Librettists on Libretti

The following transcript is from the DG Opera Committee librettists webinar, August 10, 2021, moderated by Deborah Brevoort with Mark Campbell, Stephanie Fleischmann, David Henry Hwang, E.M. Lewis, and Sandra Seaton and has been edited for print.

Nov 01, 2021

Craft

photo of laptop, notebooks, pen, and coffee for the Librettists on Libretti roundtable

DEBORAH BREVOORT: Today is a bit of a historical event. It’s the first ever webinar about opera sponsored by the Dramatists Guild, so thank you to the Guild for this. Today’s panel is composed entirely of librettists. To kick off our discussion, let me ask our panelists: why do you write opera? Sandra, what attracts you to the form?

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David Henry Hwang

’s stage works include the plays M. Butterfly, Yellow Face, Golden Child, Chinglish, and The Dance and the Railroad, as well as the musicals Soft Power, Flower Drum Song, and Disney’s Broadway and international hits Aida and Tarzan. Called America’s most produced living opera librettist by Opera News, Hwang has written thirteen operas. Ainadamar, with music by Osvaldo Golijov, made its Metropolitan Opera debut in Fall 2024 and The Monkey King, with music by Huang Ruo, will premiere at San Francisco Opera in November 2025. He is a Tony Award winner, a Grammy Award winner, a three-time OBIE Award winner, and a three-time Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Drama. A professor at Columbia University School of the Arts, he was inducted into the Theatre Hall of Fame in 2018 and received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Dramatists Guild in 2025.

E. M. LEWIS

is an award-winning playwright and opera librettist whose work has been produced around the world. Opera libretti include Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Fallen Giant (music by Evan Meier), and Town Hall (music by Theo Popov). Lewis is a member of OPERA America and the Dramatists Guild. She is currently the Mellon Foundation Playwright-in-Residence at Artists Repertory Theater. She lives and writes on her family’s farm in Oregon.

Mark Campbell

’s Pulitzer and Grammy Award-winning work includes 39 opera librettos, lyrics for seven musicals, and text for six song cycles and three oratorios. He recently created the first prize in the history of opera designated specifically for opera librettists: the Campbell Opera Librettist Prize. www.markcampbellwords.com

Sandra Seaton

is a playwright and librettist. Her recent works include the opera Night Trip and The Passion of Mary Cardwell Dawson (starring Denyce Graves), both with composer Carlos Simon; Call Me By My Name, her performance piece about Henrietta Lacks; and Dreamland: Tulsa 1921, her choral work about the Tulsa Race Massacre with composer Marques L.A. Garret.

STEPHANIE FLEISCHMANN

’s opera libretti include Poppaea (with Michael Hersch), In a Grove (with Chris Cerrone), Volcano, The Still Life of Emily Dickinson (with Anna Clyne), The Pigeon Keeper (with David Hanlon), The Other City (with Jeremy Howard Beck) and Dido (with Melinda Wagner). Previous works: The Long Walk (Beck), After the Storm (Hanlon), The Property (Marhulets).