-progress, my largest work to date, which I began researching about a year and a half ago.

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“Mabel’s Call” in New York City

Six Scenes collage image

COMPOSERS & THE VOICE: SIX SCENES

Friday, September 30 | 8:00pm
South Oxford Space
138 South Oxford Street
Brooklyn, NY 11217
Tickets $10

Sunday, October 2 | 2:30 PM
National Opera Center ”“ Rehearsal Hall
330 7th Ave, 7th floor
New York, NY 10001
Tickets $20

More Information & Tickets

An excerpt from my opera-in-progress inspired by the life of Mabel Dodge Luhan will be featured this weekend on Six Scenes: an exciting showcase presented by American Opera Projects.

This concert previews the future of opera with an evening of scenes from six operas developed during AOP’s latest season of Composers & the Voice, the Brooklyn-based fellowship training program that I’ve been privileged to participate in since Fall 2015.

Two scenes from Mabel’s Call will be performed by Tookah Sapper, soprano, as Mabel Dodge Luhan; Blake Friedman, tenor, as Maurice Sterne; and Kyle Guglielmo, baritone, as Tony Lujan, with music director Mila Henry.

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Video of “Mabel’s Call” in Taos

Enjoy this video compilation of a few special moments from last month’s workshop presentation of Mabel’s Call at the Harwood Museum of Art in Taos, featuring an ensemble of New Mexico-based performers.

Presented in conjunction with the museum’s exhibition Mabel Dodge Luhan & Company: American Moderns in the West, it was a wonderful evening with a great audience!

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Concert Presentation of “Mabel’s Call” in Taos

Bringing Mabel Dodge Luhan to Life through Opera. Friday August 12, 2016, at 5:30pm at the Harwood Museum of Art. 238 Ledoux Street, Taos, NM 87571. Admission $20/$16.

The Harwood Museum of Art is presenting an evening of scenes and arias from my opera-in-progress, Mabel’s Call, in conjunction with the Harwood Museum’s major traveling exhibit about Mabel Dodge Luhan and her circle. This workshop concert performance will be integrated into a lecture I’m giving about the process of writing the opera.

“Bringing Mabel Dodge Luhan to Life through Opera” is receiving great coverage from New Mexico Magazine, the Taos News, KRZA Radio, and the Mabel Dodge Luhan House blog.

Music from Mabel’s Call will be featured again in New York City on September 30 & October 2 as part of American Opera Project’s Six Scenes program.