Fort Worth Opera will receive a $25,000 grant from the city to help spread the word about the world premiere of  JFK, commissioned to open 2016’s Fort Worth Opera Festival. Fort Worth’s Promotion and Development Fund awarded the grant.

Photograph by Verner Reed, Verner Reed Collection, Historic New England Composer, David T. Little | Librettist, Royce Vavrek

“This investment in our company from the Mayor and the City tells me that they believe Fort Worth Opera is producing work that has a lasting, positive impact on our city,”  said General Director Darren K. Woods, in a press release.

In 2007, the Opera received a similar grant for promotions as it transitioned from a traditional stagione – or season –  style to its current festival format, said Holland Sanders, Director of Marketing and Communications for the company. This year’s grant will help the company promote JFK in regional and national markets.

JFK, by David T.  Little and Royce Vavrek, explores the hours President John F. Kennedy and his wife, Jacqueline, spent between their arrival at the Hotel Texas in Fort Worth and his assassination in Dallas the next day. It opens the Fort Worth Opera Festival at Bass Performance Hall on April 23, 2016.