Convicted murderer Walker Loats is trapped in a timeless prison. Unexpectedly befriended by a moth with an offer of a perceived way to freedom, Walker must choose between paying her dues or taking a shortcut that offers to rig the game in her favor. Oscillating between the confines of a tiny cell and an expansive visual world of animation, The Echo Drift unravels a cycle of deceit, temptation, seduction, and fantastical perception. Featuring a live chamber ensemble, electronics, and a six-channel surround sound system, this world premiere opera explores the freewheeling nature of the mind when it is robbed of external stimuli and questions, when in extreme circumstances, is it possible to act in a way that goes against one’s nature?

Music by Mikael Karlsson
Libretto by Elle Kunnos de Voss & Kathryn Walat
Directed by Mallory Catlett
Conducted by Nicholas DeMaison
Environment Design by Elle Kunnos de Voss
Projection Design by Simon Harding
Lighting Design by Christopher Kuhl
Costume and Prop Design by Andreea Mincic
Animations by Dara Hamidi (with drawings by Elle Kunnos de Voss)
Orchestration by Mikael Karlsson & Michael P. Atkinson

With the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE)
Pianist Aaron Likness

Cast
Walker Loats Blythe Gaissert
Governor & The Moth John Kelly

Four extraordinary women are the visionary producers behind the Prototype Festival: Beth Morrison (President, Beth Morrison Projects), Jecca Barry (Executive Director, Beth Morrison Projects), Kristin Martig (Artistic Director, HERE) and Kim Whitener (Producing Director, HERE). Now in its sixth year of presenting new opera-theater and music-theater works by contemporary cutting edge artists from New York City and the international community, the Prototype Festival is deeply committed to artists, giving composers, librettists, designers, performers, choreographers, conductors and directors support, developmental workshops and productions of their work. Prototype also fosters relationships with local performing arts venues, so that one evening you might be seeing a piece in a traditional setting at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater/John Jay College and then the next night head out to National Sawdust in Brooklyn for a more site-specific experience. In covering the Prototype Festival the past few years, I’ve noted that artists are invited back to the festival again and again to work and explore their next creations, which is exciting for audiences to see how artists’ work evolves and gives …Read more