2015: "PYTHIA", FOR DELPHI SONGS

This city fortified with rust
These words will grind your halls to dust

Delphi Songs is a four-part anthology from composer Meta Cohen, centered around the last Oracle of Delphi. It used various texts; I had the honour of writing the lyrics for the final part. Delphi Songs reflects an oracle who predicts her own demise, and Pythia the distance between us and her.

2023: "CAEDO", FOR VOCAL ENSEMBLE

The entrance to heaven is this
The point of a sword
The end of a word

Caedo marks a second collaboration with Meta Cohen. It centres around impressions of the events of the Albigensian Crusade, within a context of broader historical cycles of ideological violence. Caedo has been performed live twice by the Consort of Melbourne.

UPCOMING: LIBRETTO FOR "KISS MY SWORD"

I am a thing that will not be denied;
I am the heat at the heart of the fire;
I am in all ways always free–
I am Julie d’Aubigny.

I am collaborating with composer Meta Cohen and director/dramaturg Alyson Campbell as the librettist for an upcoming opera exploring the life and historiography of queer 17th-century French opera singer Julie d'Aubigny. Songs from the opera will premiere at the fortyfivedownstairs Chamber Music Festival as part of Lyric Opera's "Their Voices Will Rise".