Amy Ellen Anderson (Martha White) made her Carnegie Hall debut last year as the mezzo soloist in the Mozart and Durufle Requiems. This past fall, she performed in an opera gala for the West Virginia Symphony Orchestra at Avery Fisher Hall. She has performed the title roles in Carmen and The Rape of Lucretia, Charlotte in Werther, Rosina in Il barbiere di Siviglia, Martha in Gounod's Faust, and Dame Carruthers in The Yeomen of the Guard, and she has sung with companies including Aspen Opera Theatre, Chamber Opera Chicago, and the Ashlawn Highland Festival. She created the role of Mata in Steel Grin, an opera by composer Peter Aglinskas for Chicago Opera Theatre's New Works Showcase, and sang La Messagiera in Monteverdi's L'Orfeo at the Aldeburgh Festival in England. Ms. Anderson also performs concert and song repertoire and worked with William Bolcom in a recital of his music in New York City.

John G. Bellemer (Edward White) began the season as Ferrando in Cosi fan tutte with the Santa Barbara Grand Opera, and was seen in the annual Richard Tucker Music Foundation Opera Gala at Avery Fisher Hall. He also made his Hawaii Opera debut as Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni. As Principal-Artist-in-Residence with Opera San José for three seasons, he sang leading tenor roles including Alfredo in La traviata, Lensky in Eugene Onegin, and title roles in Faust and Xerxes. With the Mendocino Music Festival, he has portrayed Count Almaviva in Il barbiËre di Siviglia, Don José in Carmen, and the Duke in Rigoletto, and he has sung with companies including Tacoma Opera, Fresno Philharmonic, San José Symphony, and The Ohio Light Opera. He made his Carnegie Hall debut last June in Mozartís Requiem with the New England Chamber Ensemble. He debuts with San Diego Opera debut in 1999 as the Ballad Singer in Floyd's Of Mice and Men, and with Eugene Opera as Count Almaviva.

Janet Ellis's (Ma Dowling) credits in the 1997-98 season include Frau Mary in Der fliegende Hollander with Delaware Opera and Dame Quickly in Falstaff with Gold Coast Opera. With the New York City Opera, she has portrayed Katisha in The Mikado, Buttercup in H.M.S. Pinafore, and, with the Educational Tour, Hata in The Bartered Bride. Ms. Ellis has performed Rebecca Nurse in The Crucible and Mama Lucia with Tulsa Opera, Marguerite in La Dame Blanche with Eve Quelerís Opera Orchestra of New York, Gertrude in Roméo et Juliette with the San Antonio Festival, and the Maestra della Novice in Suor Angelica with Dallas Opera. Internationally, Ms. Ellis has sung abroad in Mexico and Israel, among other locales, and her concert performances have taken her from Richmond to Memphis to a recent recital tour in Puerto Rico.

Barton Green (Parson Daniel Peel) has performed with the Sarasota Opera as Des Grieux in Massenet's Manon, Leander in Carl Nielsen's Maskarade, and as Henri in the American premiere of the original French version of Verdi's I vespri siciliani. Recent engagements include performances as Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly with Dayton Opera, a company debut with Florida Grand Opera as Alfred in Die Fledermaus, as tenor soloist with the Philadelphia Orchestra in Hannibal Lokumbe's African Portraits, a piece he has sung with the San Antonio Symphony, the St. Louis Symphony, and the Chicago Symphony under Daniel Barenboim (recorded and released by Teldec Classics). Mr. Green has also sung with Tulsa Opera, Connecticut Opera, Chicago Opera Theatre, and Pittsburgh Opera in such roles as Faust, Pinkerton, Camille in The Merry Widow, and Tamino in The Magic Flute. In the 1998-99 season, Mr. Green will appear with the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra in African Portraits.

LeRoy Lehr (Pa Dowling) has appeared in many bass roles with the Metropolitan Opera, including Il barbiére di Siviglia, The Bartered Bride, Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg, Salome, Madama Butterfly, Ariadne auf Naxos, The Ghosts of Versailles, and The Rake's Progress. He returns to the Met next season for Susannah, Le nozze di Figaro, Pique Dame, La traviata, and La bohéme. Other appearances include Horace in Regina at New York City Opera, Ballad of Baby Doe for Austin Lyric Opera, and The Tender Land with the Aldeburgh Festival. Mr. Lehr has performed in the world premieres of Alan Stout's Passion with the Chicago Symphony, Dominick Argento's Masque of Angels and Jonah and the Whale, Dave Brubeck's Beloved Son, and Conrad Susa's Black River, as well as the American premieres of Gorecki's Copernicus with the Minnesota Orchestra, and Penderecki's Magnificat with the Detroit Symphony. He is featured on several recordings, including Virgin Classics's The Tender Land.

Laure Meloy (Rachel Dowling) has sung many roles in both standard and contemporary works, including the Queen of the Night in The Magic Flute for European Chamber Opera at Holland Park and England's Opera North, Norina in Don Pasquale for Rockland Opera (NY), and Rachel Dowling in American Opera Projects' first readings of Patience & Sarah. With the Bronx Opera, Ms. Meloy performed the Marquise de Cathe in Verdi's Un giorno di regno, Elsie Maynard in The Yeomen of the Guard, and Adina in L'elisir d'amore, and portrayed Despina in Cosi fan tutte with Il Teatro Lirico d'Europa in a production that toured France, Spain, and Switzerland. In addition, the American soprano has sung the High Priestess in Aida for Florentine Opera of Milwaukee, First Lady in The Magic Flute and Frasquita in Carmen at the Aspen Music Festival and in Lo speziale with the Orchestra of St. Luke's.

Lori Phillips (Patience White) has recently sung Kostelnicka in Jenufa for Sarasota Opera, Mimi in La bohéme with Toledo Opera, Elvira in Ernani with Opera Orchestra of New York under Eve Queler, and the Governess in Turn of the Screw for Utah Opera. With Opera San José, she performed Rosalinde in Die Fledermaus, Cio-Cio San in Madama Butterfly and the Countess in Le nozze di Figaro. Ms. Phillips has also sung MicaÎla in Carmen for the New York City Opera National Company, Fiordiligi and Floyd's Susannah with the Bronx Opera, Volpino in Haydn's Lo speziale with The Orchestra of St. Luke's, and created the title role in the world premiere of Leonard Lehrman's Karla for the Center for Contemporary Opera. As a concert artist, Ms. Phillips has performed as soprano soloist around the country, including with the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra and the Collegiate Chorale. Upcoming engagements include Elisabeth in a new production of Don Carlos for Opera North, and Fiordiligi for Virginia Opera.

Elaine Valby (Sarah Dowling) made her Weill Recital Hall debut last season with the jazz and improvisational pianist Uli Geissendoerfer in a concert of their new versions of American folksongs and spirituals. At last summer's Lincoln Center Festival, Ms. Valby appeared in Connie Beckley's The Aquarium, a work she also performed at the Steirischer Herbst Festival in Graz, Austria. Ms. Valby originated the role of Sarah in the AOP workshop presentations of Patience & Sarah, and she has sung mezzo-soprano roles in a number of other new American operas, including Lee Hoiby's This is the Rill Speaking, Vivian Fine and Sonya Friedman's Memoirs of Uliana Rooney, and as Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer in Flurry Tale by Rusty Magee and Billy Aronson. In March 1998, she was presented by "Friends and Enemies of New Music" in a recital of contemporary art songs. Ms. Valby, a graduate of Yale, has also appeared regionally and in New York in plays by such writers as Maxim Gorky and Tennessee Williams.

Paula M. Kimper (Composer) is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music. From 1988-93 she was resident composer for the Boston Post Road Stage Company of Westport, Connecticut. Its production of A Christmas Carol, adapted and directed by Douglas Moser and featuring a score by Ms. Kimper, won the 1992 Connecticut Critics' Circle Award for Best Adaptation of a Classic. Her music for the documentaries Does Making Things Matter? and Health in America aired nationally on PBS in 1994 and 1995. Her compact disc, "Flight of the HARMONIC MESSENGER," a one-hour meditation on Sacred Sites of the Earth, released in 1994, has played widely on New Age radio programs worldwide. "I Want to Live," the Act II duet from the opera, appears on CRI's compact disc Lesbian American Composers, released this spring. Patience & Sarah is Ms. Kimper's first opera.

Wende Persons (Librettist) is Senior Director of Marketing for PolyGram Classics (Deutsche Grammophon, London & Philips Classics), a division of PolyGram Records. She has also served as Program Director for WQED-FM in Pittsburgh, Director of Public Relations and Marketing for Pittsburgh Opera, Assistant to the Executive Director of the Wolf Trap Foundation, Orchestra Manager for the Heidelberg Castle Festival in Germany, and Assistant to the Manager of Concerts at the Eastman School of Music. Patience & Sarah is Ms. Persons' first libretto.

Steven Osgood (Conductor) has experience as conductor, musical director, and pianist has extended from experimental theater to opera, recitals, choral music, and dance. Most recently, he conducted the world premiere of Tan Dun's opera Peony Pavilion at the Vienna Festival with Peter Sellars directing. He also prepared the world premiere of Tan Dun's Marco Polo and assisted in its recording. In 1997, Mr. Osgood conducted development workshops of and was Assistant Conductor for the premiere of Peter Lieberson's Ashoka's Dream for the Santa Fe Opera. He has also worked with the Canadian Opera Company, The Lake George Opera, Jane Comfort Dancers, and New Amsterdam Singers, among others. His association with American Opera Projects has been extensive, and he has been involved in the development of Patience & Sarah for several years.

Douglas Moser (Stage Director) makes his opera debut with Patience & Sarah, which also marks his tenth collaboration with composer Paula M. Kimper. Other projects with Ms. Kimper include his original adaptation of A Christmas Carol (Connecticut Critics' Circle Award for Outstanding Adaptation of a Classic), Burn This, The Mystery of Irma Vep, Orphans, and The Boys Next Door. Past credits include Sweeney Todd, Company, Pirates of Penzance, Princess Ida, and a seven-year stint as artistic director of the Boston Post Road Stage Company in Connecticut. Recent works include Gurney's The Dining Room and Simon Gray's Stage Struck for the Stamford Theatre Works. Mr. Moser is currently developing an off-Broadway musical The Reborn Again Cowgirl by Richard Abernethey and Pat Watkins. As a playwright, his most recent work is the satire The Seminar.

Marie Anne Chiment (Set and Costume Designer) has created sets and costumes for over 100 productions across the nation for opera, theater and dance. Opera credits include world premieres of both Song of Manjun and Orpheus Descending for the Lyric Opera of Chicago as well as premieres of Beauty and the Beast, Under the Double Moon, and Black River for the Opera Theatre of St. Louis. Ms. Chiment has designed productions of The Magic Flute for the Santa Fe Opera as well as a touring production for Tennessee's Bicentennial. Theatre credits include costume designs for national tours of GREASE! and Carousel, the Broadway musical Metro, and world premieres of Love in Two Countries by Sheldon Harnick and Up From Paradise by Arthur Miller. She recently designed costumes for The Winter's Tale and Rough Crossing for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival as well as the New York premiere of Daniel Catan's Rappacciniís Daughter. Ms. Chiment would like to dedicate this production to Elizabeth.

Mimi Jordan Sherin (lighting deigner) recently designed Rienzi at the Vienna State Opera, Tristan and Isolde at the Royal Danish Opera, The Midsummer Marriage at the Bavarian State Opera, Iphigenie en Tauride at New York City Opera, Boris Godunov at Welsh National Opera, and The Skin of our Teeth at the New York Shakespeare Festival in Central Park. Ms. Sherin has worked extensively in opera overseas and also at the Houston Grand Opera, Sante Fe Opera. On Broadway, Ms. Sherin designed Our Country's Good and Glass Meagerie. For her works at the New York Shakespeare Festival, she has been awarded the American Theater Wing Award, an Obie Award, and FOur Drama Desk nominations. In London, she has collaborated with the National Theater and the Royal Shakespeare Company, and she has designed shows for numerous regional theater companies around the United States.

D. M. Wood (lighting designer) most recently designed Everybody'd Ruby at the New York Shakespeare Festival and The Music Man at Trinity Repertory Company. Selected credits include: Rafales, Fields of Dew, and Le Sanctuaire (Anik Bouvrette, choreograoher), Diversions of Sewer Sylphs (Chalasa Performance Company), Iron-mistress (Naked Theater Company), Days and Nights Within (Armory Free Theater), and The Aspern Papers (Illinois Opera Theater). Ms. Wood's work as an assistant to Pat Collins includes Broadway's Once Upon a Mattress, American Ballet Theater's Othello, and various regional theaters. Her work with Mimi Jordan Sherin includes shows at the New York Shakespeare Festival, Baltimore Center Stage, and Anne Bogart's SITI Company.

Moebius Productions, Inc. (production management/technical direction) is an up-and-coming production company that has worked in a variety of fields, including theater, film, television, and corporate events.

W. William Jones (production stage manager) has stage managed AOP's workshop presentations of Patience & Sarah, and the New York and Philadelphia premiere productions of the Vivian Fine and Sonya Friedman one-act multimedia chamber opera Memoirs of Uliana Rooney. He began his professional stage management career with the Curtis Institute of Music, and continued with the Academy of Vocal Arts Opera Theater, the Opera Company of Philadelphia, and other companies in the Philadelphia area. Several PBS broadcasts and other world premieres figure among more than one hundred opera productions Mr. Jones has stage managed. Other recent work includes the New York premiere of Henry Mollicone's Hotel Eden, the United States staged premiere of Milhauds's Christophe Columb, and the American premiere of Robert Sirota's The Clever Mistress. Mr. Jones is active in the Stage Manager's Association and is associate curator on the faculty of the New York University Library.

Susan Corso (executive producer) brings a wide range of theatrical experience to her role as producer, having worked for the Rodgers & Hammerstein Foundation; Cameron Mackintosh, Ltd.; Albert Poland, Ltd.; Circle in the Square; and Lincoln Center Theater (Vivian Beaumont Theater), among other organizations. Her commercial theater experience incudes the New York productions of Cats, Les Misérables, and Little Shop of Horrors, and she oversaw the reprint of Lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II. A 1979 graduate of Smith College, Dr. Corso also studied at the prestigious Eugene O'Neill Memorial Theater Center. She is an ordained minister and received a doctorate of divinity in 1993.

American Opera Projects, Inc. (Grethe Barrett Holby, founder/artistic director; Charles Jarden, managing director) is committed to the creation, development, and presentation of new American opera and music theater. Founded in 1988, AOP provides a stable environment and artistic resources so that established and emerging creators can develop their works. Projects are guided from conception and are further developed by AOP and other producing organizations. AOP's recent and future projects include: the world premiere production of Memoirs of Uliana Rooney by Vivian Fine and Sonya Friedman, performed in Bryant Part as part of the New Work/New York Series and at the Annenberg Center in Philadelphia; AOP's first commission in its Family Opera Initiative program, Flurry Tale by Rusty Magee and Billy Aronson; and Cigarettes and Chocolate, a play with music by Anthony Minghella (The English Patient), which was presented in New York at the Orensanz Center and then toured in Berlin and Vienna. Also under development is an opera by composer Ken Valitsky and the late author Kathy Acker, Requiem. AOP workshopped the Hildegurls Electronic Ordo Virtutum during June and July; artistic director Grethe Barrett Holby will direct the production, which opens July 22 as a part of Lincoln Center Festival 98.

Patience & Sarah was commissioned and developed by AOP, which presented four readings of the opera-in-progress at its Center for New Opera and Music Theater between 1994 and 1996. AOP brought Patience & Sarah to the Massachusetts International Festival of the Arts as a workshop production in May 1995, and in a concert version this past May. AOP has also presented excerpts from the opera in concerts around New York City. AOP is grateful to all of the gifted individuals who have participated in readings and workshops of Patience & Sarah over the past several years of development.