This week on GJ, we speak with composer Nicolás Lell Benavides and librettist Marella Martin Koch about the dedication that went into creating Southwest Opera: Dolores. An opera adaptation of Dolores Huerta’s life in 1968.
Nicolás Lell Benavides is a 2024 Guggenheim Fellow and has received commissions from West Edge Opera/San Diego Opera/Opera Southwest/BroadStage (Dolores), Music of Remembrance, The Washington National Opera, The Glimmerglass Festival, The New York Philharmonic/The Juilliard School, the LA Phil with Gustavo Dudamel, Eighth Blackbird, New Century Chamber Orchestra, and the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music with support from the likes of the Barlow Endowment, Opera America, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
Marella Martin Koch is a librettist, playwright, and lyricist whose work explores agency and its absence. Her trio of operas with composer Nicolás Lell Benavides includes Pepito, Tres minutos, and Dolores. Recognized by Operawire for her “lean and well-trimmed” storytelling “full of nuance and emotional pull,” her theatrical writing has been produced in over one-fourth of the United States. When she is not writing, she enjoys working with high school, college, and graduate students in New York City and across the country.
