IN Series has announced its 2025/26 season, IN Principio which consists solely of the premiere of works of music and theater. It is a season that lifts up the new, and showcases the possibility of new beginnings.
“To make art is to be politically optimistic—to believe that something new, born from nothing, can transform the world,” said Artistic Director Timothy Nelson. “At IN Series, this audacious hope is at the heart of all we do. Our 2025–2026 IN Principio season is a celebration of creation itself: seven premieres (including The Alcestiade on July 20 at MLK Library) that represent new beginnings, bold ideas, and the joy of discovering something for the first time. Join us in this adventure — because every time you see an IN Series production, you’re not just witnessing art. You’re witnessing a world reborn.”
ST JOHN THE BAPTIST
World Premiere Staging
October 4 – 19
Locations: 340 Maple Dr SW, Washington, DC and Baltimore Theater Project
A baroque masterpiece written in the 1670s, St John the Baptist vividly retells the harrowing story of Salome. Despite its historic significance and radiant score — featured in Maria Callas’ debut concert performance in 1945 — this opera has never been staged. Now, in collaboration with New York’s Catapult Opera, it makes its long-awaited theatrical debut. Performed in English by local singers and envisioned by Baltimore-based designers, this co-production breathes new life into a lost gem of operatic history.
DELTA KING’S BLUES
World Premiere
December 6 – 21
Locations: 340 Maple Dr SW, Washington, DC; Baltimore location TBD
Marking IN Series’ first fully commissioned opera, Delta King’s Blues is an immersive musical journey created by Baltimore artist and Cardwell Dawson Artist Fellow Jarrod Lee, with music by acclaimed composer Damien Geter. Blending classical and blues traditions, this innovative work tells the legendary tale of Robert Johnson, father of the blues, and the American myth of his Faustian bargain. A celebration of original American music, the piece resonates deeply with IN Series’ artistic mission.
PASSION PLAYS
March 6 – 29
This powerful festival presents three original works inspired by the transformative nature of the “passion experience” — transcendence through suffering.
Only the Air (March 6-8, Dupont Underground)
Bach’s St. Matthew Passion arias intertwine with a newly-commissioned libretto featuring poetic translations by Washington, DC poet Shana Oshiro. Reimagined religious texts by dramaturg Joshua Borths and new translations of Bach’s chorales by local community voices — including politicians, activists, and clergy — create a deeply resonant and communal spiritual exploration.
Passio (March 13-15, Dupont Underground)
In a groundbreaking international collaboration, eight female artists from four continents and diverse musical traditions come together to interpret suffering and rebirth through a feminine lens. The work features contributions from Baltimore artist Joyce Alexander, as well as artists versed in Indian classical music, North African Arabic styles, jazz (both traditional and avant-garde), and medieval musical forms.
For Women Serving Time (March 21-23, Dupont Underground; March 27-29, Baltimore Theater Project)
Composer Adrienne Torf and Maryland poet Fatemeh Keshavarz fuse Faure’s Requiem, jazz elements, and Brechtian theatrical traditions in a poignant meditation on female incarceration. This extended poem-opera sheds light on the lives and resilience of women in the U.S. prison system, offering a voice to a population often overlooked.
THE SONG OF ŚAKUNTALĀ
June 6 – 21
Locations: 340 Maple Dr SW, Washington, DC and Baltimore Theater Project
Artistic Director Timothy Nelson creates a new opera inspired by the ancient Indian play Shakuntala by Kalidasa. Blending Western classical and Indian Carnatic instruments, the opera reimagines this timeless tale of love and destiny through a transcultural musical lens. Featuring Baltimore sitarist and composer Ami Dang and percussionist Rajna Swaminathan, this work bridges traditions to reveal universal themes. The project was inspired by a suggestion from visionary American director Peter Sellars.
Casting to be announced at a later date.
DC and Baltimore subscriptions will be available starting May 15. Additionally, early bird subscribers will have the opportunity to attend a special musical reading of The Alcestiad, with music by Louise Talma and libretto by Thornton Wilder, July 20, 2025 at DC’s Martin Luther King Jr. Central Library. This 1962 opera was the first by an American woman to be performed in Europe, and has never been performed in the United States. This long-awaited concert performance of the third act of this landmark opera is the first chance American audiences will have had to hear this music, and includes a cast of IN Series favorites.
2025/26 VIRTUAL SEASON
IN Series’ virtual season features productions that further stretch the bounds of opera by applying IN Series’ site-based approach to producing for a digital venue. Presented on IN Series’ digital platform, INvision: The Logan OPERAhouse Without Walls, the virtual season will include other complementary digital content, such as radio and digital versions of each of our mainstage productions and is available free to the public online. Since the debut of INvision, IN Series has increased its reach to Baltimore and DC audiences who experience challenges that prevent them from regularly attending live performances and vastly expanded its audience, engaging more than 35,000 individuals in 34 countries.
About the Cardwell-Dawson Artist Fellowship
Fully launched in 2021, the Cardwell-Dawson Artist Fellowship provided the opportunities and support networks that emerging BIPOC artists need in order to develop into industry leaders, and from which artists of color are usually excluded. This unique four-year artist-incubator model fully engaged fellows in developing on-the-job workplace skills, filling the leading roles that are essential to building a sustainable career, and cultivating strong artistic networks.
About IN Series
IN Series is the standard-bearer for innovative opera theater in Washington DC. IN Series makes theater from music: transforming artists, audiences, and community by disrupting expectations, nourishing empathy, stimulating insight, and deepening the conversation. IN Series envisions a thriving global community in which opera is a fully integrated and essential part of collective conversation. In picturing the journey to this end, IN Series is a change-maker – a force that, with each groundbreaking production and outreach event, radically transforms perceptions of the “who”, “what”, “where”, and “why” of opera: who gets to make opera and for whom is it made; what is defined as an operatic experience; where operas take place; why we make opera; and why opera matters.
Founded by Carla Hübner in 1982 as a concert series of the former Mount Vernon College, “The In Series” became an independent non-profit arts organization in 2000 and has been a resident company at Source Theater since 2008. Timothy Nelson assumed the artistic directorship in 2018, quickly establishing the newly rebranded “IN Series” as DC’s home for “Thought, debate, history, and innovation” in opera.