2009 Minnesota Fringe Festival Show!

© 2009 Clare Pix Photography www.clarepix.com

The Dead Composers Society was founded in 2008 to provide young singers and musicians in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area with performing opportunities.

We are excited to be a part of the 2009 Minnesota Fringe Festival, where we will be presenting Two Short Operas: Mr. Berman's Bath-Size Bar & There's a Mastodon in My Backyard. More information and tickets are available on the Minnesota Fringe Festival website.

Opera? At the Fringe? Yes! It's in English. It's funny. None of the singers weigh 300 lbs. The Dead Composers Society, a Twin Cities-based group of young musicians, presents two short comic (and a little absurd) operas by Minneapolis composer Stephen Houtz. Based on a combination of popular urban legends, the operas explore the ridiculous side of human interaction.

Mr. Berman's Bath-Size Bar follows the correspondence between the staff of a London hotel and an increasingly-exasperated resident on a futile quest to use his own personal bar of soap. In There's a Mastodon in My Backyard, a wealthy and eccentric woman's discovery of what appear to be ancient fossils in her backyard sets off a chain reaction of excitement, skepticism, and scientific fervor within the ranks of the Smithsonian Institute - but the action becomes a race against time when the woman reveals her own plans for the bones. Directed by Robert Neu
Accompaniment and Music Direction by Andrew Fleser


Thu., Jul. 30 @ 8:30 p.m.
Sun., Aug. 2 @ 4:00 p.m. (audio described)
Tue., Aug. 4 @ 8:30 p.m.
Fri., Aug. 7 @ 10:00 p.m.
Sat., Aug. 8 @ 5:30 p.m.


Playwrights' Center 2301 Franklin Ave E Minneapolis, MN 55406