The New York Opera Fest 2019 kicked off on Monday, April 29 and for the next several weeks, New Yorkers will get ample opportunity to enjoy opera in a variety of unique ways. As has been OperaWire’s tradition over the years, we have reached out to a number of the companies participating in the festival and have asked them a series of questions that will allow our readers to get to know them a bit.

The Cantanti Project will be presenting “Teseo” with an all-female cast on May 11 and 12. 

 Tell us why you’re excited to participate in this year’s New York Opera Festival.

The festival shows how much this city loves opera and how there are a lot of passionate people, from different backgrounds and with different visions, who are committed to nurturing this art form. We love being part of this community.

What themes and/or issues are addressed in your production, and how are they relevant to your company and its mission?

One of the biggest questions I had when researching this opera was “Why is this opera called ‘Teseo’ when it’s Medea who’s really running things?” In addition to Medea, there are three other female characters who exercise their power and drive the plot forward. This is definitely an opera that upends a lot of societal gender roles as well as operatic convention: we have a range of women, from varying backgrounds and statuses, exerting their brand of control over their circumstances. It has been a fascinating process to put this show together.

As an arts organization, our aim is to empower artists and to honor traditions of classical music while bringing a fresh approach. Teseo:Medeo reflects that: we have a well-known composer-librettist pairing in Handel and Haym, but we’ve forged characters and relationships that go behind what’s on the page.

What is something special or unique about your production that NYC audiences can look forward to?

Our production features an all-female cast and a nearly all-female production team! There can be a bit of an imbalance when it comes to opportunities for women in the industry, and we wanted to let women tell this story, a story that is full of strong women. And while we focused on creating opportunities for women and making the female characters in the opera multi-dimensional, there’s also a beautiful fluidity and simplicity in what we’ve built that goes beyond gender. As of our artists singing “Teseo,” Rachel Duval, put it, “… gender has always just been a construct, and history tells us that power and love are what humans seek.”

What role do you think “indie opera” plays in a city like NYC and for the future of the art form as a whole?

When I think of the term “indie opera,” I think of opera that has a fearless and daring quality… This is the spirit that keeps the world of opera on its toes, and I think it makes NYC one of the most diverse and welcoming places for the arts.