The production will be rescheduled for a future season.Property LocationWith a stay at The Allegro Royal Sonesta Hotel Chicago Loop, a Hotel, you'll be centrally located in Chicago, steps from Cadillac Palace Theatre and Chicago City Hall. The opera leads audiences into a world where a law’s requirement of a single glass window can shatter the hopes and dreams of a family, and what happens when those dreams turn into nightmares.” The production was to be directed by James Darrah in his Lyric debut.

The chamber opera, a co-commission with the Washington National Opera, Opera Omaha and Miller Theatre at Columbia University and adapted from the Karen Russell short story with a score by former Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s Mead Composer-in-Residence Missy Mazzoli and libretto by Royce Vavrek, is, according to the official release, “a haunting, supernatural story of Nebraska homesteaders in the 1870s and their dream of ‘proving up’ and obtaining the deed to the land they have settled.

To wit, rehearsals, which were set to begin this week, were canceled as were all travel plans for artists headed to Chicago for the production. According to the official statement from Anthony Freud, Lyric Opera of Chicago’s general director, the “difficult decision is based on our current understanding of the ever-changing public health situation, with the goal of keeping the safety of our company, our audiences, and our artists as our overriding priority.” No cases of COVID presented themselves among the company, cast or crew, according to a Lyric spokesperson.

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