OPrak’s first audience in a garden on the Lower East Side of Manhattan - an enthusiastic crowd of people sitting in wheelchairs, garden chairs & benches all together for the opera ORLANDO
New York City’s First
Disability-Affirmative
Opera Company
Making a New Genre of Opera
Opera Praktikos (OPrak) is New York City’s first disability-affirmative opera company.
We present a genre of opera that is interabled and champions disability-artistry as a creative force in the field. Through deliberate reinterpretations of classical operas and the commissioning of new works, we want our performers, arts-workers and audiences to authentically find themselves in the stories we portray on stage.
We do this by honoring disability culture, fostering community and making great opera in the heart of NYC.
Photo credit: Dan Wright Photography
Illustration by Anne Beal
There Will Be
Cake!
A sweet, site-specific musical drama pairing two mono-operas about memory and food, featuring words of wisdom from Julia Child herself! One short opera bakes us a chocolate cake, the other spreads joy! Mixed together, these mono-operas make for one hour of a delicious and joy-filled community event…and yes, there WILL be cake!
Opera Praktikos, Inc received operating support from OPERA America’s NYC Opera Grant: Supporting Small-Business Organizations, supported by the Howard Gilman Foundation.
Photo credit: Dan Wright Photography
Orlando:
Hero of Love
Our first production, in collaboration and partnership with Opera Essentia is a 75-minute, one act distillation of Handel's Baroque masterpiece. Orlando: Hero of Love asks eternal questions: What is Love? Who is a Hero? Where do our journeys lead?
Photo credit: Kyabell Glass
Opera Praktikos is a 501c3 registered tax-exempt nonprofit organization.
Federal Tax ID: #88-3044485