Blog
Why a Season of Heroes?
July 29 2026
We may associate heroism with the demigods of myth and legend, but it is important that we do not, in our admiration, divorce ourselves from the heroic in the everyday. ...
Pelléas et Mélisande – Notes on the Orchestration
March 5 2026
TRANSPARENCY, TRADITION, AND THE PRIMACY OF TEXT A Note on Opera Atelier’s New Arrangement of Pelléas et Mélisande by Dr. Christopher Bagan The Grand Ravalement: Modernizing a Masterpiece The prospect...
Continue reading Pelléas et Mélisande – Notes on the Orchestration
Of All the Changing Forms
August 27 2025
by Mark Kikot Of all the changing forms that love can take, I thought by now I would have chosen one To hang my heart upon. But there are none...
The Presence
August 18 2025
by Mark Kikot What sings in us without its singing heard Is not delusion or mere fantasy; And yet, we must imagine every word That rises from our lips in...
Pastiche
August 11 2025
by Mark Kikot In sleep’s collage of dreams diaphanous We stir like poppies in a summer’s breeze. We stretch and rise, but do not wake. At ease, We hear ourselves,...
The Dancer
August 4 2025
by Mark Kikot As the stillness of his will’s creative focus gathers strength, a shamanistic magic quivers through his limbs. With buoyant silken breath, they stir and stretch out time,...
Daydream
July 28 2025
by Mark Kikot Why can’t I shake the thought of angels loose From where they lodge at night inside my head? To drop on wings of snow, like down of...
Restoration
July 21 2025
by Mark Kikot The masks I’ve worn while looking for my face Now hang like pictures time has veiled with dust; Yet still they search my eyes and try to...
Encore
July 14 2025
in memory of Martha Mann, Costume Designer for Opera Atelier (July 4, 1938 – May 27, 2019) by Mark Kikot There is the adage, “Clothes don’t make the man”; But...
Utterance
June 16 2025
by Mark Kikot by Mark Kikot Marshalling the unities of space and time and form, the dancers find their footing, flow like water fleshed around the roots they nourish, patterns...