Lile Elbe
Tobias Picker
Aryeh Lev Stollman
Sinfonieorchester St. Gallen, Modestas Pitrėnas
Lucia Lucas, Sylvia D’Eramo
FOR YOUR
GRAMMY® CONSIDERATION
Best Opera Recording
Best Contemporary Classical Composition
★★★★ BBC Music Magazine
“An Opera of Transitions for a Trans Pioneer”
— The New York Times
“A riveting performer, Lucas sings from that thing we call the soul”
— Bay Area Reporter
“The strength of the entire project is proof enough that the neglect is undeserved.”
— San Francisco Classical Voice
ABOUT
LISTEN
Lili Elbe is a two-act opera by Tobias Picker with a libretto by Aryeh Lev Stollman, based on the life of Danish painter Lili Elbe, one of the earliest recipients of gender affirmation surgery. Set within the artistic partnership between Lili and her wife Gerda Wegener, the work explores identity, transformation, and enduring love. Recorded with Theater St. Gallen, this album presents an intimate portrait of courage and self-realization.
ABOUT The Artists:
Tobias Picker, born in New York City in 1954, has been described by The Wall Street Journal as “our finest composer for the lyric stage” and by BBC Music Magazine as displaying “a distinctively soulful style that is one of the glories of the current musical scene.”
His operas include Emmeline (Santa Fe Opera), Fantastic Mr. Fox (LA Opera), Thérèse Raquin (Dallas Opera), An American Tragedy (Metropolitan Opera), Dolores Claiborne (San Francisco Opera), Awakenings (Opera Theatre of Saint Louis), and Lili Elbe (Konzert und Theater St. Gallen). His eighth opera, Safe Haven, is scheduled to premiere at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis in 2027.
Picker’s catalog also features three symphonies; concertos for violin, viola, cello, oboe, and piano—most notably his Piano Concerto No. 2, Keys to the City, commissioned by the City of New York for the Brooklyn Bridge Centennial; a ballet; and the tone poem, Old and Lost Rivers. His chamber music comprises numerous works, including two string quartets and two piano quintets. His orchestral music has been performed by major ensembles such as the New York Philharmonic and the orchestras of Chicago, Cleveland and Philadelphia, as well as the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Munich Philharmonic, Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg and Tonhalle -Orchester Zürich. Fantastic Mr. Fox (BMOP Sound) received the 2020 Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording.
Tobias Picker’s music is published exclusively by Schott.
Author and librettist Aryeh Lev Stollman writes at the intersection of literature, music, and medicine. He has written three librettos for composer Tobias Picker: Awakenings, commissioned by Opera Theatre of Saint Louis (OTSL) and premiered in 2022; Lili Elbe, commissioned by Theater St. Gallen and premiered in 2023; and Safe Haven, scheduled to premiere at OTSL in 2027.
Stollman’s first novel, The Far Euphrates (Riverhead/Penguin Putnam Inc.), received the Lambda Literary Award and was named an American Library Association Notable Book and a National Book Critics Circle Notable Book. The New York Times Book Review described it as “radiant” and “remarkable,” citing its understated prose and construction. The novel has been translated into multiple languages, including German, Dutch, Italian, Portuguese, and Hebrew.
His second novel, The Illuminated Soul (Riverhead), received Hadassah Magazine’s Harold U. Ribalow Prize. The Boston Globe called it “an admirable novel of ideas.” It has also been translated into several languages. His short fiction has appeared in The Yale Review, Story, American Short Fiction, and The Southwest Review. His collection The Dialogues of Time and Entropy was published in 2003, the same year he received the inaugural Chaim Potok Literary Award.
His story "Lotte Returns!" was commissioned and broadcast by National Public Radio. His third novel, Queen of Jerusalem, was published in 2020 by Aryeh Nir/Modan in Hebrew translation under the title דברי ימי נעמה.
Stollman is a neuroradiologist at the Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City.
