THE ANCIENT CONCERT was announced like this: A new chamber opera by Daron Hagen and Paul Muldoon will be performed at the Berlind Theatre, Princeton, at 8 o'clock on Sunday 17, 2005. Set in the Antient Concert Rooms in Dublin in August 1904, the opera centers on four characters who are coming to terms with issues of national identity and artistic integrity. Eight Princeton student singers and four student directors will stage the opera, which features music performed by the acclaimed Borromeo String Quartet.

After going to hear Daniel Bernard Roumain @ MSU, Keith and I went to Princeton to hear “The Ancient Concert” – a new opera in progress by Paul Muldoon and Daron Hagen. They have been developing the work all semester long in the Princeton Atelier, which is a program Toni Morrison has developed (and still runs) for artists to work on a new project with Princeton students before taking it into the public sphere. The students were phenomenal. I couldn't believe their stage presence and their voices. Afterwards they and Fagen and Muldoon and the chamber group all talked onstage about the process. You could see how green they were, underneath the quite professional veneer of their performances. Although I had of course understood how wonderful it must be to work with student artists, it got me very excited to think Keith and I would be working in the Atelier next fall.