Paola Prestini
While studying composition at the Juilliard School, Paola Prestini was eager to create the kind of boundary-blurring, collaborative pieces that didn\u2019t have a place on the noted conservatory\u2019s curriculum. She therefore co-created her first non-profit, the interdisciplinary arts company VisionIntoArt (VIA), and ran it successfully for 15 year thereafter, all the while gradually making her inimitable mark on the world of classical music with her own creations. \nIn 2015 she folded VIA\u2019s mission into National Sawdust, a brand-new performance space and music incubator in Brooklyn that she co-founded with tax attorney and arts lover Kevin Dolan. While managing National Sawdust\u2019s many programs and its impressive performance slate as the organization\u2019s artistic director, she has continued to compose works that have been performed around the world, including orchestral and choral works commissioned by some of the world\u2019s premier classical music venues, including the New York Philharmonic, the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Barbican Centre.\nPaola spoke with Pier Carlo Talenti in April from her home in Brooklyn, several weeks after she\u2019d returned from Minneapolis, where the pandemic lockdown had shut down rehearsals for the premiere of her first commissioned opera, \u201cEdward Tulane.\u201d Minnesota Opera has committed to premiering the work at a later date; San Diego Opera has made the same commitment for her opera \u201cAging Magician,\u201d which was also slated to premiere in spring of 2020. \n\xa0\nIn this interview she discusses how hewing to her vision with integrity has guided her artistically and institutionally and how it continues to serve her through the current crisis, in which she and National Sawdust have to lead like never before. \nhttp://paolaprestini.com/ (http://paolaprestini.com/)\nhttps://nationalsawdust.org/ (https://nationalsawdust.org/)