About the work
Laura Kaminsky's chamber opera „As One" was premiered in New York in 2014, to a libretto by Mark Campbell and Kimberly Reed. It tells the story of a transgender protagonist, Hannah, whose journey of self-discovery is embodied by two voices at once. The singing is accompanied by a string quartet alone.
Plot
The opera's only character, Hannah, is portrayed by two singers simultaneously: „Hannah before" (baritone) and „Hannah after" (mezzo-soprano) — both one and the same person at different stages of her life. In fifteen songs Hannah passes through the stages of her becoming: the childhood in which she feels herself in the wrong body and hides her difference; the awakening, the shame and the secret steps; the recognition and acceptance of her own identity as a woman; the experience of vulnerability and danger; and at last the arrival at herself, a sense of wholeness and peace. The two voices complement, question and embrace each other — until at the end, „as one", they come together.
Cultural significance
„As One" is one of the most-performed contemporary chamber operas in the United States and a pioneering work in the musical-theatrical depiction of transgender lives. Its lean forces — two voices and string quartet — and its sensitive, lyrical tone made the work producible at numerous houses and an important contribution to diversity on the opera stage.