Friday the 13th. Seriously.

It’s been a long week.

We’re saying bon voyage to a valuable member of our team. Since 2009, Ryan Taylor has been our Manager of Community Development, our summer marketing and development liaison, our 2012 season audition consultant, an invaluable colleague and a wonderful periodic addition to our small regular staff in the”off” season. He’s heading west to Phoenix, having just been tapped as Arizona Opera’s new Director of Artistic Administration. It’s fabulous news for Ryan, and we couldn’t be happier for him. (Well, we could be, if we could just find a way to clone him…)

In recent seasons, we’ve sent Administrative Fellow Joshua Winograde off to be LA Opera’s Artistic Administrator.  Eric Melear was the Music Director of our Opera Studio (having gotten his Wolf Trap start as a Coaching Fellow), and he’s just landed in Houston as their Associate Music Director. And now Ryan’s leaving us behind. Isn’t it enough that the young artists go through a revolving door and out into the world? <sigh>

We haven’t been able to hire an Administrative Fellow for a few seasons, and in light of this transition, we’re re-opening that position. To find out more, go here.

Since I seem to have little brain space for anything substantial, here’s my list of links for this Short Attention Span Friday. Happy surfing :)

• You’ve probably heard about the unfortunate cell phone incident at the NY Phil this week. I am personally terrified that my phone will learn how to turn itself on in my purse and mortify me like this. Ouch.
• Tweet Seats: Can we really welcome smart phones into the theatre in this way? I have a love/hate relationship with the idea.
• Big opera news in your nation’s capital this week. Exciting stuff for my old employer, the Washington National Opera. The return to the Terrace Theatre isn’t the biggest news in this story, but somehow it’s my favorite part.
• Aretha‘s been to Wolf Trap many times, but I wonder if she knows we have an opera company… Hmmm….
• The Virginia Opera blog scored a huge hit this week with a discussion (well, kind of a lovely rant) on pop culture’s fascination with children who sing “opera.”
• And finally, Wolf Trap’s own From The Inside Out blog featured critic and blogger Tim Smith’s take on opera trends for 2012. He says there’s nothing more foolhardy than making predictions, but I think he’s spot on.

Happy weekend!