Act Too Studio Opera Workshop

WHAT DO WE DO?

Act Too Studio Opera Workshop is an ongoing, student-driven educational arts project including classes throughout the year and a fully-staged opera each summer. Our workshop includes students between the ages of 13-19 at varying levels of development, skill, and experience. Works are chosen with those factors in mind, and though this work is performed for the community, the focus of the workshop itself is very process-heavy. In order to bring their work to performance level, students are guided through deep musical and theatrical analysis of everything they do, along with study of the work's cultural and historical context.

More importantly, however, they are tasked with making it their own. Our students work together with professional staff to adapt, promote, and fund these projects from the ground up, taking old works and re-imagining them to better reflect their sensibilities, their politics, and their vision of the future.

WHY DOES THIS  MATTER?

"I want everyone to see it, and I want everyone to know how cool and accessible learning can be." - Eliza, 15

Though we went into this project with the goal of improving our students' musical skills, the real understanding that came out of it all for all of us is that opera is for everyone. As our students discovered themselves and their own truths in the music and in their characters, their driving motivation became to share this discovery with everyone they know.

"Act Too Studio's teen Opera Workshop is the best thing I've ever been a part of. It's given me confidence. It's made me feel a kind of joy I've never felt before. And it gives me hope that more people like me: young, black, and queer, will get to have a place in the world of opera." - Syl, 19

Opera is the richest theatrical music we know, filled with emotion and all the terrifying complexity of human existence. Our students will not all become opera singers—most likely very few of them will. But they all will be a part of shaping the future of the arts and of our society. They will be the ones who, in industry and education, determine our artistic legacy.

"It's like, instead of falling in love with a person, I fell in love with opera." - McKenna, 14

HOW CAN YOU HELP?

We're committed to keeping the Opera Workshop accessible to all our teens. Your donations supplement student fees and help us pay for musicians, sets, costumes, lighting, rehearsal and performance space, and more. We need your help to keep the lights on in 2021 and beyond!