Long Leaf Opera 2009 Festival (June 12-21) is pleased to present a mid–week performance project directed and performed entirely by voice students from UNC-Chapel Hill and Meredith College. Daron Hagen’s New York Stories takes place Wednesday, June 17, 8pm at Carswell Recital Hall, Meredith College, 3800 Hillsborough Street, Raleigh. 

New York-based composer Daron Hagen, in residence for this Long Leaf Opera outreach project, will guide the student-based production along with Dr. Ellen Williams, Professor of Music and Coordinator of Vocal Studies with Meredith College and Dr. Terry Rhodes, Professor of Music and Chair, Department of Music UNC-Chapel Hill.

New York Stories tells three intimate portraits conceived as a trilogy for performance both together and separately; skit one of the trilogy is piquant and romantic, skit two dark and funny, and the third warmly domestic and ending with a delightful twist.

Broken Pieces portrays Pamela a 30-something divorcée awaiting a bathroom tile repair man. When Antonio, a middle-aged Italian immigrant arrives to do the work, the two connect and share a romantic moment. Stephanie Thrum as Pamela and John Cashwell as Antonio.

Just for the Night finds Babs, a woman of a certain age and wealth, who receives an unexpected visit from her brother chip on Christmas Eve, and turns him away. JoAna Rusche as Babs and William Reid as Chip.

Cradle Song visits Mama and Papa, a composer couple arriving home after a night on the town, attempt to put their infant son down. Lindsey Dvorak at Mama and John Charles Clark  as Papa.

Daron Hagen, composer, New York Stories
The music of Daron Aric Hagen is notable for its warm lyricism, but his style defies easy categorization. While his works demonstrate fluency with a range of twentieth century compositional techniques, those procedures are secondary to his exploitation and expansion of the possibilities of tonal harmony, giving his music an immediacy that makes it appealing to a wide spectrum of audiences drawing on a variety of styles--jazz, Broadway, Latin music, Italian verismo, and soft rock. The foundation of his oeuvre is the art song exemplified by "Dear Youth" (based on American Civil War stories) and "Songs of Madness and Sorrow

Born in Milwaukee in 1961, Hagen began his musical studies at the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music, the University of Wisconsin, Curtis Institute of Music, and the Juilliard School. Hagen's teachers include such prominent composers as Ned Rorem, Joseph Schwantner, David Diamond, Witold Lutoslawski, and Leonard Bernstein. Already known for song cycles composed in the 1980s that demonstrated his gift for lyrical and dramatically astute text setting, Hagen turned to opera with "Shining Brow" (1990-1992), a musical evocation of the life of architect Frank Lloyd Wright, with a libretto by poet Paul Muldoon. Other stage works include "Vera of Las Vegas" (a "nightmare cabaret opera"), "Bandanna" (an opera scored for wind ensemble, loosely based on Othello), and he has received a commission from the Seattle Opera for a new work, "Amelia”.

Hagen's honors and awards include the Bearns Prize from Columbia University, the Charles Ives Fellowship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, Opera America's "Next Stage" Award, two Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio residencies and the Barlow International Composition Prize for Chamber Music.