Prototype Festival’s Powerful Women

This year’s edition of the opera and music-theater program features Sarah Kirkland Snider’s ‘Hildegard,’ about the 12th-century abbess; Susan Zeeman Rogers’s ‘Precipice,’ a story of nature and feminism; and a celebration of Beth Morrison Projects, which has been producing adventurous new opera for 20 years.

By 

Heidi Waleson

Jan. 12, 2026 at 4:35 pm ET

A scene from ‘Hildegard.’ ANGEL ORIGGI

New York

The first two premieres of the 13th Prototype Festival (running through Jan. 18) were by and about women. That’s appropriate, given that this is the 20th anniversary of Beth Morrison Projects, whose principal is the pioneering co-founder and now sole producer of Prototype, and an indefatigable champion of new, unconventional operas.

Sarah Kirkland Snider’s fascinating “Hildegard,” which had its New York debut at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater on Friday, explores the life and mind of the 12th-century Benedictine abbess, visionary and composer Hildegard von Bingen. Ms. Snider’s libretto fictionalizes and extrapolates from the historical record. It is set at a biographical turning point: 1147, when Hildegard’s transcribed visions were submitted to the pope, who would declare her either a prophet or a heretic.

Ms. Snider depicts a compelling character. Hildegard repeatedly and courageously stands up to the dominant male power of the Church but is disturbed by the nature of her feelings for a troubled young novice, Richardis von Stade, who illustrates the transcriptions. A lot happens—the piece runs two hours and 40 minutes including intermission—yet the many underlying themes, including feminism, illness (Hildegard was also a healer and was thought to have migraines), shame, the importance of art, the nature of love and the nature of God, permeate the story. It’s a bit too long, with a lot of text to follow, but Hildegard’s visions, exploding out of the plot scenes, are mesmerizing.

Ms. Snider’s distinctive compositional voice finds the otherworldly in the day-to-day. The principal women get highly dramatic arias—Hildegard’s are stunningly sung by Nola Richardson in a pure, clear soprano; Richardis (Mikaela Bennett) has a darker, more tormented musical language. In the lines of Abbot Cuno, Hildegard’s antagonist, David Adam Moore exudes weight and a sense of superiority; Tenor Roy Hage, as her friend Volmar, radiates concern. Traditional Latin prayers sung by men have a heavy, chant-like ominousness; the two female angels who appear in the visions convey an urgent, slightly dissonant ecstasy.

The richness and variety of orchestral timbres belie the ensemble’s small size—a string quartet and a woodwind trio of bassoon, clarinet and flute go from glassy to earthy; a forcefully plucked bass suggests trouble, while a harp is everywhere, suggesting Hildegard’s visceral connection to the divine. Drew Sensue-Weinstein’ssound design, which included adroit use of reverb on voices and instruments, dovetailed with Gabriel Crouch’s skillful conducting, which brought out the score’s transparent, early music-style radiance.

The production invoked the historical paintings of Hildegard’s visions as well as modern interpretations of them, using videos in which swirling specks of colored light coalesced into figures. (Deborah Johnson designed the artwork and projections.) Marsha Ginsberg’s set featured an open-sided gold box that rotated and moved on and off stage—it became the scriptorium and the abbot’s domain. In keeping with the medieval look, some of the individuals pushing it had animal headdresses, reminiscent of illuminated manuscripts. Molly Irelan designed attractive monastic garb; a luxurious brocade gown for Richardis’s mother, the imperious Margravine (Blythe Gaissert); and fantastical robes and headdresses for the angels. Elkhanah Pulitzer’s direction segued smoothly from the real to the visionary. Ms. Snider is an astute dramatist: Her heroine tragically loses the woman she loves, but finds her strength and, with the papal seal of approval on her visions, is able to move her nuns out from under the thumb of the abbot to form a women-only community. Feminism triumphs.

A scene from ‘Precipice.’ MARIA BARANOVA

“Precipice,” given its world premiere on Thursday at the La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club, is billed as an object-theater/chamber opera. The concept is by the visual artist Susan Zeeman Rogers and the 75-minute show works primarily as a narrative for her videos and miniature dioramas. This time, the feminist story is a little thin and predictable: Karen Fisher’s libretto is about how men silence women and seek to dominate the natural world. As a child, the imaginative Ana (Alice Tolan-Mee) longs to be a tree, but is suppressed by her parents (Daisy Press and Kyle Pfortmiller); as an adult, she escapes when her fiancé (Gabriel Hernández) also tries to control her. Rima Fand’s pleasant, folk-tinged score is illustrative rather than striking; the accompanying ensemble of mandolin, string quartet and bass, led from the piano by Mila Henry, plays a lot of ostinatos. Mallory Catlett directed.

Ms. Rogers’s set and object designs are eye-catching. The miniature family-house diorama at the front of the stage gets explored in the background video, its rooms opened like a dollhouse; Ana lies in a tiny, snow-covered forest, trying to become a part of it. The video also whirls through black-and-white landscapes of created objects—paper trees, a cardboard strip mine, a mirror lake. This use of video—along with a murmuring choral background—makes Ana’s dream sequences, in which she tries to become part of the landscape, the most effective parts of the show. In the final coup de théâtre, a black-and-white environment slowly transforms into a brilliantly green, leafy tree as Ana’s choked syllables become the “I” that her father forbade her to use.

Beth Morrison Projects is celebrating its 20th anniversary with the release of the two-volume “BMP: Songbook,” a recording and sheet-music anthology of selections from the company’s more than 65 commissioned and produced operas and music-theater works. One striking feature of the anthology is the prominence of female composers—11 out of 19—including such current luminaries as Missy Mazzoli, Du Yun and Ellen Reid, all of whom were championed early on by BMP. Ms. Morrison wanted to infuse opera with new people, new voices, new forms, and stories that didn’t necessarily end with dead heroines. These two Prototype operas represent just one aspect of the significant impact she has had on the field.