Composer in Residence Missy Mazzoli Featured in Opera News
Opera News profiled Bard Composer in Residence Missy Mazzoli ahead of her opera's premier at the Met.
Bard Composer in Residence Missy Mazzoli was profiled by Opera News ahead of the premier of her work, Lincoln in the Bardo, at the Metropolitan Opera. The profile gives an account of Mazzoli’s upbringing in a Philadelphia suburb, from taking up piano at age seven to playing in punk bands on cemetery grounds, to composing globally recognized operas performed in Europe and the United States. Mazzoli made the connection between her childhood home and common themes of her work, like opioid addiction, which claimed the lives of many she grew up with. “The people I went to high school with, who are now in the grips of addiction—that could have very easily been me if I hadn’t been so distracted by music,” said Mazzoli. “The difference in our circumstances is very small.”
Opera News also details the challenges and doubts that Mazzoli has overcome in her stellar career, such as the professor who assured her that she would never achieve an academic position as a composer—Mazzoli is now a composer in residence at Bard—as well as promises from leading figures in opera that “the current crop of women composers were not ready for the “big leagues.” Mazolli is also the first woman to premier an opera at the Met, and her previous premier, The Galloping Cure, was hailed by the Times of London as “one of the greatest operas of the century.” The piece also introduced the mentorship program she co-founded with fellow composer Ellen Reid, in order to ensure other young composers do not face the same headwinds. “These comments have reverberated through my mind every time I applied for a job, every time I put myself out there,” says Mazzoli. “My success is indeed the sweetest form of revenge I can imagine.”
Mazzoli is faculty member in the Bard Music Program and the Bard College Conservatory of Music, whose mission is to provide the best possible preparation for a person dedicated to a life immersed in the creation and performance of music. She teaches classes on composition and new music, as well as giving private studio instruction for composition majors at Bard.
Post Date: 10-07-2026
Opera News also details the challenges and doubts that Mazzoli has overcome in her stellar career, such as the professor who assured her that she would never achieve an academic position as a composer—Mazzoli is now a composer in residence at Bard—as well as promises from leading figures in opera that “the current crop of women composers were not ready for the “big leagues.” Mazolli is also the first woman to premier an opera at the Met, and her previous premier, The Galloping Cure, was hailed by the Times of London as “one of the greatest operas of the century.” The piece also introduced the mentorship program she co-founded with fellow composer Ellen Reid, in order to ensure other young composers do not face the same headwinds. “These comments have reverberated through my mind every time I applied for a job, every time I put myself out there,” says Mazzoli. “My success is indeed the sweetest form of revenge I can imagine.”
Mazzoli is faculty member in the Bard Music Program and the Bard College Conservatory of Music, whose mission is to provide the best possible preparation for a person dedicated to a life immersed in the creation and performance of music. She teaches classes on composition and new music, as well as giving private studio instruction for composition majors at Bard.
Post Date: 10-07-2026