The Ango-American Librettist & Producer Lila Palmer takes us to rural Vermont and to beautifully vivid moments of music in her childhood, like crouching under a grand piano listening to a family friend play, onto her days studying History at Cambridge, where she became aware of overlooked narratives hidden around every corner. Starting down the path as a Mezzo, training at New England Conservatory of Music and English National Opera, she found the stories she was inhabiting didn’t give her enough agency, and it was suggested to her that she might be more comfortable on the other side of the table, writing the roles herself. Since then, Lila trained as a Librettist at both the Guildhall in London and the American Lyric Theatre in New York, and her work has been performed from the Barbican Centre in London to Washington National Opera, to Opera Saratoga, the Edinburgh Fringe and performed by Golda Schutz on her recital tour.  Alongside her commissions, Lila is the interim managing director at ALT, and is developing her own research project: The Archetypes. Lila shares her ideas on collaboration, how she started to develop her work early on, and how she approaches the demands of a ‘portfolio career’.

Read more about Lila on her website here and her work with ALT here and follow her on Instagram here