Apologies for x-posting...
It is my pleasure to announce tonight's premiere of OPERAcraft. Hosted by Virginia Tech's Institute for Creativity, Arts, and Technology, in collaboration with the School of Performing Arts (SOPA), and Linux Laptop Orchestra (L2Ork), this week will feature a premiere and a second performance of a newly produced opera. While both events are sold out, they will be also streamed live online (please see below for a link and additional info).
OPERAcraft couples traditional opera with a custom mod of ubiquitous Minecraft designed at Virginia Tech specially for this purpose. Using Linux Laptop Orchestra's pd-l2ork software Minecraft's custom mod is transformed into a full-fledged staging environment, with animated character mouth movement driven through pd-l2ork's speech analysis engine, hand and body gestures, multiple camera angles, camera view mixer, subtitles, behind-the-scenes performer warnings, and a full scene control (fadeouts, transitions, etc.).
A 20-minute opera titled "The Surface: a world above" is desiged by and large by high school students, including story, libretto, costume and set design. The project is directed by Prof. Ariana Wyatt, Virginia Tech School of Performing Arts' voice faculty. The music is an adaptation of Mozart's arias performed by Virginia Tech School of Performing Arts' piano faculty Dr. Tracy Cowden. Operacraft mod and supporting pd-l2ork infrastructure was imagined and designed by Virginia Tech School of Performing Arts' and ICAT computer music faculty Dr. Ivica Ico Bukvic and devised in collaboration with Virginia Tech Computer Science undergraduate student Cody Cahoon.
For additional info visit:
Virginia Tech Center for the Arts Page: https://www.artscenter.vt.edu/Online/ (click on Performances & Events -> Other Events)
Virginia Tech Institute for Creativity, Arts, and Technology http://www.icat.vt.edu/funding/operacraft
Livestream (December 4th 730pm EST, December 7th 2pm EST): https://new.livestream.com/operacraft
L2Ork and Pd-L2Ork: http://l2ork.music.vt.edu http://l2ork.music.vt.edu/main/?page_id=56
Best wishes,