On February 8, Ohio’s ProMusica Chamber Orchestra and Opera Columbus will join forces to perform the world premiere of The Flood, a new chamber opera by Korine Fujiwara, at the Southern Theatre in Columbus. The opera’s librettist and director is Stephen Wadsworth, and Steven Osgood will conduct. The work—ProMusica’s 67th commissioned work and Opera Columbus’s first mainstage commission in nearly 20 years—represents the first collaboration between the two arts organizations. The opera focuses on the Ohio Flood of 1913 and its effects on Columbus’s low-lying Franklinton neighborhood west of the Scioto River, which was destroyed in the flood. Composer Korine Fujiwara is a founding member of the Columbus-based Carpe Diem String Quartet, the Marble Cliff Chamber Players (Columbus and Delaware, Ohio), and Snake River Chamber Players (Keystone, Colorado). The opera is co-produced by Peggy Kriha Dye, Opera Columbus’s general and artistic director, and Janet Chen, ProMusica Chamber Orchestra’s executive director. Funding for the opera came from Columbus Foundation’s Arts Innovation Fund, as well as Opera America’s grants for repertoire development and for female composers.
Posted February 8, 2018
