Composer

Based on the novel by Ernest Hemingway, The Old Man and the Sea is an opera by Paola Prestini, Royce Vavrek and Karmina Šilec that presents a dual track of storytelling by combining the Hemingway text with original portraits of quotidian life to create a look at aging, legacy, and our relationship to oceans. The work includes longtime collaborators/muses of Prestini’s including Jeffrey Zeigler as the featured cellist. The cast includes a choir, and brings to life the seminal characters: Santiago, Manolin, and the wife, recast as La Virgen del Cobre, a goddess in Santería, the Afro-Caribbean faith, who was found floating on a wooden board off the coast of eastern Cuba in 1628. Themes of baseball, ecology, religion, and economy paint a conflict between progress and tradition, craft passion and exploitation, ultimately shedding contemporary perspectives on this timeless tale.

EPSG:4326

The Old Man and the Sea

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Composer Paola Prestini (BM ’95, Composition) and librettist Royce Vavrek’s The Old Man and the Sea opera receives its premiere November 4 at Arizona State University; it was commissioned by Beth Morrison Projects and ASU Gammage.

Alumni Event: Paola Prestini

ASU Gammage

Sensorium Ex is an ambitious new opera by librettist Brenda Shaughnessy and acclaimed composer Paola Prestini, co-directed by Jerron Herman and Jay Scheib, that synthesizes artificial intelligence, disability, and the arts in a groundbreaking and innovative artistic work.

Paola Prestini

Composer

Events

Upcoming events

22 - 25 May, 2025

Sensorium Ex · Beth Morrison Projects

Past events

Feb 10, 2024

The Old Man and the Sea · Beth Morrison Projects

4 - 5 Nov, 2023

Alumni Event: Paola Prestini · Peabody Institute of The Johns Hopkins University

About

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