American Lyric Theater to host 20th anniversary gala honoring Susan Feder on Oct. 23

In celebration of its 20th anniversary, American Lyric Theater is proud to announce Celebrating 20 Years of American Lyric Theater, a gala performance on October 23, 2025 at 7:00pm at Merkin Concert Hall, 129 W. 67th Street, New York, NY 10023. The evening will honor Susan Feder for her extraordinary contributions to contemporary American opera. The concert program will feature scenes from a wide range of operas by alumni of ALT’s Composer Librettist Development Program (CLDP), including works developed and commissioned by ALT as well as operas that were commissioned and premiered at other leading companies across the country. A highlight of the evening will be a very special preview of an aria from Lincoln in the Bardo—the first opera by a CLDP alum to be commissioned by The Metropolitan Opera. Composed by Missy Mazzoli with a libretto by Royce Vavrek (CLDP 2007/08), the work is scheduled to receive its world premiere in the fall of 2026.

In addition to the special preview of Lincoln in the Bardo, the Gala Concert will feature scenes from a powerful lineup of operas written by CLDP alumni, including:

She Who Dared – Jasmine Arielle Barnes* / Deborah D.E.E.P. Mouton*
The Long Walk – Jeremy Howard Beck* / Stephanie Fleischmann*
The Life and Death(s) of Alan Turing – Justine F. Chen* / David Simpatico*
I Am a Dreamer Who No Longer Dreams – Jorge Sosa* / Cerise Lim Jacobs
JFK – David T. Little / Royce Vavrek*
Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Fallen Giant – Evan Meier* / E.M. Lewis*
Scalia/Ginsburg – Derrick Wang *
All Wounds Bleed – Christopher Cerrone* / Tony Asaro*
The Selfish Giant – Clarice Assad* / Lila Palmer*
The Infinite Energy of Ada Lovelace – Kamala Sankaram* / Rob Handel*
The Knock – Aleksandra Vrebalov* / Deborah Brevoort*
The Halloween Tree – Theo Popov* / Tony Asaro*
Working for the Macbeths – Johanny Navarro* / Marcus Yi*
Tevye’s Daughters – Alex Weiser* / Stephanie Fleischmann*

*indicates alumni of the Composer Librettist Development Program at ALT

Featured performers include many of the singers who have contributed significantly to the development of new operas at ALT, including sopranos Jacqueline Echols, Karen Vuong, Caroline Worra, and Jennifer Zetlan; mezzo-sopranos Heather Johnson and Gina Perregrino; tenor Andrew Bidlack; baritones and Jonathan Michie and Ethan Vincent; bass-baritone Justin Hopkins; and pianists Djordje Nesic, Jason Wirth and ALT’s Associate Artistic Director Kelly Kuo.

This milestone event will honor Susan Feder, whose 15-year tenure as Program Officer in the Arts and Culture Program at the Mellon Foundation was transformative for the American opera field. Feder’s visionary leadership and support of ALT helped to catalyze the company’s growth and amplify its national impact.

“Susan was one of the first people to believe in my vision for ALT,” said ALT’s Founder and Artistic and General Director, Lawrence Edelson. “I still remember our early meetings at the Mellon Foundation—how invigorating it was to be met with Susan’s curiosity, and how meaningful it was that she was willing to take a chance on a scrappy little company doing things differently. Her belief in ALT, and the investment she championed through Mellon, made it possible for us to grow and to attract additional support. ALT has changed the face of American opera, and it’s no exaggeration to say that without Susan, that would never have been possible.”

Susan Feder’s multifaceted arts career culminated in her remarkable tenure at the Mellon Foundation. Bringing deep knowledge of artists’ processes to bear, she supported programs that enabled opportunities for reflection, experimentation, and risk-taking, resulting in a significant expansion of contemporary arts repertoire. She also developed collaborative, systems-building initiatives on behalf of artists and organizations long under-resourced by philanthropy. Earlier, as vice president of music publisher G. Schirmer, Feder nurtured the careers of composers in the United States, Europe, and the former Soviet Union. She was also editorial coordinator of The New Grove Dictionary of American Music (1986) and program editor at the San Francisco Symphony. Currently she serves on the boards of several arts nonprofits and foundations. She is also a principal in SAMBA Filmworks, founded by her husband, which to date has produced six of his short narrative films. Feder holds degrees in music from Princeton University and UC Berkeley.

Gala tickets are $500, which include VIP concert seating and admission to an exclusive post-concert reception with the performers and CLDP alumni who have come together from across the country for this special celebration.

Honorary Committee tickets are available from $1,000 to $10,000, which include VIP concert seating and the gala reception, with premium recognition and opportunities to support ALT’s continued impact on American opera.

A limited number of Concert Tickets without the gala reception are also available, from $60 to $100.

For more information, and to purchase tickets or join the Honorary Committee, visit www.altnyc.org/gala20

Founded in 2005 by Lawrence Edelson, the idea to create ALT was born out of conversations between Edelson and composer/librettist Mark Adamo in 2002, when Edelson was the assistant director on a new production of Little Women at the Glimmerglass Festival. Their discussions—about the lack of professional training and mentorship for opera writers on par with programs for emerging singers—inspired Edelson to dive into a multi-year research project exploring how opera composers and librettists were—and were not —being trained. This led to Edelson founding American Lyric Theater in 2005 and launching the company’s flagship Composer Librettist Development Program in 2007, creating an unprecedented model for supporting emerging opera writers.

“I cobbled together my own education from various places,” explained composer/librettist Mark Adamo. “I’d acted and written plays as a child before getting my first piano at the age of 16. Then I entered NYU as a playwriting major and, alongside that work, improvised the beginning of a double major in composition. I finished my composition degree in Washington and started conducting and singing chorally, writing program notes, et cetera – all practices which, of course, ultimately fortified my opera composition. But they were not to be taught, or learned, in any one place – which was precisely the need that Larry had identified. How could you take artists who already knew something about writing and composing, and give them the tools to develop those skills specifically for the stage?”

To support his goals, Edelson brought together ALT’s founding faculty, which included Adamo, dramaturg Cori Ellison, and composers Daniel Catán and Anthony Davis. The faculty has since expanded to feature some of the leading artists in the field, including librettists Mark Campbell, Michael Korie and Deborah Brevoort; and composers Scott Davenport Richards, Paul Moravec, and Ricky Ian Gordon. To this day, the CLDP is the only full-time initiative in the U.S. that trains composers and librettists side by side, with equal emphasis on both disciplines; and in 2017, ALT also began mentoring opera dramaturgs—another first in American opera.

“Before participating in the CLDP, I loved opera and knew I wanted to write it, but the pathways into becoming an opera writer felt hidden,” shared composer Jasmine Arielle Barnes, whose first full-length opera, She Who Dared, recently premiered at Chicago Opera Theater to critical and audience acclaim. “Becoming a professional opera composer seemed out of my grasp. ALT not only provided me with a clear entry point to pursue my opera-writing goals, but also expanded the ways I approach opera as a composer. I now have many tools in my proverbial toolbox that allow me to serve the stories I want to tell more fully and create impactful art.”

Over the past 20 years, ALT has provided deeply personalized mentorship and direct commissioning support to more than 50 emerging opera creatives. Operas developed through ALT, as well as those created by CLDP alumni elsewhere, have been produced by more than 70 companies worldwide, such as Opera Philadelphia, Chicago Opera Theater, Glimmerglass Festival, Houston Grand Opera, LA Opera, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, Pittsburgh Opera, La Monnaie, Scottish Opera, Opera de Montréal, and PROTOTYPE Festival, among many others.

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