Number Our Days: A Photographic Oratorio
Music by Luna Pearl Woolf
Concept and Libretto by David Van Taylor
Based on Jamie Livingston’s “Photo Of the Day”
Conducted by Kamna Gupta
Directed by Ty Defoe
Co-Produced with Trinity Church Wall Street
How can we hold onto each other with joy, even in the face of inevitable loss?
Each day for 18 years, Jamie Livingston documented his life by taking a single Polaroid—until his death at age 41. Then his “Photo of the Day” went online, creating an immediate global sensation years before Instagram launched. With music for chorus, orchestra, and soloists by Grammy nominee Luna Pearl Woolf (Fire & Flood) and a non-fiction libretto by acclaimed filmmaker David Van Taylor (Good Ol’ Charles Schulz), this multi-media oratorio explores our era’s strange alchemy of technology, memory, and community.
A PAC NYC commission.
Polaroid photos by Jamie Livingston.
Ty Defoe
Ty Defoe (he/we) is an indigiqueer citizen of the Oneida and Anishinaabe Nations. A writer, interdisciplinary artist, writer/director and Grammy Award winner.
Kamna Gupta
Kamna Gupta is an American Prize-winning conductor experienced in operatic, orchestral, and choral repertoires.
David Van Taylor
David Van Taylor is an award-winning filmmaker, an innovative producer, a successful change advocate, and more. His documentaries have screened around the world, from the Berlin Film Festival and NYC’s Film Forum to PBS, HBO, and the BBC. David’s work has confronted America’s changing socio-political landscape for over three decades, while continually expanding the creative and practical bounds of nonfiction filmmaking. And he’s a practicing opera librettist, too!
Luna Pearl Woolf
Composer, producer and dramaturg Luna Pearl Woolf has long used her creative voice to advocate for social and political change. Her work has been praised as “brilliant… profoundly moving” (Opera Going Toronto) for its “psychological nuances and emotional depth” (The New York Times).
