We spoke with Emma about her project, the inspiration behind it, and her time at MSM so far.
Mezzo-soprano, Emma Kristin Batchvarov (BM ’28) is a junior Vocal Arts major from Antwerp, Belgium currently studying with Mary Dunleavy.
Emma: There is one writer whose legacy has endured for centuries through the timeless truths of comedy, tragedy, and the complexities of human relationships: William Shakespeare. His works have transcended art forms, inspired adaptations, and influenced music across genres, establishing him as a pioneer of modern storytelling and laying the foundation for countless stories that followed. Through a classical lens, Shakespeare explores human struggles that remain relevant today, with characters and narratives continually reimagined through opera, musical theatre, jazz, and beyond.
In this project, we have chosen to tell these stories through the voices of the secondary characters—the figures who create the drama and drive the action, yet rarely take center stage. From Desdemona, whose fate is intertwined with the tragedy of Othello and Iago, to Ophelia, who reveals the humanity within Hamlet, and Juliet, who transforms Romeo and his relationship with the world, we explore Shakespeare’s timeless stories through the perspectives of those who shape them from the sidelines.
Emma: My sister is an actor and theatre-maker with a master’s degree in drama, training in the Meisner technique and classical texts, and a repertoire that includes multiple Shakespearean roles. I, on the other hand, am pursuing opera. Though our artistic paths move through different disciplines, we found ourselves drawn to the same questions: Where do opera and theater meet? Almost instinctively, our conversation turned to Shakespeare.
There was something inevitable about it. Shakespeare’s words seem to resist belonging to any one art form; they are at once poetry, theatre, music, and movement. His language carries a rhythm of its own, a musicality that invites interpretation beyond the page. And so, what began as a simple conversation became a larger curiosity: What other art forms have found a home in Shakespeare? How have his words been interpreted through opera, dance, music, and visual art? What happens when artists from different disciplines encounter the same text, each bringing their own sensibilities, styles, and ways of interpreting it?
I began imagining a space where friends and peers could come together, bringing their individual practices to experiment, collaborate, listen, and question what emerges when our disciplines meet around a shared source of inspiration. Perhaps Shakespeare could become our meeting point: a common language through which we could explore our differences, uncover unexpected connections, and create something that none of us might have arrived at alone.
Emma in rehearsal for The Seven Shadows of Shakespeare
Emma: The Seven Shadows of Shakespeare is a cross-departmental project that brings together MSM’s Vocal Arts, Musical Theatre, and Jazz departments. We have selected arias by Verdi, Handel, Gounod, Finzi, and Bernstein, alongside original compositions and arrangements created by MSM student composers. Siddharth Ragavan (BM ’28) has composed a classical trio especially for our performance, bringing the grace and beauty of Shakespeare’s 17th-century words in Sonnet 18 to life. Evan Furrow (BM ’28), a drummer from the Jazz department, has written “Weird Sisters” and will perform it alongside fellow Jazz Arts students Luke Bacani (BM ’25, MM ’27), Ben Lerner (MM ’27), Robbie Nicolls (MM ’27), and Jack Towse (MM ’27). Elias Valle (BM ’28) has created a piano quintet arrangement of Othello’s “Ave Maria” and will perform it with strings students Cody Conley (BM ’28), Adrian Walker (BM‘28), August Schwob (BM ’27), and Alex Hansen (BM ’28).
Emma: The Seven Shadows of Shakespeare brings together theatre, opera, jazz, and movement to give a voice to seven characters from William Shakespeare’s body of work. These are the figures who typically serve the protagonist’s story: characters who drive the drama but are rarely heard themselves. We aim to invite audiences to encounter these Shakespearean figures through music, explore the timeless themes of love, loss, ambition, jealousy, and longing, and experience a variety of musical styles. More than simply translating Shakespeare’s words into music, the project creates a dialogue between text and sound.
Shakespeare’s words seem to resist belonging to any one art form; they are at once poetry, theatre, music, and movement. His language carries a rhythm of its own, a musicality that invites interpretation beyond the page. Emma Kristin Batchvarov (BM ’28), Vocal Arts
Shakespeare’s words seem to resist belonging to any one art form; they are at once poetry, theatre, music, and movement. His language carries a rhythm of its own, a musicality that invites interpretation beyond the page.
Emma Kristin Batchvarov (BM ’28), Vocal Arts
Emma: There are so many good schools across the globe, each with something special that draws students to them. What attracted me most to MSM was how warmly I was welcomed, along with the advice of my pre-college voice teacher and the opportunity to take a trial lesson with Mary Dunleavy. She is a fantastic educator who doesn’t impose her own interpretations or dictate how music should be performed, but instead helps you discover your own way of interpreting it.
Emma: If I could ask William Shakespeare a question, well, I have a thousand questions: and probably among these, the one about music would be the main one: which opera, aria, song, composition would speak to him deeply. Which piece of music would he feel resonates most profoundly with his writing, capturing the rhythm of his language, the intensity of his emotions, and the complexity of his characters? Would he recognize in a particular melody the echoes of his own verses, or discover something entirely new in the way music gives breath to words? I would love to know which composition he believes comes closest to his own artistic world: not simply as an accompaniment to his writing, but as its musical counterpart, a work that seems to understand what his words are trying to say even before they are spoken.
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