Every day is opening night.

Press Contact:

Rick Miramontez / Lee Abrahamian / Briana Sanchez / Ellie Detweiler
rick@omdkc.com / lee.abrahamian@icloud.com / briana@omdkc.com / ellie@omdkc.com
212 695 7400

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, PLEASE

LITTLE ISLAND

ANNOUNCES COMPLETE CAST & CREATIVE TEAM FOR

“ROBESOͶ”

AS PART OF ITS CURRENT SUMMER SEASON

 CO-CREATED AND STARRING BASS-BARITONE

DAVÓNE TINES

CO-CREATED AND DIRECTED BY ZACK WINOKUR

 ALSO STARRING

JOHN BITOY & KHARI LUCAS

PERFORMANCES BEGIN ON WEDNESDAY, JUNE 26

WITH OPENING NIGHT SET FOR THURSDAY, JUNE 27

New York, NY (June 20, 2024) – Little Island is pleased to announce ROBESOИ, a new work created and performed by star bass-baritone Davóne Tines, co-created and directed by Zack Winokur, about the life and music of activist and artist Paul Robeson. ROBESOИ begins performances on Wednesday, June 26, with the official opening set for Thursday, June 27. Performances will run on Little Island through Saturday, June 29.

In ROBESOИ, Tines grapples with the legacy of a hero. Exploding the diverse and dynamic musical repertoire of Paul Robeson, Tines takes us on a trip from the stage of Carnegie Hall to a Moscow hotel room, in an attempt to understand an icon through his own words.

Fresh off making his Met Opera debut and notching a spot on the CULT100, Tines is a multi-hyphenate on a mission. With his unmatched blend of classical bonafides and contemporary sensibility, he’s crafted concerts and recitals that have earned him the title of “[one] of the most powerful voices of our time” (Los Angeles Times). Now, Tines breaks new ground, having created a band alongside bassist and sound artist Khari Lucas and pianist John Bitoy, DAVÓNE & THE TRUTH, with whom he created musical arrangements for and performs ROBESOИ. The band has also recorded an album of the same name, to be released by Nonesuch this fall.

Tines said, “I consider Paul Robeson a spiritual ancestor, but I found my connection to him not because of his colossal achievements, but through his most vulnerable moment of almost giving up. My band THE TRUTH and I wildly reimagine Robeson’s repertoire as the soundtrack to a fever dream journey of almost losing yourself but finding the strength to go on.”

Along with Tines, Winokur, Lucas, and Bitoy; scenic design by Adam Charlap Hyman; lighting design by Mary Ellen Stebbins; sound design by Kai Harada; clothing for Tines by Emily Adams Bode Aujla; and production stage manager Betsy Ayer.

 To download headshots, please click here.

ROBESOИ runs June 26-29 at Little Island’s Amph.

 Little Island recently announced that an annual, four-month-long summer season of world premieres, which kicked off on June 1, will feature a total of nine newly commissioned pieces. Little Island’s new arts program moves towards the future with a commitment to a multi-year roster of original work, all commissioned by and developed at Little Island. Bookended by the premiere of choreographer Twyla Tharp’s newest work How Long Blues and a 90-minute remix of Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro in which outré opera diva Anthony Roth Costanzo sings every leading role, the season will offer premieres of varying scales across all areas of performance – including music, dance, theater, opera, comedy, jazz, pop, and funk, all outdoors and directly sited on the Hudson River at 14^th Street in New York City. The Amph, the park’s 700-seat amphitheater, will house larger scale performances at a $25 ticket price, while The Glade, the park’s 200-seat venue, will be home to more intimate works, all of which will be completely free to the public.

KEY ART FOR SUMMER SEASON AVAILABLE HERE

IMAGE OF LITTLE ISLAND AVAILABLE HERE

Tickets to Little Island’s summer season of performances are available for purchase on littleislandtickets.com, TodayTix.com, or by downloading the TodayTix app.

CAST & CREATIVE BIOGRAPHIES

Davóne Tines (Co-creator and cast). Heralded as an artist “changing what it means to be a classical singer (The New Yorker) and “[one] of the most powerful voices of our time” (Los Angeles Times), Tines is a pathbreaking artist whose work encompasses a diverse repertoire, ranging from early music to new commissions by leading composers, while exploring the social issues of today. A creator, curator, and performer at the intersection of many histories, cultures, and aesthetics, he is engaged in work that blends opera, art song, spirituals, contemporary classical, gospel, and protest songs as a means to tell a deeply personal story of perseverance connecting to all of humanity.

Tines is a musician who takes full agency of his work, devising new programs and pieces from conception to performance. He reflects this ethos in his Recital No. 1: MASS, an examination of the liturgy, comparing Western European, African American, and 21st Century traditions; as well as in his orchestral creations: Concerto No. 1: SERMON, a work he premiered with the Philadelphia and BBC Symphony Orchestras; and Concerto No. 2: ANTHEM, premiered with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Tines has also premiered operas by today’s leading composers, including John Adams, Terence Blanchard, and Matthew Aucoin; and his concert appearances include performances of works ranging from Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony to Kaija Saariaho’s True Fire. This season, he made his Metropolitan Opera debut performing in John Adams’ El Niño.

He is Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Artist-in-Residence and Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra & Chorale’s first-ever Creative Partner. He recently served as Artist-in-Residence at Detroit Opera—an appointment that culminated in his performance in the title role of Anthony Davis’ X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X in the spring of 2022. Tines is featured on the Grammy-nominated world premiere recording of the opera released on BMOP/sound in 2022. Tines is a member of AMOC and co-creator of The Black Clown, a music theater experience commissioned and premiered by American Repertory Theater. He is Musical America’s 2022 Vocalist of the Year, a winner of the 2020 Sphinx Medal of Excellence, and the recipient of the 2018 Emerging Artists Award from Lincoln Center. He is a graduate of The Juilliard School and Harvard University.

Zack Winkour (Co-creator and director). Recent directing highlights include: Mammoth, featuring Yo-Yo Ma 400 feet underground inside Mammoth Cave National Park in Kentucky; Tristan and Isolde at the Santa Fe Opera; Messiaen’s Harawi at the Aix-en-Provence Festival, De Singel, Elbphilharmonie; Only an Octave Apart starring Justin Vivian Bond and Anthony Roth Costanzo at St. Ann’s Warehouse, the New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Opera, Wilton’s Music Hall in London, the Spoleto Festival USA, and the Gate Theater, Dublin; The Black Clown at the Mostly Mozart Festival at Lincoln Center and the American Repertory Theater; and Perle Noire: Meditations for Joséphine by Tyshawn Sorey and Claudia Rankine, starring Julia Bullock on the grand staircase of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Winokur is Artistic Director and Co-Founder of AMOC, a “blindingly impressive” (NY Times) collective of singers, dancers, and instrumentalists; he served as Artistic Director of NYPopsUp, a sprawling state initiative to reopen the performing arts across NY State with over 300 performances from February to July 2020; and co-teaches, with Davóne Tines, a transdisciplinary storytelling class at Harvard.

John Bitoy (Cast) is an Afro-Dominican pianist and composer originally from Chicago, where he enjoys a multi-faceted career as a soloist and collaborative pianist. His recent solo engagements include performances of Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2 with the South Loop Symphony and Symphony of Oak Park, and a solo Recital at Dame Myra Hess.

John is a passionate advocate for new music in performance spaces. Past and current projects include the recording and world premiere of several pieces from Steve Wallace’s Solo piano and chamber compositions in 2020, followed by his opera in 2021, and the soft opening of his own Jazz club in the summer of 2024.  As an avid chamber musician, John has been invited to play at the Gateways Music Festival, The Boston Celebrity Series, the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, the Bienen School of Music, the Philharmonic Society of Orange County, Epiphany Center, Yoko Ono Lennon Centre, Princeton University, the University of Chicago, Smith College, Harvard University, De Doelen, the Dame Myra Hess Series, Caramoor, the Big Ears Festival, the Bold Tendencies festival, and has performed new works by Marcus Norris, Tyshawn Sorey, Davóne Tines, Ahmed Alabaca, Brian Raphael Nabors, James Lee III, Jessie Montgomery, Lauren McCall,

Mr. Bitoy enjoys playing standard repertoire, yet he is simultaneously devoted to shedding light on the new music of composers of the African Diaspora. In addition to taking pleasure in his classical engagements, John is well versed in other genres. He was invited to perform with Sigur Ros during their 2019 United States Tour of Riceboy Sleeps, performed his own original Jazz compositions with at Epiphany Center, and has performed at the Jazz Showcase and Andy’s Jazz Club. He also has his own avant garde Jazz fusion band: Aśe, where he performs exclusively his own original compositions within the Jazz idiom.

Khari Lucas (Cast). is a songwriter/musician (most often releasing work under the alias Contour), scoring composer, writer/poet, and occasional programmer in both digital and real space. His work, grounded in Black musical traditions (i.e. jazz, soul, blues), follows in the footsteps of artist-expressors throughout history, and seeks to honor these traditions while carrying them through the present and into the future, as well as offer provocations, invitations, and tools for Black listeners to contextualize their own emotions and experiences. His songwriting explores themes including grief, love, violence, labor, and the inner emotional landscape at large.

Adam Charlap Hyman (Scenic Design). As a principal of Charlap Hyman & Herrero, Adam Charlap Hyman has steered the firm toward an ever-widening variety of design pursuits, from residential projects to opera sets to art galleries. With a degree in Furniture Design and Art History from RISD and a professional background in major home furnishings companies, Adam has helped implement a holistic, yet succinct vision for the firm. Adam ranked among Forbes Magazine’s “30 Under 30” in their art and style category.

Mary Ellen Stebbins (Lighting Design). Collaborations include work with MCC Theater, Primary Stages, Opera Philadelphia, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, as well as Theresa Rebeck, Clare Barron, A$AP Rocky, and AMOC*. Mary Ellen is a 2020 Bessie Award Honoree and a 2016 Henry Hewes nominee.  She is a 2019 Opera America Tobin Director-Designer Prize recipient, a 2014 Live Design Young Designer to Watch, the 2011 USITT Barbizon Lighting Design Award winner, and a 2009 Hangar Theater Lab Company Design Fellow. Mary Ellen holds an AB from Harvard University and an MFA from Boston University.  She is a member of USA 829 and currently teaches at Carnegie Mellon School of Drama.

Kai Harada (Sound Design). Broadway: The Days of Wine and Roses; Merrily We Roll Along (Tony Nomination); Spamalot (co-design); New York, New York (Tony Nomination); Kimberly Akimbo; The Old Man and the Pool; Mister Saturday Night; Head Over Heels; The Band’s Visit (Tony Award, Drama Desk Award); Amélie; Sunday in the Park With George; Allegiance; Gigi; Fun Home; On the Town; First Date; Follies (Tony, Drama Desk Nominations); and Million Dollar Quartet. West End: Crazy For You; Million Dollar Quartet. Many other musicals off-Broadway, on tour, regionally, and internationally. Education: Yale University. Pronouns: he/him.

Emily Adams Bode Aujla (Clothing for Mr. Tines) was born and raised in Atlanta, Georgia. After studying in Switzerland, she moved to New York and graduated from Parsons School of Design and Eugene Lang College with a BA/BFA dual degree in Menswear Design and Philosophy. Bode Aujla founded her eponymous brand, Bode, in 2016 with a collection of one-of-a-kind garments composed entirely of antique textiles. She was the first female designer to show at NYFW: Men’s and continues to reinvigorate American menswear and womenswear through the art of storytelling and craft preservation.

ABOUT LITTLE ISLAND

Little Island, the 2.4-acre park that sits along the Hudson River, opened in May 2021 and has since been enjoyed by 4.6 million visitors. In 2013, Barry Diller, in partnership with Hudson River Park Trust leadership, embarked on the unique opportunity to envision a solution for the repair and reactivation of Pier 54, which had been badly damaged by Hurricane Sandy. The park was designed as an entirely new type of public space for New York, one that would create an immersive experience of nature and art. Born from a collaboration of the UK-based Heatherwick Studio and the New York-based landscape architecture firm MNLA, led by Signe Nielsen, the park’s imaginative design offers all New Yorkers and visitors a new public space that is dynamic, captivating, and restorative.

Little Island is operated year-round by a 50-member staff co-helmed by Producing Artistic Director Zack Winokur and Executive Director Laura Clement.

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