In 2017, Thompson was a student at the Aspen Music Festival and School, where he was awarded the Hermitage Prize, an honor bestowed by the Hermitage Artist Retreat (Florida) and the AMFS. Joel Thompson '20MMA during a workshop of his opera "The Snowy Day." Photo by Matt Fried. Soprano Madeline Ehlinger ’20MM appreciated the “collaborative feeling” in the room and the unique opportunity to help inform a work in progress. “The chance to work with the composer” is unique, given that singers in the Yale Opera program typically learn and perform works that have been in their final form for many years. Yale Opera Manager Erika Niemi Heltzel said there was a “really positive atmosphere in the room” during the weeklong workshop, an opportunity that was “huge for Joel and his career” and “an opportunity for our singers, as well.”
Thompson said in a recent interview that he’s nearly done with the writing. The HGO will premiere Thompson’s new opera in a production that will run from December 10 through December 20, 2020.
The workshops took place at the Yale School of Music, with members of the Yale Opera program singing the work’s various roles. In January, the Houston Grand Opera (HGO) workshopped The Snowy Day, an operatic adaptation of Ezra Jack Keats’ illustrated children’s story that the company commissioned from composer Joel Thompson ’20MMA in 2017.
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