Sandra Cisneros: Reading, Discussion, and Performance from the Opera “The House on Mango Street”

The Litowitz MFA+MA Program and the Bienen School of Music are proud to present Sandra Cisneros, in conversation with Derek Bermel.

The program will include a reading, a discussion with Derek Bermel, and a performance of a piece from the work-in-progress opera “The House on Mango Street.”

Sandra Cisneros is the author of the world-renowned novel The House on Mango Street, which won the Before Columbus Foundation’s American Book Award in 1985 and is required reading in middle schools, high schools, and universities across the country. It has sold over six million copies since its initial publication.

Her other works include a chapbook of poetry, Bad Boys (Mango Press 1980); two full-length poetry books, My Wicked Wicked Ways (Third Woman Press 1987; Random House 1992) and Loose Woman (Alfred A. Knopf 1994); a collection of stories, Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories (Random House 1991); a children’s book, Hairs/Pelitos (Alfred A. Knopf 1994); the novels The House on Mango Street (Vintage 1991) and Caramelo (Knopf 2002), and the picture book Have You Seen Marie? (Knopf 2012). A House of My Own: Stories from My Life (Alfred A. Knopf 2015) is a collection of personal essays, and Puro Amor (Sarabande 2018) is a bilingual story that Cisneros also illustrated. Her most recent works include the Spanish and English story Martita, I Remember You/Martita te recuerdo (Vintage 2021) and a poetry collection, Mujer Sin Vergüenza (2022).

Composer and clarinetist Derek Bermel has received the Alpert Award in the Arts, the Rome Prize, Guggenheim and Fulbright Fellowships, the Trailblazer Award from the American Music Center, and the Academy Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Recordings of his music have received three Grammy nominations: Intonations (Naxos, 2023), Migrations (Naxos, 2020) and Voices (BMOP, 2010). Bermel’s orchestral commissions have included works for the Pittsburgh, National, Boston, Saint Louis, New Jersey, and Pacific Symphonies, and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and his work has been performed by major orchestras and ensembles in concert halls from São Paulo to London to Beijing. His chamber music has been commissioned by Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, eighth blackbird, the Guarneri String Quartet, Music from China, Copland House, Asko/Schönberg (Netherlands), Jazz Xchange (U.K.), La Jolla Music Society, Seattle Chamber Music Festival, Figura (Denmark), and the Koussevitzky and Fromm Foundations.