BIOGRAPHY

Photo by Christopher Turner

Alan Olejniczak is an opera librettist and playwright based in San Francisco. His operas, including Atlas of Remote Islands (2023) and Unbound, (2021)  with music by Nathan Hall, and Death of Ivan Ilych (2021) with music by John Young. 

Alan has two more premieres this year. His play, Concerto with the Lyric Theatre of Oklahoma. and his oratorio, Yosef and the Counseling Angel with music by Cole Thomason-Redus in Denver. He also has an upcoming opera workshop of Midnight to Midnight with Dante de Silva and Synchomy in Los Angeles in June 2024. In September 2024, his opera, Dreams Americanos will premiere with I Colori dell'opera in Houston​. Alan currently has six other operas in development and has set the text for the song cycle A Light Rekindled with Iranian-American composer Amin Sarrafi.

Alan is also the Playwright in Residence with The Proscenium, a London-based online theatre company. Their first season includes his plays Next of Kin, Helt Texas, and his adaptation of A Christmas Carol with David Ricardo-Pearce. His upcoming plays include Workforce and Plunder, written with writing lead, Carl Prekopp.
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​Alan was the Artist in Residence for Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park and the first playwright ever selected by the National Parks Arts Foundation. Alan’s other artist residencies include: Micro Galleries in Pātan, Nepal; Nes Residency in Skagaströnd, Iceland; Nocefresca in Milis, Sardinia; along with the prestigious The Arctic Circle Residency, sailing the icy waters around Svalbard. Alan will return to Svalbard in August 2024, for another residency for their Alumni Expedition. Alan is currently an Opera Committee Member of the Dramatist Guild and an Advisory Board Member of Opera Parallèle in San Francisco. ​
 
​Full Resume

​Becoming a storyteller is another reinvention for Alan. In past lives, he was a wine professional for twelve years, started his career at the City Grill in Atlanta and ending as the Sommelier of the Dining Room of the Ritz Carton - Buckhead, a Mobil Five-Star, AAA Five Diamond restaurant. Alan then went on to become a Special Educator working for sixteen years with elementary and middle-school students with a focus on reading acquisition.  

"How in the heck do you pronounce that last name?" OH/la/KNEE/check  ​