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Director and animator Joshua Frankel and composer Judd Greenstein will make a virtual visit to Penn State’s Center for the Performing Arts to discuss their multimedia work-in-progress with “New Opera as Art and Social Discourse,” at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 10. The event will be broadcast live via Zoom and questions will be taken through the chat function. A recording of the conversation will be available to stream from 7:30 p.m. Friday, Feb. 12, to 7:30 p.m. Friday, Feb. 19.

In fall 2019, the creative team for “A Marvelous Order” brought their modern opera to Eisenhower Auditorium for a weeklong developmental residency. The free event will feature a video highlighting their artistic journey and discussion of the opera.

“A Marvelous Order” tells a tale of opposing sides of a New York City community — the desire to develop and expand pitted against the need to maintain character and intimacy. It is based on the real-life public battle between author and urban studies activist Jane Jacobs and “mid-20th-century master builder” Robert Moses. It features a libretto by former U.S. Poet Laureate Tracy K. Smith.

“This is a story that is important to anyone who lives in or near buildings,” Frankel said in a Center for the Performing Arts interview. “Anywhere things get built, there are disagreements about what is to be built and where and when and why.”