The Boy Who Drew Cats was created by award-winning composer Asako Hirabayashi in collaboration with award-winning visual artist Mayumi Amada. Based on an ancient Japanese folktale, rewritten by Asako Hirabayashi, the story is about how children’s perceived shortcomings can end up being strengths, leading to success in their lives. Instead of a realistic stage set for the opera, Mayumi creates imaginary, spiritual, and abstract images on the stage to enhance the opera's message. Influenced by the spirit and ideologies of Buddhism, Mayumi draws upon the philosophy of Zen to give direction to the creation of her work.

About the Producer

Asako Hirabayashi is a composer who has written five operas and 33 chamber pieces, which have been played in 15 countries, and a harpsichordist who has performed as a soloist in seven countries since her New York debut recital at Carnegie Hall in New York. Hirabayashi's compositions have been recorded on three commercial CDs. Her first commercial CD, for which she composed and played all the music, received seven favorable reviews internationally. It was named one of the top 10 albums of the year 2018 and won the Gold Medal Award by the Global Music Awards. Fanfare reviewed the album, saying, "Twenty-four tracks of passionate, sparkling, lyrical, even poignant music to help secure the harpsichord’s presence in the new millennium. ... Her contemporary harpsichord music is ingenious, fanciful, diverse, and unpretentious. ... I admit I’ve never been a fan of the harpsichord, she has changed all that for me and awakened me to the idea that a composer can reinvent an instrument." Hirabayashi has received numerous awards, including two McKnight fellowships, two first prizes at the Alienor International Harpsichord Composition Competition, first prize at the NHK International Song Writing Competition in Japan, a 2021 OPERA America Discovery Grant, MNiatures:Tiny Operas, Big Ideas by MN Opera, 2019 Schubert Club Composer Award, 2012 Jerome Fund for New Music, and 2008 Subito grant. Hirabayashi earned her D.M.A. from The Juilliard School. 

The Awards for Digital Excellence in Opera are supported by The Joseph and Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation.