National Endowment for the Arts FY 2017 Fall Grant Announcement

the University of West Florida and at Pensacola State College. The Pensacola Museum of Art and Artel Gallery
will exhibit collections of art curated from the works of convicts and death row inmates. Town Hall meetings will
be scheduled before the performances and may include members of law enforcement, legal community,
religious community, and social services organizations. Artists-in-residence will perform excerpts from the opera
at places such as libraries, community centers, and military bases. The creative team may include conductor
Jerome Shannon, director Dean Anthony, baritone Michael Mayes, and mezzo-soprano Elise Quagliata. As many
as two performances and a student dress rehearsal will occur at the Pensacola Saenger
Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra (aka Philharmonia)
$10,000 San Francisco, CA
To support performances of "Le Temple de la Gloire" by composer John-Philippe Rameau with a libretto by
Voltaire. Premiered as a five-act opera-ballet at Versailles to celebrate the French victory of the Battle of
Fontenoy, the work was subsequently revised to a three-act opera. The performances-of the original version
that has not been performed since the premiere in 1745-will mark the company's first fully staged opera and will
include a full orchestra, chorale, six principal singers, and eight baroque dancers. Organizational partners Cal
Performances and Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles (Versailles, France) will help develop a series of
lectures and excerpted performances for University of California at Berkeley students. In addition, talks with the
costume designers, set designers, and musicologists from UC Berkeley and Stanford will be hosted by reporters
and hosts from the NPR affiliate in San Francisco as well as KDFC. As many as three performances will occur at
the Zellerbach Hall on the UC Berkeley campus in the spring of 2017.
Pittsburgh Opera, Inc. (aka Pittsburgh Opera)
$25,000 Pittsburgh, PA
To support the world premiere of "The Summer King" by composer and librettist Daniel Sonenberg. The opera
focuses on the life of legendary Negro League baseball catcher Josh Gibson, a Pittsburgh native whose talent
drew comparisons to Babe Ruth and earned him a place as the second Negro League ballplayer ever inducted
into the Baseball Hall of Fame. As the story examines the trials and triumphs of a great athlete against the
backdrop of the racial divide in America's favorite pastime of baseball, the work explores civil rights and social
justice in our own communities today. The creative team may include stage director Sam Helfrich, set designer
Andrew Lieberman, costume designer Kaye Voyce, lighting designer Robert Wierzel, and baritone Lester Lynch.
The opera will be the first world premiere by the company in its 78-year history, with as many as four
performances to occur at the Benedum Center for the Performing Arts in the spring of 2017.
Portland Opera Association Inc. (aka Portland Opera)
$15,000 Portland, OR
To support a double bill of "The Difficulty of Crossing A Field" by composer David Lang and librettist Mac
Wellman and "The Little Match Girl Passion" with words and music by Lang. The first work is a 75-minute oneact
opera that features five principal singers, a six-person chorus, and onstage string quartet accompaniment.
Set in the pre-Civil War American South, the opera focuses on the disappearance of a slave owner in plain view
of his family, neighbors, and slaves, and about the story of those he left behind. The second work is a 35-minute
Pulitzer Prize-winning passion play comprising four principal singers and percussion. Based on a fable by Hans
Christian Andersen in a format influenced by Bach's "St. Matthew's Passion" that tells the story of a poor girl
who, despite great adversity, retains her purity of spirit. The creative team may include director Jerry Mouawad
and conductor Hal France. The principal artists may include sopranos Lisa Williamson and Cree Carrico, mezzosoprano
Hannah Penn, contralto Nicole Mitchell, and tenor Martin Bakari. As many as four performances will
take place at the Newmark Theatre in the summer of 2017.
Some details of the projects listed are subject to change, contingent upon prior Arts Endowment approval. Information is current as of
December 7, 2016.