SNAPSHOT 2022

"expressive, insinuating, full of enigmatic fervor... Each excerpt includes passages that make one intrigued to hear the work at fuller length" -Joshua Kosman SF Chronicle

"Somehow, some way, one or more of these works may make it to a full production — at West Edge or somewhere else’. -Steven Winn, SFCV

A Korean boy has lost his mother and sister in the Korean war. Bewildered, he cries and reminisces.

A woman with short black hair, wearing a black shirt and gold earrings, smiling outdoors with blurred green foliage in the background.

Jean Ahn, Composer & Librettist

Exploring the margins of love is Cristina Doesn’t Need Saving by composer/librettist Gabrielle Rosse. A 15-year-old girl, estranged from her home, seeks love and community in an uncertain environment of drugs and predation.

A woman with dark curly hair, light skin, and brown eyes wearing a black leather jacket and necklace, looking at the camera against a dark background.

Gabrielle Rosse, Composer & Librettist

The Dark Horse - a music-theatrical treatment of Enzo Ferrari’s rise to success - by composer Cesar Cancino and librettist Scott DeTurk, both Bay Area artists.

A middle-aged man with gray hair, glasses, and a blue shirt smiling outdoors with wooden fence background.
Close-up of a middle-aged man with short dark hair, wearing a dark blazer, smiling, with a wooden fence in the background.

Cesar Cancino, Composer; Scott DeTurk, Librettist

A man with glasses and short hair smiling, wearing a maroon shirt, with a wooden background.

Lilith by Oakland based composer/librettist Michael Kaulkin is a setting of J.R. Salamanca’s 1961 novel about a recovering WW2 vet who interacts tragically with a primordially seductive patient at a mental institution.

Michael Kaulkin, Composer & Librettist

The School for Girls who Lost Everything in the Fire by composer Ryan Suleiman and librettist Cristina Friès, is about three homeless girls held hostage after a terrible fire. From this surreal coming-of age-story, amid fear of the unknown adult world, Suleiman and Fríes share an excerpt from the complete opera which in development in our Aperture program. Suleiman and Fríes participated in SNAPSHOT 2019 with the lauded Moon, Bride, Dogs.

A man with dark, curly hair and light skin wearing a white shirt outdoors, with trees and blurred background.
A young woman with shoulder-length wavy brown hair, smiling slightly, wearing a black shirt, standing in front of a gray, industrial metal background.

Ryan Suleiman, Composer; Cristina Friès, Librettist