Kamala Sankaram (born 1978) is an American composer, vocalist, playwright and actress. Based in New York City, she is best known for chamber operas about women who find themselves in situations where they are forced to confront patriarchal structures. Sankaram is also known for incorporating the latest technologies (e.g., virtual reality) and discussing the social effects of technology in musical theater works.
The daughter of an Indian father and a white American mother, Sankaram was born in Orange County, California, and grew up largely in Ramona, a small town in San Diego County. She took some piano lessons as a child, but her interest soon turned to theater. She said, “I was in a theater show called Choice in Southern California. I would do these big dance and song numbers and that’s what got me even more interested in it. I wanted to be on Broadway!” [1]
In 1996, Sankaram moved to New York to attend Sarah Lawrence College. She then went on to earn a doctorate in cognitive psychology at the New School of Social Research. Her 2013 dissertation examines how interactivity affects the way people process information on the Internet. She concludes, “Reading on the Internet may also have the potential to create a more positive effect on reading in the form of deeper information processing. In particular, reading may be enhanced by the presence of some form of interactive, two-way communication, such as a comments section.” [2]
Sankaram’s musical career began taking off as she was finishing her Ph.D., ironically because, as she says, “I couldn’t get any grant money to research on Twitter, but people started asking me to write more music.” [3] As a composer, her current catalogue includes eleven musical theatrical works, some of which have been produced by the Washington National Opera, the Los Angeles Opera and the Houston Grand Opera, and numerous vocal and instrumental chamber works. With regards to her musical inspirations, Sankaram stated, “I have played as much rock and avant jazz as I have classical music, and those connections are found in the music I write.” In the same interview, she also said, “I grew up hearing a lot Carnatic music in my house, so I think that those modalities are always present. As far as specific influences, they range from [Anthony] Braxton to Strauss to Radiohead and Pink Floyd.” [4] She also loves Bollywood songs, and incorporates elements of this style in many works.
As a coloratura soprano, Sankaram has starred in many of her own works, and performed with Anthony Braxton, Meredith Monk, the Philip Glass Ensemble, and the Wooster Group. She is also the leader of Bombay Rickey, a five-piece band that evokes 1960’s movie soundscapes through a fusion of surf music, cumbia, Bollywood, film noir jazz, Spaghetti Western, and opera.
Sankaram teaches musical composition at State University of New York-Purchase, and is co-Artistic Director of Experiments in Opera, a New York-based company that believes in “re-writing the history of opera” through producing new works that are “adventurous and fun, focused on strong and intimate storytelling.” [5] With regard to the latter role, she said, “We tend to hire those that we can think of quickly, and we tend to be able to think of people who are most similar to us more quickly than people who are not. As both a woman and a person of South Asian descent, my worldview and my network are different than many people in the field. Therefore, as a gatekeeper, I see my role as inviting people to the table who may not have had an invitation before.” [6]
Toni Michele Braxton is an American singer, songwriter, actress and television personality. She has sold over 70 million records worldwide and is one of the best-selling female artists in history. Braxton has won seven Grammy Awards, nine Billboard Music Awards, seven American Music Awards, and numerous other accolades. In 2011, Braxton was inducted into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame. In 2017 she was honored with the Legend Award at the Soul Train Music Awards.
Mary Beth Peil is an American actress and soprano. She began her career as an opera singer in 1962 with the Goldovsky Opera Theater. In 1964 she won two major singing competitions, the Young Concert Artists International Auditions and the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions; the latter of which earned her a contract with the Metropolitan Opera National Company with whom she performed in two seasons of national tours as a leading soprano from 1965 to 1967. She continued to perform in operas through the 1970s, notably creating the role of Alma in the world premiere of Lee Hoiby's Summer and Smoke at the Minnesota Opera in 1971. She later recorded that role for American television in 1982. With that same opera company she transitioned into musical theatre, performing the title role of Cole Porter's Kiss Me, Kate in 1983. Later that year she joined the national tour of Rodgers and Hammerstein's The King and I as Anna Leonowens opposite Yul Brynner, and continued with that production when it opened on Broadway on January 7, 1985. She was nominated for a Tony Award for her portrayal.
Jeanine Tesori, known earlier in her career as Jeanine Levenson, is an American composer and musical arranger best known for her work in the theater. She is the most prolific and honored female theatrical composer in history, with five Broadway musicals and six Tony Award nominations. She won the 1999 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Music in a Play for Nicholas Hytner's production of Twelfth Night at Lincoln Center, the 2004 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Music for Caroline, or Change, the 2015 Tony Award for Best Original Score for Fun Home, making them the first female writing team to win that award, and the 2023 Tony Award for Best Original Score for Kimberly Akimbo. She was named a Pulitzer Prize for Drama finalist twice for Fun Home and Soft Power.
Tamar Estine Braxton is an American singer, songwriter, actress and television personality.
Marilyn Crispell is an American jazz pianist and composer. Scott Yanow described her as "a powerful player... who has her own way of using space... She is near the top of her field." Jon Pareles of The New York Times wrote: "Hearing Marilyn Crispell play solo piano is like monitoring an active volcano... She is one of a very few pianists who rise to the challenge of free jazz." In addition to her own extensive work as a soloist or bandleader, Crispell is also known as a longtime member of saxophonist Anthony Braxton's quartet in the 1980s and '90s.
Aleksandra Vrebalov is a Serbian-American composer based in New York City and Novi Sad, Serbia.
Catherine Filloux is an American playwright. Filloux's plays have confronted the issue of human rights in many nations. She is of French and Algeria descent. She lives in New York City, New York.
Anne Midgette is an American music critic who was the first woman to write classical music criticism regularly for The New York Times. She was the chief classical music critic of The Washington Post from 2008 to 2019, prior to which she wrote for The New York Times from 2001 to 2007. A specialist in opera and composers of contemporary classical music, Midgette advocates the importance of online criticism and has previously maintained a classical music blog.
Laura Beth Clayton is an American mezzo-soprano opera singer, and a native of Malvern, Arkansas.
Harolyn Blackwell is an American lyric coloratura soprano who has performed in many of the world's finest opera houses, concert halls, and theaters in operas, oratorios, recitals, and Broadway musicals. Initially known for her work within musical theater during the early 1980s, Blackwell moved into the field of opera and by 1987 had established herself as an artist within the soubrette repertoire in many major opera houses both in the United States and in Europe. Feeling that she was being "type cast" into one particular kind of role, Blackwell strove to establish herself within the lyric coloratura repertoire beginning in the mid-1990s. With the aid of such companies as Seattle Opera, Blackwell successfully made this move and is now an interpreter of such roles as Lucia in Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor and Olympia in Offenbach's Les contes d'Hoffman. She has also periodically returned to musical theater performances throughout her career in staged productions, concert work, and recitals. Blackwell is known for her interpretations and recordings of the works of Leonard Bernstein.
Elizabeth Searle is an American novelist, short story writer, playwright and screenwriter. She is the author of five books of fiction and a rock opera, and she is co-writer of "I'll Show You Mine," a feature film from Duplass Brothers Productions and that was released by Gravitas Ventures in 2023 in select theaters in NYC, LA and more and widely via VOD on AmazonPrime, AppleTV, Comcast OnDemand, Vudu and more. The film which Elizabeth co-wrote with David Shields and Tiffany Louquet, is directed by Megan Griffiths and stars Poorna Jagannathan and Casey Thomas Brown. It received positive reviews in the New York Times and more, as well as national media coverage in VARIETY and more. Elizabeth has several other film projects in development. Her theater work TONYA & NANCY: THE ROCK OPERA has been performed around the country. Both I'LL SHOW YOU MINE and TONYA & NANCY: THE ROCK OPERA have received national media attention.
Ryan Scott Oliver is an American musical theatre composer and lyricist. He is a 2011 Lucille Lortel Award Nominee and the recipient of both the 2009 Jonathan Larson Grant and the 2008 Richard Rodgers Award for Musical Theater. Oliver is an adjunct professor at Pace University in New York, and Artistic Director of the Pasadena Musical Theatre Program in California. He received his B.A. in Music Composition from UCLA and his M.F.A. in Musical Theatre Writing from the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University. He is also the creator of the blog Crazytown and a member of ASCAP. Oliver's work has been performed at the Writers Guild Awards, Off Broadway in TheatreWorksUSA's We the People, and in countless showcases.
Anna Rabinowitz is an American poet, librettist and editor. She has published five volumes of poetry: Words on the Street winner of the Sheila Margaret Motton Book Prize 2017; Present Tense selected by The Huffington Post as one of the best poetry books of 2010; The Wanton Sublime: A Florilegium of Whethers and Wonders ; Darkling: A Poem ; and At the Site of Inside Out winner of the Juniper Prize 1997.
Carly Rose Sonenclar, who performs under the name Carly Rose, is an American singer, songwriter and actress. In December 2012, she became the runner-up on the second season of The X Factor USA.
Susan Yankowitz is an American dramatist and novelist who has created works on mortality, violence against women, and the Jonestown Massacre.
Margaret Garwood was an American composer who is best known for her operas.
Paola Prestini is a composer of classical music. The New York Times referred to Prestini as "the enterprising composer and impresario" and a "human resources alchemist". In 2011, she was named one of the Top 100 Composers in the World under 40 by National Public Radio.
Steven Osgood is an American classical music conductor.
Beth Morrison is an American producer of contemporary opera.
Mark Campbell is a New York-based librettist and lyricist whose operas have received both a Pulitzer Prize in Music and a GRAMMY Award. Mark began writing for the stage as a musical theatre lyricist, but turned to libretto-writing after he premiered Volpone, his first full-length opera in 2004 at Wolf Trap Opera Company.