YOURS FOREVER, LINCOLN examines the intimate same-sex relationships of Abraham Lincoln. World premiering in October 2022, Quarry Theatre’s original chamber opera, Yours Forever, Lincoln, aims to spark discussions around the history of sexuality, American revisionist history, and the importance of LGBTQAI+ visibility.

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"From the first scene, one notices an eclectic, yet fully cohesive, collage of stylistic elements in the production…a lovely and evocative evening’s entertainment. There is an aching and yearning grapple with impossibility saturating the piece."

-Max Garner, Maryland Theatre Guide

Photos by Katie Simmons-Barth

"Musically, the highlight of the performance belongs to Hernandez in 'Comrades.' Bryant, in turn, shines in 'Yours Forever.' Both artists are fine actors and wonderful vocalists."

-Max Garner, Maryland Theatre Guide

Scene One: Grammar Lessons

Scene Two: Comrades

Scene Three: Bedfellows (Excerpt)

Scene Five: The Fatal First (Excerpt)

Scene Six: Yours Forever (Excerpt)

Scene Eight: Who Could Resist Him (Excerpt)

Epilogue: And That Night I Was Happy (Excerpt)

"It is Alexander’s most inventive composition...a melancholic and brooding presentation of melodic and psychic descent."

-Max Garner, Maryland Theatre Guide

About the opera

The intimate male relationships of Abraham Lincoln have been under the scholar’s microscope

for decades with many proposing the idea that these relationships went beyond basic friendships. Quarry Theatre’s original chamber opera Yours Forever, Lincoln aims to spark discussions around the history of sexuality, American revisionist history, and the importance of LGBTQAI+ visibility.

A compilation of original text, historical first-person accounts, letters and poetry by Lincoln, and Queer-themed poetry by Walt Whitman and Lord Byron, Yours Forever, Lincoln explores the beauty of ambiguity, sexuality as a spectrum, and the men who helped shape one of the most iconic leaders in American history.

"Lincoln has a mythological status in American culture and the realization that even an icon’s

history can be erased inspired me to tell this story,” says Patrick Alexander, composer and

co-librettist for the new opera, Yours Forever, Lincoln. “I hope other LGBTQAI+ people, upon

experiencing this opera, will also feel seen."

Yours Forever, Lincoln premiered at The Voxel in Baltimore, MD and ran from October 21-29, 2022.

Creators

Music by Patrick Alexander

Libretto by Laura Holland and Patrick Alexander

Cast

Abraham Lincoln: Gabriel Hernandez

Billy Greene/Joshua Speed/Elmer Ellsworth/David Derickson: Zachary Bryant

The Biographer: Joshua Poole