For its mid-season production, Marble City Opera is presenting The Infinite Energy of Ada Lovelace—music by Kamala Sankaram and libretto by Rob Handel. The one-act chamber opera received its premiere in 2019 from Opera Ithaca. The MCO production will be the work’s third staging.
A bit of background—Ada Lovelace, was the only legitimate child of Lord Byron and Lady Anabella Byron during their tempestuous marriage. The couple separated only a month after Ada was born with the young girl never again seeing her famous father; Ada was only eight when Lord Byron died in Greece. Her mother saw to it that Ada received a substantial education, including mathematics and science. In 1835 at age twenty, she met and married William King-Noel, 1st Earl of Lovelace, becoming known as Ada Lovelace.
Lovelace met mathematician and inventor Charles Babbage when she was 18 through a mutual friend. She became fascinated with his work and and his prototype of his difference engine, a mechanical device used to calculate polynomial functions. They remained friends through the years after her marriage. Years later, Lovelace worked translating a technical article by the Italian mathematician Luigi Menabrea on Babbage’s proposed machine, the Analytical Engine. Her notes, which she created to supplement the translation presented the potential for the engine to carry out an algorithm, thus leading writers to call her the first computer programmer. The opera’s story reflects the struggle between her work as a mathematician and her efforts to uphold her reputation as a wife, mother, and public figure.
The opera, directed by Sierra Hammond with musical direction by Christy Lee, features six roles. Ada, Countess of Lovelace, will be sung by Theresa Kesser; her husband William King-Noel by Ben Werley; Charles Babbage by Daniel Spiotta; and Harriet Beecher Stowe by Kathryn Grumley. Two roles are called “the Nanny” (Kayla Beard) and “the Butler” (Joel Brown). The work is scored for keyboard and a string quartet.
You may be asking: how does Harriet Beecher Stowe, author and abolitionist, figure into the story? For extra credit prior to seeing The Infinite Energy of Ada Lovelace, read “The True Story of Lady Byron’s Life” by Stowe from the September, 1869, issue of The Atlantic magazine.
There are three performances of The Infinite Energy of Ada Lovelace at the Old City Performing Arts Center, 111 State Street; Thursday – Saturday, March 16, 17, 18, at 7:30 PM. One can also choose to view it via streaming by selecting the virtual option on the ticket page.
The production is a participant in the Penny4Arts program, allowing children to attend FREE.
