Patrick Summers Takes Helm as Artistic and Music Director * Perryn Leech Named Managing Director

Houston, TX, May 25, 2011: The Board of Directors of Houston Grand Opera (HGO) today voted unanimously to realign its top management structure, naming Patrick Summers as Artistic and Music Director, occupying the Margaret Alkek Williams Chair. Chief Operating Officer Perryn Leech has been named Managing Director. Chief Advancement Officer Greg Robertson completes the executive leadership team, which is supported by an eight-member senior management staff. These moves follow the departure of Anthony Freud, the company’s General Director, who has been appointed to lead the Lyric Opera of Chicago.

HGO Chairman of the Board Glen Rosenbaum said, “On behalf of the HGO Board of Directors, I am delighted to announce the appointment of Patrick Summers as Artistic and Music Director. Patrick is one of the world’s great opera visionaries and conductors. Since he joined HGO in the 1998-99 season, Patrick’s knowledge and leadership have immeasurably inspired and elevated the quality of our artistic product. The pairing of Patrick’s vision with the superb managerial and technical expertise of Perryn Leech provides HGO the leadership to achieve new heights of excellence in all its undertakings.”

“The Board’s primary objective was to assemble a world-class leadership team, and we found those individuals within HGO,” noted Rosenbaum. “Each is highly respected in the opera world, and together they assure that our company will build on its successes, continuing and expanding its magnificent record of achievements onstage at the Wortham Center and around the world. Mr. Summers, Mr. Leech and Mr. Robertson all possess extensive knowledge and strong entrepreneurial skills qualities that are essential to managing a complex and innovative enterprise like HGO.”

Mr. Summers said, “I am as honored by the Houston Grand Opera board’s confidence as I am grateful to have been mentored by two extraordinary leaders during my tenure as the company’s Music Director. I thank David Gockley, who brought me to Houston in the late 1990s, for the many years we worked together. Most especially, I wish to acknowledge my colleague Anthony Freud, with whom I have enjoyed the most inspired and rewarding artistic partnership of my life over these past six seasons. I look forward to the success he will undoubtedly have with Chicago’s historic company.

“My initial attraction to Houston Grand Opera has greatly deepened during my years here. In this precarious time for the arts in the United States, HGO has managed to constantly re-define what an arts company could look like in a young and growing American city. HGO is an institution reflective of its city: it is entrepreneurial, inspired by bold ideas. It prefers to climb new mountains rather than stroll through the familiar hills. It is not simply a European Opera house dropped into an American city, waiting for adherents; it is a uniquely American institution, a model for the future of many arts organizations in our nation. Our main objective is to produce great opera, and to make this inspiring art form as available and affordable as possible, while breaking down the social clichés that are unfairly attached to the performing arts.

“In addition to producing the finest performances we can during our seasons, I want to rigorously address an area I feel to be vital not just to HGO, but to American culture: arts education. As governments relentlessly cut the arts from schools, the responsibilities for arts education will increasingly move to arts companies and to the artisans who populate them. We have a moral imperative as artists: to be more than simply the guardians of an honestly great tradition, but to also begin to assume the mantle of educators. Tradition, it must be remembered, is only truly honored by innovation.”

In his thirteen years with Houston Grand Opera, Mr. Summers has conducted more than forty-five operas across the full range of the repertoire and is responsible for many of the company’s important artistic advances, including the formation and development of the Houston Grand Opera Orchestra, regularly praised by visiting critics as a world-class ensemble. In demand as a conductor at many of the world’s great opera houses, he is Principal Guest Conductor at San Francisco Opera, a company with which he has had a long and important association; he also appears regularly at the Metropolitan Opera, Bregenz Festival, and Opera Australia, among others. In August 2010, he was named one of “The 25 Most Powerful Names in U.S. Opera” by Opera News.

During his 27-year career in production at theaters and opera companies including English National Opera and Welsh National Opera, Mr. Leech helped facilitate and realize the vision of many renowned directors and designers, along the way accumulating a wealth of theatrical experience across many artistic disciplines. At HGO, he has taken on increasing responsibilities culminating in his promotion to Chief Operating Officer in 2010, a role in which he has overseen all aspects of the company’s technical, financial, artistic and administrative operations. Mr. Leech said, “I am committed to continuing to build upon the solid foundations established by Anthony Freud and the HGO Board. Patrick and I look forward to working with and leading our HGO colleagues in building an exciting and strong future for the company.”

Departing General Director and CEO Anthony Freud said, “HGO is an extraordinary company of exceptionally talented people with a truly remarkable leadership team that commands tremendous respect throughout the opera business. I couldn’t be more delighted that Patrick and Perryn are assuming these extremely important new roles. Both are uniquely well-qualified, and I am sure they will have enormous success.” He added, “HGO is a company that I will always love and admire. It is wonderful to know that it will be led by this outstanding and visionary new team, who will I am sure take the company from the strong position it presently occupies to new levels of vision, achievement, and acclaim.”

David Gockley, who was General Director at Houston Grand Opera until 2005 and is presently General Director of San Francisco Opera, said “I am thrilled that Patrick will take charge of the artistic fortunes of my beloved HGO. His superior knowledge of the art form and the stature he has attained as the company’s Music Director and a widely heralded guest conductor have placed him in an ideal position to lead HGO to the next level of accomplishment.”

Honorary board member, mezzo-soprano Frederica von Stade commented, “Patrick manifests supreme knowledge, ability and judgment and more than anything a noble heart. It has been the gift of a lifetime to know him and work with him, and HGO is so lucky to have him as its leader.”

Houston Grand Opera’s fifty-sixth season concluded Sunday after a weekend of free performances: Puccini’s Madame Butterfly played at Miller Outdoor Theatre to capacity crowds, and Your Name Means The Sea by Franghiz Alizadeh, the company’s forty-third world premiere, played to a packed house at the Cullen Theater. At the Board meeting Wednesday morning, the company reported ticket sales of over $4 million, more than ninety-four percent of capacity. HGO’s comprehensive campaign, launched in 2007, has raised over $75 million. “At a time when so many U.S. arts organizations are struggling, Houston Grand Opera is succeeding in all areas  and maintaining tremendous momentum,” stated Rosenbaum, adding, “The level of artistic excellence has never been higher, and through the Nexus Initiative and HGOco we are doing groundbreaking work in providing relevant and meaningful service to our community. Our future is very bright indeed.”

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STARRING THOMAS HAMPSON, WILLIAM BURDEN AND MELODY MOORE PATRICK SUMMERS TO CONDUCT, FRANCESCA ZAMBELLO TO DIRECT

Heart of a Soldier based on Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist James B. Stewart’s acclaimed book and the life stories of Susan Rescorla, Rick Rescorla and Daniel J. Hill
A true story of military combat, love, friendship and heroism culminating with the devastating terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center

San Francisco, CA (December 7, 2010) – San Francisco Opera today announced details of Heart of a Soldier, a new opera by composer Christopher Theofanidis with a libretto by Donna DiNovelli, starring baritone Thomas Hampson, tenor William Burden and soprano Melody Moore. Commissioned by San Francisco Opera, Heart of a Soldier is based on the critically acclaimed non-fiction book of the same name by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist James B. Stewart and the life stories of Susan Rescorla, Rick Rescorla and Daniel J. Hill. The announcement was made at a press conference by San Francisco Opera General Director David Gockley and members of the opera’s creative team, including Christopher Theofanidis, Donna DiNovelli, Patrick Summers, Francesca Zambello, James B. Stewart and Susan Rescorla.

Heart of a Soldier will premiere on Saturday, September 10, 2011—the eve of the tenth anniversary of the World Trade Center attacks—as part of the Company’s 2011–12 repertory season.  Six additional performances will be presented through September 30 at the historic War Memorial Opera House. San Francisco Opera Artistic Adviser Francesca Zambello will direct this world premiere production and San Francisco Opera Principal Guest Conductor Patrick Summers will lead the San Francisco Opera Orchestra and Chorus. The production team includes set designer Peter J. Davison, costume designer Jess Goldstein, lighting designer Mark McCullough, projection designer S. Katy Tucker, movement director Rick Sordelet and company chorus director Ian Robertson.

The world premiere of Heart of a Soldier is made possible, in part, by Company Sponsors John A. and Cynthia Fry Gunn. Additional support provided by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts.

A story of war, love, friendship and heroism, Heart of a Soldier reflects on the extraordinary true story of Rick Rescorla, a man trained to be a consummate warrior who gave up his own life saving thousands in the attacks on September 11, 2001. Inspired by the American soldiers he saw as a boy in Cornwall, England preparing to launch the Normandy invasion on what became D-Day, and his adult friendship with American fighting man Dan Hill, whom he meets in war-torn Rhodesia, Rescorla emigrates to the United States in the early 1960s to become a soldier and a “Yank,” ultimately becoming a decorated platoon leader during the Vietnam War.

On September 11, 2001, as head of security for Morgan Stanley at Two World Trade Center, Rescorla is thrown to the floor when United Airlines Flight 175 crashes into the South Tower. Amidst the unimaginable chaos that ensues, Rescorla uses his commanding presence and booming voice to literally sing his colleagues down smoke-filled stairs and out of the building. While he successfully evacuates all of his company’s 2,700 employees from the South Tower before it collapses, Rescorla makes the ultimate sacrifice when he goes back into the building to search for stragglers. Heart of a Soldier is an opera about a hero who disdains that very term, and about his deep friendship with an American soldier, so unlike him in approach and yet so similar in dedication and bravery.

“For nearly a decade I have been hoping to commission an opera from the brilliantly talented Christopher Theofanidis,” stated David Gockley. “When there finally was a window of opportunity at Houston Grand Opera, I changed jobs and preliminary plans for Heart of a Soldier had to be put on hold.  Once in San Francisco, I felt the opportunity to commission this work in observation of the tenth anniversary of the tragic events of 9/11—and the commitment of Tom Hampson to create the lead role—gave the project critical mass. On the surface the piece is about what it takes to be a true hero, but what will drive the music is the passion, the suspense and the ultimate tragedy.”

Heart of a Soldier features a traditional orchestra with added elements including electric guitar and synthesizer, as well as a large choral presence. The score evokes contemporary idioms of American classical music along with Cornish ballads and 20th-century pop-rock influences. According to Christopher Theofanidis: “The tone is lyrical and has a great deal of humor woven throughout, which is part of the humanity these characters bring to the story. There are hints of music from very different circumstances here that run below the surface—music from the 1940s, rock of the 1960s, Cornish folksong and Islamic calls to prayer (Dan Hill converts to Islam and goes to fight for the U.S. in Afghanistan). However, the music stylistically strives to integrate and fuse these elements into the work.”

Theofanidis continues: “Donna and I have met with Dan Hill and Susan Rescorla (Rick Rescorla’s widow) and we are honored to be involved with this project. The fact that it is a true story has made it very personal for both of us. This is fundamentally a deeply humanistic work, with an emphasis on Rick and Dan coming to understand who they are as people and then maximizing their potential. The essence of this comes from a sense of service to others and duty—the heart of a soldier. This nobility of spirit is transformed in the arc of the opera from Vietnam, where it kept Rick and Dan’s troops together, to September 11th, when Rick went back into a building he knew was going to fall. Another theme resonating throughout the opera is how we honor and remember the dead, how we incorporate them into our own hearts and come to grips with great loss.”

“When I read James Stewart’s true story of an unsung hero of 9/11, its epic themes of a warrior’s code of honor, intense bonds of loyalty, late-found love and overwhelming tragedy struck me as extremely theatrical,” said Francesca Zambello. “It also takes up ideas and ideals, morals and morality in the context of modern American lives. I have always wanted to create an opera based on a real life story and was very gratified when David Gockley agreed to develop this work with me.”

Ancillary Events
In conjunction with the Heart of a Soldier world premiere, San Francisco Opera will offer an array of educational and enrichment programs both prior to and concurrently with the presentation of the new opera. Recognizing the sensitivity of the subject matter, initial plans call for informative panel discussions and lectures with the opera’s artistic team about the creation of the work in addition to a broader discussion with members of the community’s emergency response teams, veterans of foreign wars, and religious and civic leaders.

Tickets & Information
Heart of a Soldier will be presented as part of San Francisco Opera’s 2011-12 Season in seven performances on September 10, 13, 18, 21, 24, 27 and 30, 2011 at the War Memorial Opera House.  Complete details of San Francisco Opera’s 2011–12 Season will be announced in January 2011.  Subscription tickets for the 2011–12 Season will go on sale to San Francisco Opera subscribers beginning January 2011; single tickets will go on sale in July 2011. For more information about San Francisco Opera, visit sfopera.com or call the San Francisco Opera Box Office

Production Information
*San Francisco Opera debut  ● OperaVision performance

Heart of a Soldier — World Premiere                        September 10 (8pm), 13● (7:30pm), 18● (2pm),

Music by Christopher Theofanidis                                         21● (7:30pm), 24 (2pm), 27 (8pm),

Libretto by Donna DiNovelli                                                    30 (8pm), 2011

Based on the book by James B. Stewart                              War Memorial Opera House, San Francisco

and the life stories of Susan Rescorla, Rick Rescorla and Daniel J. Hill

Commissioned by San Francisco Opera

Sung in English with English supertitles

Approximate running time: 2 hours 45 minutes including 1 intermission

San Francisco Opera production

Cast:                                                                                       Production:

Rick Rescorla: Thomas Hampson                                               Conductor: Patrick Summers

Daniel J. Hill: William Burden                                                     Director: Francesca Zambello

Susan Rescorla: Melody Moore                                                  Set Designer: Peter J. Davison

Costume Designer: Jess Goldstein*

Lighting Designer: Mark McCullough

Projection Designer: S. Katy Tucker*

Chorus Director: Ian Robertson

Movement Director: Rick Sordelet*

About San Francisco Opera
San Francisco Opera is the second largest opera company in North America and has been one of the world’s leading producers of opera since its inception in 1923. David Gockley became San Francisco Opera’s sixth general director in January 2006. Considered one of the major innovators in American opera, Gockley came to San Francisco after three decades at the helm of Houston Grand Opera, which he led to become America’s leading commissioner and producer of new works, including 35 world premieres. Under Gockley’s direction, San Francisco Opera has already presented two world premieres: Appomattox (2007), from composer Philip Glass and librettist Christopher Hampton, and The Bonesetter’s Daughter (2008), by composer Stewart Wallace and Bay Area novelist Amy Tan.

With a current budget of $70.4 million, the Company opened its 88th season at the 3,100-seat War Memorial Opera House on September 10, 2010 with Verdi’s Aida, led by Music Director Nicola Luisotti.  The 2010–11 Season features a repertory of ten operas including a new production of Jules Massenet’s Werther, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro, Giacomo Puccini’s Madama Butterfly, the Company premiere of Franco Alfano’s Cyrano de Bergerac, a new production of Leoš Janaček’s The Makropulos Case, and this summer, Richard Wagner’s epic four-opera cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen, directed by Francesca Zambello.

Heart of a Soldier is part of David Gockley’s strategic mission of developing a vital American operatic repertoire. His commitment to presenting new works continues in future seasons with composer Mark Adamo’s The Gospel of Mary Magdalene, scheduled to premiere in June 2013. According to the composer, this opera “draws on the Gnostic gospels, the canonical gospels and fifty years of new Biblical scholarship to reimagine the loves and conflicts of the New Testament through the eyes of its leading female character.” The Company also plans to present the Bay Area stage premieres of John Adams’s seminal opera, Nixon in China, in Summer 2012, and Jake Heggie’s Moby-Dick in Fall 2012, a San Francisco Opera co-commission that received widespread critical and audience acclaim at its Dallas Opera premiere last season.

About the Heart of a Soldier Artists & Creative Team
Christopher Theofanidis’ work has been performed by many leading orchestras around the world, including the National Symphony (Washington, D.C.), the London Symphony, the Oslo Philharmonic, the Moscow Soloists, the Monte Carlo Philharmonic, the California Symphony (for which he was composer-in-residence from 1994 to 1996), the Oregon Symphony, the Brooklyn Philharmonic, the Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra, and the symphony orchestras of Atlanta, Houston, Baltimore, St. Louis, and Detroit, among others. His musical-dramatic work, The Refuge, received its premiere at Houston Grand Opera in 2007. Theofanidis has been the recipient of the International Masterprize (hosted at the Barbican Centre in London), the Rome Prize, a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Barlow Prize, six ASCAP Gould Prizes, a Fulbright Fellowship to France, a Tanglewood Fellowship, and the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Charles Ives Fellowship. He was recently nominated for a Grammy for best composition for his chorus and orchestra work The Here and Now, which received its premiere at Carnegie Hall by the Atlanta Symphony and Chorus. His orchestral concert work, Rainbow Body, has been performed by more than 70 orchestras during the last ten years. He has served as a delegate to the U.S.-Japan Foundation’s Leadership Program and is a former faculty member of the Juilliard School. Theofanidis currently teaches at the Peabody Conservatory at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.

As a librettist and lyricist, Donna DiNovelli’s work has been presented at the New York City Opera, the Public Theater, and Joe’s Pub. Her collaborations with director Francesca Zambello include lyrics for composer Rachel Portman’s 2008 musical Little House on the Prairie and Hildegard: A Measure of Joy, commissioned by the San Francisco Grammy-winning vocal ensemble Chanticleer. She has also collaborated with Randall Eng for many years, most notably on Florida (New York City Opera; Lyric Opera Cleveland; and a Frederick Loewe Foundation Reading, directed by David Herskovits). DiNovelli has written text for the Los Angeles Modern Dance and Ballet (Twelve Dancing Princesses) and has been invited to the National Musical Theater Conference, the Mac Dowell Colony, and the Atlantic Center for the Arts. Her stage play, The First Eff (Mark Taper Forum) was excerpted in New Monologues For Women; by Women (Heinemann Press). She has won commissions and fellowships from the Manhattan Theater Club, ASCAP, Mabou Mines, Houston Grand Opera, and the BBC. Besides teaching in the Graduate Musical Theater Writing Program at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, she teaches playwriting at the O’Neill Theater Center and was a visiting professor at Brown University, where she earned a master’s degree in fine arts working with Paula Vogel. She is working on a new opera with Paola Prestini which will be excerpted at NYCO’s Vox festival in the spring; and a new musical with Heidi Rodewald (Passing Strange).

The creative team worked closely with writer James B. Stewart during the opera’s gestation period to develop a working scenario based on his 2002 book, Heart of a Soldier. The book grew out of his New Yorker article “The Real Heroes Are Dead” (February 2002). Stewart received the 1988 Pulitzer Prize for his Wall Street Journal articles on the 1987 stock market crash and the insider trading scandal. In addition to Heart of a Soldier, named best non-fiction book of 2002 by Time magazine, the best-selling author’s books include Den of Thieves, Blind Eye, Blood Sport, and DisneyWar. Stewart is a former front-page editor of the Wall Street Journal, staff writer for The New Yorker and founding editor of SmartMoney. He is the Bloomberg professor of business journalism at Columbia University.

Preeminent American baritone Thomas Hampson returns to San Francisco Opera to create the role of Rick Rescorla. He has appeared with the Company as Ulysses (Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria); Figaro (The Barber of Seville); the title roles of Hamlet and Macbeth; and as Valmont in the world premiere of The Dangerous Liaisons. Hampson enjoys a singular international career as a recitalist, opera singer, and recording artist, and maintains an active interest in teaching, research, and technology. He has performed in all of the world’s most important concert halls and opera houses with many of today’s most renowned singers, pianists, conductors, and orchestras. Hampson has won worldwide recognition for his thoughtfully researched and creatively constructed programs that explore the rich repertoire of song in a wide range of styles, languages, and periods. He is one of the most important interpreters of German Romantic song, and with his celebrated “Song of America” project, he has become the “ambassador” of American song. His discography of more than 150 albums includes winners of a Grammy Award, two Edison Prizes, and the Grand Prix du Disque. He carries the titles of Kammersänger of the Vienna State Opera and Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the Republic of France, and was awarded the Austrian Medal of Honor in Arts and Sciences in 2004. He is the 2009 Distinguished Artistic Leadership Award recipient from the Atlantic Council in Washington D.C., and in 2008 he was named special adviser to the study and performance of music in America by Dr. James H. Billington, Librarian of Congress. In 2010, Hampson was elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and received the Library of Congress’s “Living Legend” award, which recognizes individuals who have made significant contributions to America’s diverse cultural, scientific, and social heritage.

William Burden creates the role of Dan Hill, Rescorla’s best friend and Vietnam War comrade. The tenor made his San Francisco Opera debut in 1992 as Count Lerma (Don Carlo) and has returned as Janek (The Makropulos Case), Lindoro (L’Italiana in Algeri), and Tom Rakewell (The Rake’s Progress). He has appeared in many prestigious opera houses in the United States and Europe, including the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Houston Grand Opera, Seattle Opera, Opera Company of Philadelphia, Santa Fe Opera, Glimmerglass Opera, New York City Opera, Teatro alla Scala, Paris Opera, Glyndebourne Opera Festival, the Paris Theatre du Chatelet, Munich’s Bavarian State Opera, Berlin State Opera, Madrid’s Teatro Real, and the Saito Kinen Festival. His many roles include the title roles of Faust, Pelléas et Mélisande, Roméo et Juliette, Béatrice and Bénédict, Candide, and Acis and Galatea; Captain Vere in Billy Budd, Don Jose in Carmen, Nemorino in L’Elisir d’Amore, Pylade in Iphigénie en Tauride, Narraboth in Salome, Gerald in Lakmé, Nerone in L’Incoronazione di Poppea, Ferrando in Cosí fan tutte, and Aschenbach in Death in Venice. He also created the role of Gilbert Griffiths in Picker’s An AmericanTragedy at the Metropolitan Opera, and the role of Dodge in Daron Hagen’s Amelia at the Seattle Opera.  Burden’s recordings include Barber’s Vanessa with the BBC Symphony Orchestra (Chandos, Musique adorable) and The Songs of Emmanuel Chabrier (Hyperion).

One of America’s exciting new talents, Melody Moore portrays Susan Rescorla, Rick Rescorla’s wife and soul mate. A former San Francisco Opera Adler Fellow and Merola Opera Program alumna, she was last seen on the San Francisco Opera stage as Mimi (La Bohème) in 2008. Her other Company credits include Countess Almaviva (Le Nozze di Figaro), Kate Pinkerton (Madama Butterfly), Ida (Die Fledermaus), a Greek Maiden (Iphigénie en Tauride), and Bianca (La Rondine). Career highlights include Mimi at English National Opera and Opera Cleveland; Countess Almaviva with Los Angeles Opera and appearances in that company’s productions of Der Zwerg, Der Zerbrochene Krug, and Suor Angelica; the title role of Manon Lescaut with New Orleans Opera; the title role of Suor Angelica with Orlando Opera; and Donna Anna (Don Giovanni) with the Cincinnati Chamber Opera. Recent and upcoming engagements include Marguerite (Faust) with English National Opera and Hawaii Opera Theater, Countess Almaviva with Madison Opera, Rita Clayton in the New York premiere of Stephen Schwartz’s Seance on a Wet Afternoon with New York City Opera, and debut with the Bavarian Radio Symphony in concert performances and a recording of excerpts of Gordon Getty’s Plump Jack. A graduate of the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, she performed for them the role of Candace Whitcomb in Stephen Paulus’s TheVillage Singer and received the Norman Treigle and Andrew White Awards.

Houston Grand Opera music director and principal guest conductor for San Francisco Opera, Patrick Summers has led a vast repertory for the Company, including Ariodante; Samson et Dalila; Iphigénie en Tauride; Il Trittico; the world premieres of Andre Previn’s A Streetcar Named Desire (1998) and Jake Heggie’s Dead Man Walking (2000); and the West Coast premiere of Heggie’s Three Decembers in 2008.  Summers has twice received Merola Opera Program’s Otto Guth Award and was named its “Distinguished Alumnus” in 2001. The maestro has led an array of productions at the Metropolitan Opera, including La Traviata, Lucia di Lammermoor, Così fan tutte, I Puritani, and Rodelinda, as well as Madama Butterfly and Salome, which were both broadcast live in HD to movie theaters around the world.  This season he conducts Iphigénie en Tauride and Lucia di Lammermoor with that company. Summers is also a regular guest with the world’s preeminent opera companies, including Barcelona’s Gran Teatre del Liceu, Welsh National Opera, the Dallas Opera, Opera Australia, Seattle Opera, Lisbon Opera, Bordeaux Opera, and the Bregenz Festival, among many others. His most recent world premieres include Previn’s Brief Encounter at Houston Grand Opera and Paul Moravec’s The Letter at the Santa Fe Opera. Now in his second decade as Houston Grand Opera’s music director, Summers has overseen many of the company’s important artistic advances, including the formation of its own orchestra, the Houston Grand Opera Orchestra. During his tenure, he has supervised and conducted seven world premieres as well as premiering many seminal opera works not previously mounted by the company in addition to a score of new productions. The Indiana University graduate was named Stolichnaya’s “Artist of the Year” in 1998.

General and artistic director of Glimmerglass Festival, Francesca Zambello began her long association with San Francisco Opera in 1983 as assistant stage director for Ariadne auf Naxos and has since been involved in nearly 20 productions here. The Company produced the first installment of her new Ring cycle, Das Rheingold, in 2008 and the second installment, Die Walküre, this past summer; San Francisco Opera presents the complete cycle in 2011. Her work has been seen at the Metropolitan Opera, Milan’s Teatro alla Scala, the Bolshoi, Covent Garden, the Munich Staatsoper, the Paris Opera, the New York City Opera, the Washington National Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, and the English National Opera.  She has staged plays and musicals on Broadway and at the Royal National Theatre, Guthrie Theater, Vienna’s Raimund Theater, Disneyland, Berlin’s Theatre des Westens and at the Kennedy Center.  Zambello has been awarded the Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres from the French government and the Russian Federation’s medal for service to culture. Her theatrical honors include three Olivier Awards, two Evening Standard Awards, two French Grand Prix des Critiques, Helpmann Award, Green Room Award, Palme d’Or in Germany and the Golden Mask in Russia. She began her directing career as the artistic director of the Skylight Opera Theatre and as an assistant director to the late Jean-Pierre Ponnelle. She has been a guest lecturer at Harvard, Juilliard, and Yale.

Peter J. Davison has designed sets for opera, theater, musicals, and ballet since his professional debut in 1988 at London’s National Theatre. He made his San Francisco Opera debut with his set designs for 2009’s Porgy and Bess. Other opera credits include The Rake’s Progress, Le Nozze di Figaro, and Cyrano de Bergerac for the Metropolitan Opera; The Queen of Spades for the Royal Opera, Covent Garden; Manon Lescaut for Opera Australia; Der Rosenkavalier, Carmen, and Maria Stuarda for English National Opera; Guillaume Tell for Paris Opera; Lucia di Lammermoor at Welsh National Opera; Capriccio for Deutsche Oper Berlin and Turin’s Teatro Regio; Anna Bolena for the Bavarian State Opera; La Rondine at Venice’s La Fenice; Cyrano de Bergerac at Milan’s La Scala; and Mitridate, Re di Ponto for the Salzburg Festival, among others. Davison’s work has been nominated for a Tony and Drama Desk Award (Medea) and Olivier Awards (Medea, Le Cid, and St. Joan). He received “Best Designer” at the Martini/TMA Regional Theatre Awards for Medea and St. Joan and won an award for the musical theater production of Rebecca in Vienna.

On Broadway, Jess Goldstein’s costume designs have been seen at the Lincoln Center for Henry IV, Enchanted April, Take Me Out, Judgment at Nuremberg, Love! Valour! Compassion!, and Tintypes. For Henry IV (2004), Goldstein earned nominations for the Tony Award, Outer Critics Circle Award, and Drama Desk Award for costume design. Other Broadway productions include revivals of The Most Happy Fella, Inherit the Wind, A Streetcar Named Desire, and Night Must Fall. Off-Broadway, Goldstein’s regional work includes designs for Hartford Stage Company, Long Wharf, Arena Stage, the Mark Taper Forum, Actors Theatre of Louisville, and Williamstown Theatre Festival. Goldstein is a graduate of Yale School of Drama and has taught design there. His film work includes costume designs for A Walk on the Moon, Love! Valour! Compassion! and The Substance of Fire. In 2005, his costumes designs for The Rivals won a Tony Award.

Lighting designer Mark McCullough made his San Francisco Opera debut with Luisa Miller (2000) and has returned for numerous productions, including Arshak II, The Mother of Us All, Rigoletto, Das Rheingold, Porgy and Bess, and Die Walküre. He has designed lighting for the Metropolitan Opera; Milan’s La Scala; Madrid’s Teatro Real; the Royal Opera, Covent Garden; Rhine Opera; Opera North; Washington National Opera; Lyric Opera of Chicago; Opera Theatre of Saint Louis; the Dallas Opera; Opera de Montreal; Grand Theatre de Geneve; New York City Opera; Seattle Opera; and the Royal Shakespeare Company, among others. His creations have also been seen on Broadway and in regional theater companies nationwide.

S. Katy Tucker is a video and projections designer based in New York City. She worked with projection designer Jan Hartley on San Francisco Opera’s presentations of Das Rheingold (2008) and Die Walküre (2010). Tucker began her career as a painter and installation artist, exhibiting her work at a variety of galleries, such as the Corcoran Museum in Washington, D.C. and Artist’s Space in New York City. Her work in theater and opera has been seen around the world, including Broadway; Off-Broadway; the Royal Opera, Covent Garden; Mariinsky Theatre; Carnegie Hall; Disney World; the Kennedy Center; San Francisco Ballet; Denver Center; Alley Theatre; Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center; Mark Taper Forum; Actors Theatre of Louisville; and the Juilliard School, among others. Recent productions include underneathmybed at the Rattlestick Playwrights Theatre, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown on Broadway, Body Maps with composer Paola Prestini and cellist Jeffrey Zeigler of the Kronos Quartet, and Der Ring des Nibelungen at the Mariinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg and Covent Garden.

Ian Robertson has been chorus director and conductor with San Francisco Opera since 1987, having prepared more than 275 productions for the Company. He was awarded the Olivier Messiaen Foundation Prize in 2003 for his artistic contribution to the preparation of the Company’s North American premiere of Saint François d’Assise. Robertson made his San Francisco Opera conducting debut with Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk and has since led performances of Falstaff, Lohengrin, Rigoletto, La Traviata, Don Carlo, Turandot, Il Trovatore, and La Bohème. Other North American opera credits include productions with Sarasota Opera, Edmonton Opera, and Philadelphia’s Curtis Opera Theatre. Before joining San Francisco Opera, Robertson was head of music and chorus director of Scottish Opera. Robertson is currently the artistic director of the San Francisco Festival Chorale and the San Francisco Boys Chorus. A recent trip with the San Francisco Boys Chorus took him to the 2009 inauguration of the President of the United States.

Movement director Rick Sordelet has staged 37 Broadway productions, including Disney’s The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast, Tarzan, and Aida; Titanic; Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?; 12 Angry Men; Frozen; Curtains; 110 in the Shade; Into the Woods; Urinetown; Seascape; The Scarlet Pimpernel; and True West. Off-Broadway credits include Howard Katz, King Lear at the Public starring Kevin Klein, Macbeth and Romeo and Juliet at the Delacort for the Public, Touch of the Poet, Mr. Marmalade, and A Soldier’s Play. He has staged the fights for Cyrano de Bergerac starring Placido Domingo at the Metropolitan Opera; the Royal Opera, Covent Garden and in Valencia and Milan. Sordelet teaches at the New School for Drama, the Yale School of Drama, and the Neighborhood Playhouse. He is a company member of the Drama Department, a board member for the Shakespeare Theater of New Jersey, and the author of the play Buried Treasure.

- SFO - Heart of a Soldier press materials including this press release and downloadable photographs of the Heart of a Soldier cast and production team are available at sfopera.com/press. To obtain set model photographs, or for further press information, please contact:

San Francisco Opera Communications –
Jon Finck  jfinck@sfopera.com
Julia Inouye  jinouye@sfopera.com
Robin Freeman  rfreeman@sfopera.com
National Press Representation –
shumanpr@shumanassociates.net

Technorati: sfo, opera

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Opera, the well known and very popular form of western classical music which was immensely common in UK, Italy, France and Germany is now gaining popularity in India as well, especially in New Delhi.

The organisations that have been dedicated to the cause of popularising Opera in Delhi include The Neemrana Music Foundation (TNMF) and the Delhi Opera Ensemble (DOE).

Some of the upcoming performances in New Delhi include:

• French Opera – If I Were King : January 12, 14 and 15 – Siri Fort, Delhi
• French Rock Opera – Hair : March – April, 2010

The youth is showing special interest in learning this art and many students are joining organisations such as DOE to learn more about the art and make their individual presence felt as Sopranos and Tenors.

To know more about Operas, visit : What is Opera?

Technorati Tags: opera, delhi opera ensemble, siri fort, delhi

Check out the list of Popular Music Festivals, India & International | Music Museums | Famous International Music Awards | Choirs & Orchestras Around the World | Budding Music Artists, India | Institutes & Courses In Music | Artist Biographies – Artists In Focus | Promote Your Upcoming Music Performances | Indian Classical Music | Genres Of Music | Contribute Music Related Articles | Glossary Of Musical Terms | Share Your Musical Escapades