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Huang Ruo
Composer & Librettist
Huang Ruo has been lauded by The New York Times for having “a distinctive style.” His vibrant and inventive musical voice draws equal inspiration from Chinese ancient and folk music, Western avant-garde, experimental, noise, natural and processed sound, rock, and jazz to create a seamless, organic integration using a compositional technique he calls “Dimensionalism.” Huang Ruo’s diverse compositional works span from orchestra, chamber music, opera, theater, and dance, to cross-genre, sound installation, architectural installation, multi-media, experimental improvisation, folk rock, and film. His music has been premiered and performed by the New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, Boston Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, National Polish Radio Orchestra, Santa Fe Opera, Washington National Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Opera Theatre of St. Louis, Asko/Schoenberg, Ensemble Modern, London Sinfonietta, and conductors such as Wolfgang Sawallisch, Marin Alsop, Andrew Davis, Michael Tilson Thomas, and James Conlon. His opera An American Soldier (with libretto by David Henry Hwang) received its world premiere at the Opera Theatre of St. Louis in 2018, and was named one of the best classical music events in 2018 by The New York Times. Huang Ruo is a composition faculty at the Mannes School of Music in NY, and is the artistic director and conductor of Ensemble FIRE. He was selected as a Young Leader Fellow by the National Committee on United States–China Relations in 2006. Huang Ruo’s music is published by Ricordi. HuangRuo.com

Basil Twist
Director & Production Designer
Basil Twist is a third-generation puppeteer. He is the sole American to graduate from the École Supérieure Nationale des Arts de la Marionnette in Charleville-Mezieres, France. Twist’s showmanship was spotlighted in New York by the Jim Henson International Festival of Puppetry with his award-winning The Araneidae Show. Through this recognition, coupled with the groundbreaking and multiple award-winning Symphonie Fantastique, Twist was revealed as a singular artist of unlimited imagination. Subsequently Twist has created over 20 original full-length works for the stage. Highlights include Petrushka, The Rite of Spring (Lincoln Center), Dogugaeshi (Barbican, Paris, Charleveille-Mezieres), Behind the Lid (New York) and Arias with a Twist (Paris, Stockholm). He was set designer and co-director for A Streetcar Named Desire (La Comédie Française) Other operas he has directed and designed include Respighi’s La bella dormente nel bosco (Lincoln Center Festival, Spoleto) and Hansel and Gretel (Houston, Atlanta, Michigan Opera). Ballet collaborations with Christopher Wheeldon include Cinderella (Dutch National and San Francisco Ballet), The Winter’s Tale (Royal Ballet) and The Nutcracker (Joffrey). His honors include Obie, Henry Hewes and Doris Duke Performing awards, multiple UNIMA and Bessie Awards, a Guggenheim fellowship, a MacArthur Fellowship and the Rome Prize. He directs the Dream Music Puppetry Program at HERE, New York City. BasilTwist.com

Miles Lallement
Conductor
Miles Lallemant was born in Wales. He began his formal musical education as a Cathedral Chorister at Llandaff Cathedral. He was awarded a music scholarship to Monmouth School and studied piano with Richard McMahon at the Welsh College of Music and Drama. He won a choral scholarship to Robinson College, Cambridge where he read Classics and continued his piano studies with Peter Katin in London. Subsequently Miles lived in Ireland for several years during which he sang in the choir of St Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin and worked as keyboard player with such outfits as Opera Ireland, Northern Ireland Opera, Ulster Orchestra, and RTE Concert Orchestra. After Ireland, Miles lived on a volcano in Sicily and directed the music at St George’s, Taormina before moving to London. As Director of Music at St Matthew’s Kensington Olympia, Miles co-founded the Kensington Olympia Festival of Music and the Arts with Denis Moriarty. As well as organizing a variety of musical events, the Festival exists as a charitable foundation to give performance experience and other assistance to young musicians. Miles has worked with Paul Hillier for 14 years during which he has performed and recorded a large variety of music from the earliest chant to the most recent commissions as part of Chamber Choir Ireland, Ars Nova, and Theatre of Voices. Currently Miles is the Chorus Master of Ars Nova and lives in Copenhagen with his harpsichord, organ, baby grand, his partner mezzo-soprano Laura Lamph and his baby Lysander.

Ars Nova Copenhagen
Vocal Ensemble
Founded in 1979, Ars Nova Copenhagen is widely recognized as one of the world's finest vocal ensembles. Ars Nova has worked with Paul Hillier, Bo Holten, Tamás Vetö (former chief conductors), Kaspars Putnins, Andrew Lawrence King, Anthony Rooley, Kees Boeke, Michael Bojesen and Søren K. Hansen (all of whom have appeared as guest conductors). The ensemble specializes in the interpretation of the polyphonic choral music of the renaissance and new vocal music. Ars Nova is also building collaborations with creative artists in different fields such as drama, film, and ballet, as well as cultivating new modes of concert performance and innovative repertoire. The group's performances are marked with precision and nerve with a sound that attracts attention worldwide. With an annual concert season in Copenhagen, numerous concerts in the rest of Denmark and recurring tours worldwide, the group is now more in demand than ever. In 2015 Ars Nova completed a longer tour to China with more than ten concerts as a significant part of the Danish cultural campaign in the country. In 2016 they co-organized the Nordic Choir Expedition, presenting the leading Nordic choirs and vocal ensembles in each of the Nordic capital cities. Other recent and upcoming tours include Spain, the Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, Holland, Finland, Italy, Orkney, England, USA, Canada and Hong Kong. Ars Nova has made a large number of recordings that have won numerous awards, including a Grammy for David Lang's the little match girl passion (Harmonia Mundi). Among their most recent records are Gallos y Huesos with music by contemporary Argentinian composer Pablo Ortiz (Orchid Classics), First Drop, a recital featuring music by Howard Skempton, Michael Gordon, David Lang, Kevin Volans, Pablo Ortiz, Louis Andriessen, Gabriel Jackson, Steve Reich and Terry Riley (Cantaloupe) and Crossing Borders featuring music by Danish composers Niels W. Gade, Carl Nielsen, Vagn Holmboe and Line Tjørnhøj (Dacapo Records).  
ArsNova.dk

Ayumu "Poe" Saegusa
Lighting Designer
Ayumu "Poe" Saegusa has been Basil Twist's lighting designer since 2008. He began his career in stage lighting design in 2000 in Tokyo. He moved to New York City in 2005 and became the resident lighting designer at HERE Arts Center. He also works as a freelance lighting designer for various types of shows, from the New York Fringe festival to Lincoln Center Festival. He is a frequent collaborator on productions ranging from multimedia opera and to all sorts of puppet shows. His credits include Kristin Martin's Looking at You (HERE main stage, 2019, New York) and Basil Twist's The Rite of Spring (White Light Festival at Lincoln Center 2014, New York). 

Beth Morrison
Creative Producer
Recipient of the Musical America Award for Best Artist of the Year and Agent of Change and a Kennedy Center Next50 Honoree, Beth Morrison is hailed as a “contemporary opera mastermind” (Los Angeles Times) and “a powerhouse leading the industry to new heights” (WQXR). She is President and Creative Producer of Beth Morrison Projects, and Founding Co-Director of the PROTOTYPE Festival. Opera News has noted: “More than any other figure in the opera industry, Beth Morrison has helped propel the art form into the 21st century." Beth served a founding tenure as Producer for the Yale Institute for Music Theatre, as well as Producer for New York City Opera's VOX: Contemporary American Opera Lab. She first honed her management skills as the Administrative Director for the Boston University Tanglewood Institute. She is currently an advisory board member of National Sawdust and Brooklyn Youth Chorus, as well as a board member of Opera America, the international competition Music Theatre Now, and Voices 21C, a social justice choir. She holds a Bachelor of Music from Boston University, a Master of Music from Arizona State University, and an MFA from Yale School of Drama. BethMorrisonProjects.org