Posts Categorized: 2012 Season

It was a nerdy Friday night, with a wonderful collection of opera geeks in the Lecture Hall at the Center for Education. WTOC coach/pianist Jeremy Frank and four Studio Artists treated us to a whirlwind tour through Stravinsky’s musical styles. Our Fine Tuning series kicked off last year with a companion concert to our Tales of Hoffman production, “The Tale(nt)s

Many things happening so quickly in this last week of the 2012 season: A morning with children and their families at The Barns – exploring all the many things it takes to make an opera… We built Baba Beards, learned how to conduct, collected fabric swatches, wrote supertitles and saw the short opera Tom’s Four

If I had a personal blog, this might be the kind of post I’d write. Nothing awfully revealing, as I’m essentially a private person; but more than I’m accustomed to sharing professionally. I do try to cultivate some objectivity about our company and its product, but I think that I’ve lost this particular battle. Rake’s Progress is

Last night, Ryan, Jason, Maggie & Corinne joined forces with the National Symphony Orchestra and the Washington Chorus for Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. It was a magical evening in the outdoors – one that reminded me of my love/hate (or, in this case, shall we say “Freude/Bösen”) relationship with our beautiful outdoor venue. Die Freude On

Final two rehearsals for Sunday’s Make-Your-Own-Concert: Mezzo-soprano Maggie Gawrysiak and I had our rehearsal in the theatre, to check balances. (We’re already building the Rake’s Progress set onstage, so the piano is on the house floor.) We prepped Joan of Arc’s aria from Tchaikovsky’s The Maid of Orleans, the Witch’s aria from Hansel and Gretel

Three more rehearsals today, dusting off aria and song favorites in preparation for Sunday’s aleatory musical event… (I may never go back to my desk again…) Mezzo-soprano Olivia Vote and I covered some amazing ground, from Rossini to Strauss. We started with the Habanera from Carmen, and moved on to the gorgeous Viljalied from Lehar’s

Tuesday’s rehearsals for Sunday’s wildly exciting make-your-own-concert: Bass-baritone Ryan Kuster and I made the rounds from the boy next door (Figaro) to the the testosterone-laden Toreador, and from the incurable optimist (Don Quixote) to the devil himself (Méphistophélès). We began with Mozart”s “Se vuol ballare” (The Marriage of Figaro) and moved into “Votre toast” from

I’m happily back at the piano this week, prepping music for this Sunday’s Aria Jukebox. Each singer is offering four arias/songs, and audience members will get to choose the playlists for the concert by stuffing the coin bins with quarters. (At left: quarters at the ready, to be distributed at the door!)  Monday’s Rehearsals Bass

Last week’s Studio Spotlight performances were gutsy, gratifying, inspiring and exciting. Huge thanks go out to our twelve Studio Artists (listed below in context of their performances), pianists Eric McEnaney & Tomoko Nakayama, director Nathan Troup, assistant director Kelsey Carroll, stage manager Andrew Esposito, coach and supertitle coordinator Stephanie Rhodes, and Studio Co-Managers Lee Anne Myslewski