OI Insights | Why Santa Fe Opera’s New Hire is Seismically Good News

(Santa Fe, NM) - On February 12th, The Santa Fe Opera announced that it had hired The Dallas Opera’s David Lomelí as its new Chief Artistic Officer, consolidating the roles previously held by Artistic Director Alexander Neef (now leading Opéra de Paris) and Director of Artistic Administration Brad Woolbright, who retired in December 2020.

Santa Fe Opera Appoints Chief Artistic Officer

By Mark Tiarks for The New Mexican (13FEB2021)

Read The New Mexican Story

Lomelí’s years of artistic and artistic administration success, which includes a robust, globally-recognized singing career and the founding and exponential growth of The Dallas Opera’s wildly successful, YouTube-based TDO Network (boasting 28 weekly shows and 90 million views) is complimented by international marketing and computer science engineering degrees from Spain and Mexico, respectively. A seismic new hire, in our opinion. Lomelí, a quadruple threat rarely seen in opera, arrives in Santa Fe at a pivotal and eventful moment in the company’s history.

Santa Fe is a unique house with a unique story. A summer festival that functions more like a full-season, A-level house, we branded Santa Fe as the Davos-Sundance of Opera, based upon where it sits, literally and figuratively, in the global opera universe. For most opera companies and professionals, 2020 was a shared annus horribilis. But, Santa Fe punched well above its weight, pivoting to a hybrid, digital summer apprentices program, as well as the Songs from The Santa Fe Opera series, which celebrated 2020’s five (5), originally scheduled operas from its high desert stage with remote performances and interviews from around the world, notably before Metropolitan' Opera’s Met Stars Live debuted.

In the fall, stunning Opera For All Voices programming arrived. “Is This America,” a film showcasing Chandler Carter and Diana Solomon-Glover’s “This Little Light of Mine,” a one-act opera portraying key events in the life of voting rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer, screened in partnership with CCA Santa Fe just before the November election. In February, OFAV’s Key Change, one of the country’s best podcasts, began its third season exploring the development of new OFAV works while keeping a finger on the pulse of social justice, immigration and the state of our union (more on this breakthrough podcast soon).

With an eye to the coming summer season, General Director Robert K. Meya shared that Santa Fe Opera is heavily invested in a COVID-safe 2021 season, having created a new position - COVID Compliance and Safety Officer - to manage new protocols developed with CHRISTUS St. Vincent, partnering with Production Safe Zone “to conduct testing and help maintain performer and worker social distancing protocols.”

Santa Fe Opera is effectively in the process of creating the world premiere of a proprietary, safety-first opera brand experience - a thrilling business, health, science, performing arts and human interest story like no other, and just in time for Mr. Lomelí’s arrival. We’ve no inside information on Mr. Lomelí’s full Chief Artistic Officer responsibilities or his specific plans, but OI Insights would like to the first to highlight some clear, additional business wins. Full disclosure: we’ve not yet had the opportunity to formally meet Mr. Lomelí and these thoughts are based upon publicly available information.

Optics

I’m hard pressed to think of another US-based, Latinx person at Mr. Lomelí’s level of artistry, artistic leadership and experience in the business of opera (this Mexican-American cheered when he heard the news). Santa Fe Opera is an increasingly diverse place to work, especially when fully staffed during the season, but leadership positions haven’t always been as representative of multicultural New Mexico. Given this, Mr. Lomelí’s arrival is right on time; he will not only build upon his success at The Dallas Opera and abroad, but bring critical diversity insights and best practices with him. Per Opera News:

“His tenure at The Dallas Opera marked the first time in the history of an American opera company that a Latino has held a top position at a Level 1 opera company. Lomelí serves as a Strategic Committee Member with OPERA America’s ALAANA (African, Latinx, Arab, Asian and Native American) Steering Committee and is committed to enhancing opera and the opera industry through increased diversity and equitable practices.”

- Opera News, February 12, 2021

Mr. Lomelí’s standing in the industry as a Latinx person, coupled with the aforementioned OPERA America service, it would not be a stretch to say that he could be Santa Fe Opera’s de facto Chief Diversity Officer. At the very least, he will be able to provide fellow members of Santa Fe leadership, his Human Resources colleagues (as well as board members and staff) with on point guidance, based upon his experience with these best practices in the opera space, which every American company worth its salt must actively engage, embrace and grow.

Expertise

As detailed in various articles written about Mr. Lomelí’s impending arrival, he brings a diversified portfolio of experience, credentials and business success to the table. But no two companies are the same and Santa Fe Opera presents unique opportunities.

Over the course of his career, Lomelí appears to have taken calculated risks and forged new paths. Based upon his use of TDO social media, he’s effectively become one of its most recognized faces, and his clear understanding of public relations - his use of personal PR as well as a publicist - demonstrates the importance he places on telling a compelling, real-time story not only for himself but for his brand. Applying this to TDO Network’s raison d’être, the initiative was born due to a lack of substantial TDO video archives and a reluctance to begin creating expensive digital opera. Given these realities, Lomelí and his team ideated and executed a programming vision that not only employs talented creatives, many of whom are out of work opera singers, but also creates real-time space and conversation around some of opera and American culture’s hot button topics - equity, inequality and race - during one of our nation’s most hot button times (cue the OFAV Key Change synergies).

Shockingly, there are only a few other regularly-seen ‘face of the brand’ individuals in opera. Some who come to mind are San Francisco Opera’s Matthew Shilvock, Fort Worth Opera’s Afton Battle, Glimmerglass Festival’s Francesca Zambello and a certain gent in New York City. As General Director, Mr. Meya appeared throughout 2020’s digital programming and is regularly identified as Santa Fe Opera’s chief executive. However, given Mr. Lomelí’s regular #FOTB appearances across the TDO Network and his deft use of social media and public relations for himself and his brand, SFO is almost certainly considering how to harness the success of this opera world influencer, recreating and growing the global digital success first born in Dallas .

Even with high-dollar investments in a COVID-safe SFO brand experience this summer, there’s every reason for the company to also invest in its digital capabilities now that the pandemic has forever changed how we consume - and accept - alternatives to live performance. Leveraging Lomelí’s global network, SFO could digitally introduce itself into new homes, regions and spheres of influence (i.e. global business), elevating itself to the worldwide omnimedia prominence and resonance it deserves, while still remaining place-based and fully associated with The City Different. If, of course, Santa Fe Opera wants this, as we stated in our 2019 blog. The results could be on par with TDO Network and Met Opera, making Santa Fe Opera a Top Five, globally-recognized opera brand with the ability to monetize its prominence (today’s Scott Galloway-esque prediction). We’re hoping SFO is audacious enough to consider and make it a reality.

Vision

Continuing in the spirit of the last section and based upon his reported global consulting, Mr. Lomelí undoubtedly sees the world as his operating environment, not just New Mexico, the Southwest or even the United States. Santa Fe Opera has been steadily building its working relationships with Europe since Mr. Meya became General Director, which has been exciting to watch and critical to the growth of SFO’s global footprint. In addition to key European relationships, Mr. Lomelí’s ready access to and standing in the Spanish-speaking opera, business and cultural worlds means that Santa Fe Opera could become The Americas’ most influential opera company. A thought: Monocle Magazine’s annual soft-power issue ranks “how well countries project themselves abroad.” In the same way, with a bilingual digital network, Santa Fe Opera could create indelible velocity of message, projecting its own brand of soft, multi-cultural power around the world, but specifically across North and Latin America, becoming a unifying force for American opera and, more critically, Opera in the Americas. Our recent, frank assessment of this country’s flagship opera company makes this a strategic objective worth considering and most certainly a goal that’s within reach. If I was formally advising the company, this would be the hill I’d jump up and down upon.

Mr. Lomeli from a recent ABC News article, speaking to opera generally and The Dallas Opera Network:

"It's a business that doesn't have a lot of clues on how to do this," Lomeli said. "We debunk myths, and a lot of people who are following us are around the globe…singers or people who are just starting (to watch)."

Mr. Lomeli probably recognizes that the opera world is watching and studying his particular approach to opera innovation (as they should), while he continues to write the book on building a dominant, glocal brand, perhaps even beyond opera-world recognition. As suggested above, the bilingual or multi-lingual expansion and exportation of Santa Fe Opera’s one of a kind ethos, with emphasis on multi-cultural New Mexico, could power connection through bold performance, pop up experiences, brand partnerships and omnimedia, scaling the brand to new and dizzying heights.

A clue: how do national tourism efforts work in the global travel market?

JM for OI Insights

Opera Innovator: Grammy-Winning Librettist Mark Campbell Keeps Creating in the New Now

Librettist Mark Campbell, photographed on Fire Island, New York.

(Santa Fe, NM) - When news of Mark Campbell’s librettist prize with OPERA America hit the internet, I sent him a congratulatory Facebook DM. What ensued was a weeks-long conversation that resulted in the wonderful Q&A below. In addition to The Campbell Opera Librettist Prize (COLP), Mark is a man who’s remained just as prolific as he was pre-pandemic, making his ongoing flight into artistic headwinds seem absolutely doable, an inspiration to all of us during these difficult times. With the arrival of new collaborations, operas and another well-deserved 2021 Grammy nomination, this time with composer Paul Moravec for their Sanctuary Road oratorio, we thought a Q&A format would be best, no pun intended. We’re also honored to break some exclusive opera news: Mark’s currently writing a new theatrical song cycle with young, gay composer Matthew Ricketts, inspired by Derek Jarman's book, Modern Nature. Per Mark: “You probably know Jarman as a filmmaker, but he wrote this memoir in 1989-1990 after he’d purchased a fisherman's cottage in a desolate location on the English Channel, soon after he was diagnosed with AIDS.” All this and more revealed below via Mark’s trademark warmth, feeling and humor. JM

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OI: How did you and Matthew Ricketts come together to begin creating this song cycle based on Derek Jarman's memoir? Given the context of Jarman's writings, an AIDS pandemic that's never gone away and the magnitude of our current public health disaster, this is a timely if not extremely real brief. You mentioned that this project would be an opportunity to write "more poetic text." Could you expand on that?

MC: When my husband and I moved into our modest home on Fire Island earlier this spring,  I began imagining my little garden here. Around that time, I read a beautifully written article in The New Yorker by Rebecca Mead about filmmaker and gay activist Derek Jarman and the remarkable garden he created at Prospect Cottage, a scrappy fisherman's shack in Dungeness that he had purchased soon after his AIDS diagnosis. Jarman captured his experiences in 1989 and 1990 at this cottage in his very moving memoir, Modern Nature, and as I read the book, I felt inspired to write a song cycle about it. It sings.

Matthew and I had been "courting" each other as composer and librettist for a little over a year, I proposed the idea and he loved it. (By the way, Matthew who received a Guggenheim Foundation Award last year, is a composer to watch!)

Composer Matthew Ricketts. Photo credit: Michael Kuhn

I had originally thought of the work as a short (4 or 5 songs) song cycle, but the more I write the text, the more I see it as a complete theatrical evening, a contemplative structure similar to the libretto Kimberly Reed and I created for As One. I generally shy away from overt poetry when creating text for operas or oratorios—it tends to call attention to itself and distracts from the music. But with this piece—tentatively titled Unruly Sun—poetry seems right. Of course, I feel many strong personal connections to the story—moving away from a city to escape a pandemic, mortality and the garden, the need for a legacy, a gay man who lost many people to AIDS…the list goes on and on…and the more I enumerate these connections, the more I wince at the obviousness of them.

OI: Let's change directions a bit and talk about West Edge Opera's Aperture program. We love the real-time BTS aspect, tracking almost two dozen original works from the ground up. You're working with composer Kamala Sankaram, breathing life into My Own Country, a longtime dream project that chronicles an immigrant doctor's experiences in Johnson City, Tennessee while caring for people with AIDS during the early years of the crisis. I will sign myself up tout de suite, but what can you share with us about the process thus far? 

MC: As you know, opera companies around the country are trying to find ways to remain connected with their communities during the pandemic. Mark Streshinsky, General Director of West Edge Opera, and his smart and mighty team, came up with the ingenious idea of spending more significant time exploring the process of composers and librettists when they create new operas. They audaciously chose 22 projects to feature and I'm flattered that my name appears on a roster with so many composers and librettists I respect and admire. 

Composer Kamala Sankaram.

My Own Country, which I'm creating with the brilliant (and deservedly overworked) composer Kamala Sankaram is a piece I've been dreaming about creating for 25 years. It's based on Dr. Abraham Verghese's 1994 memoir (another memoir!) of the same name and chronicles his experiences as a doctor and an immigrant in Johnson City, Tennessee as AIDS begins to enter the community. Two years ago, New York Theatre Workshop gave Kamala and I a residency to begin work on the opera and I created an outline and she and I wrote a few songs. If WEO awards us a full commission, we would be able to complete this work.  

OI: Several weeks ago, we started talking about your latest world premiere film project with composer Joe Illick and Fort Worth Opera, based in the now familiar universe of zoom. We've seen the extra Broadway World piece, so we'll have extra popcorn on hand as we watch your A-list cast navigate the "virtual comedy" of an online book club discussing The Handmaid's Tale. This sounds delicious and oh so you. 

MC: Oh, I love working with Joe. We wrote two children's operas which are entering the repertoire very quickly. He asked me for an "adult" libretto and I came up with a story about a mean little book club that meets on Zoom for the first time at the end of April, 2020. It's a pretty bleak view about our country during this crisis and the threat of totalitarianism (expressed in the mute button), but I hope you won't notice that with the work of our director Cara Consilvio, our conductor Andy Whitfield and our crazily stellar cast (Brenda Harris, Bill Burden, Donnie Ray Albert, Joyce Castle and Gabrielle Gilliam).  

Composer Paul Moravec and Mark Campbell worked for three years to adapt Stephen King's The Shining. Photo credit: Euan Kerr | MPR News (2016)

OI: In 2019, we were thrilled when you and Mason Bates won Grammys for The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs. It was also excellent to see you at Santa Fe Opera last summer to congratulate you in person. Interestingly, I watched the 2021 Grammy nominations via Twitter and didn't realize that you and Paul Moravec are nominated for Sanctuary Road, performed by Oratorio Society of New York (librettists not mentioned in Grammy noms, had no idea). Getting the full memo via Facebook (big congrats to you), I realized that it's impossible to keep up with opera's most prolific creative. In addition to a new, third oratorio with Mr. Moravec focused on voting rights, you mentioned a secret opera and The Secret River at Opera Orlando?

MC: Yeah, it's pretty ridiculous that the Grammys fail to credit the librettist for operas or choral works. (The Pulitzer does the same dumb thing, by the way.) Whining aside, I am very pleased with this nod from the Recording Academy for Sanctuary Road, a work I am very proud of. Paul is a master of musical drama and a fantastic collaborator and, yes, we are about to begin work on our third oratorio to complete a trilogy of operas about freedom. (Our second, A Nation of Others, set in Ellis Island in 1921, was to premiere at Carnegie Hall in May, again with the Oratorio Society of New York.)  By the way, we are turning Sanctuary Road into an opera with stage director Dennis Whitehead Darling, who will also be directing The Secret River (music by Stella Sung) at Opera Orlando. The "secret" opera still hasn't been announced but I will say that it is for Des Moines Metro Opera and is a many-acred thing. Other works waiting to premiere are A Sweet Silence in Cremona (composer: Roberto Scarcella Perino); Supermax (composer: Stewart Wallace, co-librettist, Michael Korie); Edward Tulane (composer: Paola Prestini); again and again. and again (composer: Conrad Cummings) and This Lingering Life (composer: Anne LeBaron, co-librettist Chiori Miyagawa).

OI: The Campbell Opera Librettist Prize (COLP) was announced in late July 2020, in association with OPERA America. The competition opens up December 15th, with the winning librettist selected by a panel of independent experts in May 2021. We did the "opera librettist award" Google and 95% of the entries on that first page were for this award! So, in addition to brilliant branding, what was the inspiration for this nearly only one of its kind recognition for opera librettists? 

MC: I've been very fortunate in that a number of my works (Silent Night, The Shining, The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs, Sanctuary Road, Elizabeth Cree, As One—and more) generate decent income in royalties and will continue to do so after I'm gone. As I was preparing my will about a year ago, I thought about what I might be able to contribute to the future of American opera. It's no secret that I've been and continue to be an advocate for librettists through the Dramatists Guild's Librettist Initiative, which I co-chair with librettist Michael Korie. It was probably through my work there, that I identified that there are no awards specifically for opera librettists. So I decided to create one. And fund it. Our industry has some truly brilliant librettists working in it now; I view the COLP as a way for opera to build on that by continuing to attract the best theatre writers. 

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Learn more and apply for OPERA America’s Mark Campbell Opera Librettist Prize.

Tickets now available for the 14-24JAN digital streaming of Bernadette's Cozy Book Nook.

Press Contact: Barbara Hogenson | (212) 874-8084 | BHogenson@aol.com 

Visit markcampbellwords.com

Letter from Berlin: Insignia Athlone Artists Power Forward in Europe

Tenor Spencer Britten and Baritone Ian Burns in Berlin. Life partners with coveted spots on the newly-formed Insignia Athlone Artist Management roster, specifically built for the European market. Photo: Spencer Britten (2020)

The first time I met Ian Burns, he was a 2019 Santa Fe Opera Apprentice. He and his collegues had just given a stirring concert performance at Four Seasons Santa Fe, an annual event that generally kicks off the Company’s summer season. It was wonderful to see him excel across four (4) different productions (The Pearl Fishers, Cosí fan tutte, Jenufa, and The Thirteenth Child). Thanks to Instagram, I later discovered that his partner Spencer Britten was also an opera singer at L’ Atelier Lyrique de l’Opéra de Montréal. Fast forward to our COVID-19 present, Ian and Spencer have put the long-distance dynamic behind them, now living and working together in Berlin, Germany. Thanks to Spencer’s Instagram, I also discovered that they’re both part of a newly formed partnership between US-based opera management firms Insignia Artists and Athlone Artists - Insignia Athlone, a hybrid agency purpose-built for the European market. Ian and Spencer were both receptive to sharing thoughts regarding Insignia Athlone’s innovative business model and approach, as well as how they’re managing in the age of COVID-19, perhaps supporting a trend of opera professionals relocating to Europe, something Opera Innovation’s noticed, at least anecdotally. Ian and Spencer also echo #Opera2point0 thoughts on the future of opera and changes roiling an industry experiencing its own, real-time evolution. Over to you, gents. JM

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By Ian Burns and Spencer Britten

(Berlin, Germany) - As an opera couple, we feel extremely lucky to have already had a plan to move to Berlin prior to the pandemic that’s continued to crush the arts globally, but especially in our respective home countries of Canada and the United States. Prior to our decision to move to Germany, we’d intended to relocate somewhere in the US, continuing to feed our growing roots in the North American market. However, fate had a different idea when Spencer was offered a position at the International Opera Studio of the Staatsoper Unter den Linden. We ultimately decided to put an end to years of long-distance relationship, going to Berlin together, Ian introducing himself to the European market.

Both of us were very gratefully to be represented by Miguel Rodriguez at Athlone Artists - we felt very secure knowing that we’d have his guidance and support during our initial, transitional period in Germany. However, once the pandemic hit, many of our performance and audition opportunities began to disappear; we felt like we’d instantly lost a huge portion of what we’d envisioned to be our market. In spite of it all, Miguel has been wonderful, reassuring his entire Athlone roster that things were in motion and rapidly changing.

Of course, timing is everything.

As we were settling in as an opera couple in Berlin, another type of coming together was happening. On October 7, 2020, Miguel’s Athlone Artists, Gloria Parker’s Insignia Artists and Catriona Bell officially announced Insignia Athlone Artists, a collaborative agency purpose-built to bring select artists from each founder’s roster to Europe; we’re so honored to be represented by these dynamic management professionals, and to be a part of this incredible group of singers, directors and conductors.

From Insignia Athlone’s 07OCT press release, Co-Founder Gloria Parker said: “In a time of transition, we see opportunity.” Putting our business of opera hats on, we see Insignia Athlone’s combined synergies and efficiencies as the establishment of a novel, nimble and effective artist management model for Europe. As singers on IA’s founding roster, we’re so grateful to have the reassurance and optimism of our management team during these uncertain times. And their ability to quickly pivot during a global pandemic, ideating and launching Insignia Athlone…this is completely reassuring.

Spencer and Ian on Athlone Street in Vancouver, British Columbia. Photo: Spencer Britten (2020)

The same, values-driven approach that Miguel shared with us as Athlone Artists also resonates across the new venture. Miguel from the same 07OCT press release: “Insignia Athlone Artists will provide comprehensive worldwide service, bringing to bear a depth of knowledge in our combined skills. That includes extensive personal experience with vocalism and stagecraft, honest evaluation of talent, thoughtful casting, and integrity in our professional relationships.”

We’d also like to emphasize how grateful we are to have planned our move to Berlin before the pandemic happened. Opportunities in Germany seemed like a great starting point for the next chapter of our careers and, despite the global pandemic, we’ve still made some great strides forward, personally and professionally. Also, Vancouver is the most expensive Canadian city in which to live, so Berlin provides us with an affordable cost of living as we continue to work and audition, live and online. Even though we’re working through shutdowns, German opera companies are fighting tooth and nail to maintain operations as they’re able, within government guidelines.

“This career is full of sudden changes and big moves, being on the Insignia Athlone roster brings me a steady partnership while navigating this ever-changing industry. It’s a good feeling having such a great team to work with, the innovative partnership that is Insignia Athlone will be a guiding force through the pandemic and a light at the end of the tunnel when we all come out on the other side.”  - Ian Burns, Baritone | Insignia Athlone

Like every other singer, we’re learning how to master the brave new world of online opera. Ian’s also been successfully navigating a primarily online audition season via pre-recorded videos, as well as live-streamed auditions. We’re really fortunate in Germany since some live auditions are still taking place. Ian’s found that having a live audition in a room (if possible) is ideal and when it comes to technology, he’s keeping it as simple as possible (here come the pro tips). For example, for best results on zoom, Ian uses his laptop with the built-in mic, enabling Original Sound through the Zoom platform. In the event that pre-recorded tracks are necessary, figuring out how to acquire custom-made tracks is ideal; best case scenario is with video, in order to keep in time with the pianist as they play and conduct as necessary for each piece. 

“Having Miguel, Gloria, and Catriona, working together with this premium roster brings me great faith that we are working towards a great future in opera. Through these tough times, they are providing a light that will shine forward through and past this pandemic.” - Spencer Britten, Tenor | Insignia Athlone

But opportunity knocks outside Germany, too. Just this month, Spencer traveled back to Vancouver (with requisite quarantine time and testing) to be part of an incredible online project with Canada’s Against the Grain Theatre (AtG.)  From the press release: “On December 13th, 2020, the multi-award-winning innovative team at Against the Grain Theatre (AtG) is proud to present a bold interpretation of Handel’s Messiah, created in partnership with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra (TSO). The daring, seventy-minute filmed performance of Messiah/Complex will showcase multilingual translations, and feature a diverse cast of soloists and choirs from every Province and Territory across Canada, accompanied by the exceptional sounds of the TSO and conducted by Johannes Debus (Canadian Opera Company). Messiah/Complex is co-directed by the Founding Artistic Director of AtG, Joel Ivany, and Banff Centre’s Director of Indigenous Arts, Reneltta Arluk.”

We both admire leaders and companies like Joel Ivany and AtG, along with the aforementioned arts management expertise of Gloria, Miguel and Catriona. They are the forces creating a path forward for opera, innovating new ways to keep the art form alive and accessible, as well as creating artist income opportunities and making diversity central to their projects. It really is a brand new world for opera, or, at least the beginning of one. We’ve embraced the necessity to adapt quickly, to evolve. Both of us, at one time or another, have heard people say that opera is ten years behind the rest of the performing arts. That may or may not be true, but the pandemic might be kicking our industry into a higher, more purposeful gear, forcing us to catch up. - SB | IB

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Spencer Britten is a Chinese-Canadian tenor. Originally from British Columbia, Canada, Spencer completed his operatic studies with J.Patrick Raftery at The University of British Columbia. He recently finished two seasons at both The Glimmerglass Festival and l’Opéra de Montréal. Spencer joined the International Opera Studio at Staatsoper Unter den Linden in 2020, making his house debut in Ariadne auf Naxos. Upcoming 2020-21 performances include Tannhäuser, Rigoletto, Die Zauberflöte, Der Rosenkavalier, La bohème, La Traviata, Salome, and La fanciulla del west.

Visit SpencerBritten.com and follow Spencer on Instagram and Facebook.

The 2020-21 International Opera Studio of the Staatsoper Unter den Linden. Founded in November 2007, and under the direction of conductor, pianist and vocal coach Boris Anifantakis, The International Opera Studio “offers young, talented singers the possibility to prepare themselves for an artistically demanding career in opera and musical theatre. The overall artistic direction of the International Opera Studio is provided by Daniel Barenboim, whose primary concern is to provide continuing education and consistent support within the framework of the Staatsoper for the artistic development of promising young singers.” - Excerpted from Staatsoper Unter den Linden’s website

Ian Burns is a Peruvian-Irish American baritone. A recent graduate of the University of British Columbia’s Diploma in Voice program, completing his operatic studies with J. Patrick Raftery, Ian is rapidly gaining recognition for his rich tone and self-assured stage presence. In the summer of 2020, Burns was prepared to cover the roles of Herr Zeller in The Sound of Music and Masetto in Don Giovanni as a member of the Glimmerglass Festival’s Young Artist Program, but instead participated in the company’s six-week virtual festival created in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. The summer of 2019 saw Burns as an Apprentice Artist at Santa Fe Opera, where he covered the roles of the Foreman in Janáček’s Jenůfa and The Gardener in the world premiere of Poul Ruders’ The Thirteenth Child and Marcello in La Bohème. Berlin-based for the 2020-21 season, Ian and his Insignia Athlone team are focused on building his career in Germany and across Europe.

Visit IanBurnsBaritone.com and follow Ian on Instagram.

San Diego's Opera Hack: Optimizing Opera’s Future with New Technology

The San Diego Opera’s 2019 Opera Hack was held at Microsoft Corporation’s San Diego Offices on July 27-28, 2019. Photo: Angel Mannion

(Santa Fe, NM) - It started when The Santa Fe Opera tweeted about “Opera Hack”. We didn't know about this endeavor, so down the Google rabbit hole we went, followed by an email and phone chat with Opera Hack’s Angel Mannion, who got me up to speed. The top line from Broadway World:

“In July of 2019, San Diego Opera partnered with Microsoft, with support from Opera America and the Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation, to bring together professionals from theater companies, tech companies, and prominent university engineering and theater programs for a two-day hackathon to discover new ways for technology to be used in theater.

Inspired by ‘hacks’ in the technological sector which often brings together experts in disparate fields to work together to solve a presented problem, usually in a limited amount of time, San Diego Opera's Opera Hack partnered participants with local universities and tech companies to come up with creative solutions to scenarios presented by San Diego Opera. Forty multi-disciplinary experts from around North America submitted sixteen proposals to a panel of tech and theater-based advisors.

$40,000 in funding was disbursed to the three winning ideas enabling them to develop their proposal over the course of the year. “

We’re honored to host Angel’s blog below, which details his professional journey at San Diego Opera, from onstage roles to behind the scenes, ultimately arriving at Opera Hack, managing this one-of-a-kind opera industry incubator. JM

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By Angel Mannion

(San Diego, CA) -My career with San Diego Opera began in 2011, working as a chorister while pursuing a music degree in college. I was fortunate to sing with the company semi-regularly until 2015, but following SDO’s 2014 season difficulties, I began to understand how the career of a professional musician could be unstable and expanded my horizons, exploring choral conducting and arts project management.

While my heart hasn’t fully recovered from singing in the company’s final production (at that time), I’ve come to realize six years later that I’m a better person and professional from the experience.

Over the course of ten years in classical music, I’ve learned that each season provides new reasons for companies to consider shutting down. While COVID-19 has brought us unprecedented performance challenges, it’s also forced our industry to sit down and acknowledge longstanding problems. If we could turn back time to the pre-pandemic years, wouldn’t it first be worth asking if prior business models were ever that beneficial? It’s common for a major American opera house to spend over $1MM on a production that the public will see and experience only a handful of times. Ticket sales rarely cover more than 25% of those costs, while the other 75% comes primarily from donations, grants, and government funding; this model hasn’t traditionally worked very well for opera.

Now that our operating environment is exponentially more difficult, we have the golden opportunity to entirely deconstruct how opera is defined, produced, and experienced.

The theater industry has already entered a new epoch of public performance. While we can’t control how the economic ripple effects of the pandemic will impact our patrons or government programs, it will take a long time for healthy attendance levels to return. If we can’t rely on performing in local theaters, we’ll need to place a priority on exploring other creative avenues - and venues - that serve our communities, locally and nationally. (Note: San Diego Opera did exactly this with its “La Boheme” performances this weekend at San Diego’s Pechanga Arena parking lot, read the San Diego Union Tribune story).

The most prominent figures in opera are conductors, musicians and composers. However, anyone who works in musical theater knows that the success of any opera is dependent upon the level of skilled labor that powers each production, including stage management, sets, wardrobe, makeup, and everything else that happens behind-the-scenes. High-level production for an opera house (especially a unionized one) is expensive to plan, execute, and maintain. So, (theoretically) the more money a company saves on individual productions, the number of productions will increase. And, hopefully, tickets will become less expensive to purchase.

As the cost of living continues to rise in major cities, younger people will have less financial freedom to choose opera as a new experience. We simply can’t assume or rely upon younger audiences to both become fans and financially support 75% of classical music’s costs as they age and (hopefully) become more affluent. As a proactive measure, it would be more prudent for our industry to immediately embrace and seek new technologies that make opera more accessible, relatable, and affordable to/for younger patrons.

Increasing and optimizing the use of technology in opera will make companies more nimble and competitive in an entertainment market catering to Gen-Y and Millennial consumers.

In order to accomplish this, opera needed both the opportunity and venue for coming together; a way to brainstorm how technology could transform the skilled labor side of opera, making it more efficient, more utilitarian, and more widely understood as public service and an art form unto itself.

The first Opera Hack was held at Microsoft Corporation’s San Diego Offices July 27-28, 2019. OPERA America hosted a webinar showcasing first hackathon winners on August, 2020. Opera Hack 2.0 is scheduled for 2021. Photo: Angel Mannion

San Diego Opera General Director David Bennett, center right, talks to participants at the company’s two-day Opera Hack event on July 27-28, 2019, held at Microsoft Corporation’s offices in San Diego. Photo: Pam Kragen for The San Diego Union-Tribune.

Opera Hack’s Angel Mannion (left at podium) with Opera Hacker Ellen Fishman, a member of the Synctus (TM) team, July 27-28, 2019. Photo: San Diego Opera

2019 Opera Hack-winning members of the Becoming team (left to right): John Burnette, Francesca Talenti, Shahrokh Yagdegari and Louis Pisha collaborate on their winning project, July 27-28, 2019. Photo: Angel Mannion

Cue Opera Hack. In the Spring of 2017, I was a part of the marketing team for SDO and had heard rumors that David Bennett was hoping to apply for an OPERA America Innovation Grant to fund a collaborative initiative between tech experts and theater artists. This idea immediately resonated because of its community-centric approach, so I volunteered to assist writing the grant application, with the understanding that I’d have the opportunity to lead and manage the project if it was successfully funded. 

Happily, OPERA America awarded San Diego Opera a two (2)-year grant in 2018 and Opera Hack was born; I’ve managed the project ever since. Following the award, I recruited a panel of local and national advisors to help create the platform (Matt Witkamp, Dr. Chris Warren, Vita Tzykun, David Adam Moore, Charles Murdock Lucas, Anne E. McMills, Ryan Hunt, and Victoria Robertson).

The mission of Opera Hack is broken down into the following pillars:

COLLABORATE - To be a platform that embraces diversity and solves problems by combining expertise from all backgrounds of theater and technology.

INNOVATE - To discover new methods for technology to be used in the production and presentation of musical theater.

EVOLVE - To promote new ways to make all forms and aspects of theater more exciting, affordable and sustainable.

As previously mentioned, San Diego Opera hosted the first Opera Hack in July 2019, a two-day hackathon at Microsoft’s San Diego corporate office. Forty multi-disciplinary experts from across the US and Canada convened to uncover new ways for technology to be used in theater. This group included representatives from Disney, Google Brain, and Microsoft; administrative leaders from Austin Opera, Houston Grand Opera, and Opera on Tap; as well as graduate engineering and music students from Florida Tech, Yale, Indiana University, University of Buffalo, UC San Diego, and San Diego State University. After submitting a total of 16 proposals to a panel of advisors, $40,000 was awarded to three (3) winning teams - OperaMap, Becoming, and Open Show.

Ashley Tata, a multimedia theater and opera designer and director, uses a virtual reality headset during San Diego Opera’s Opera Hack event July 27-28, 2019 at Microsoft Corporation’s offices in San Diego. Photo via Opera Hack, as printed in a San Diego Union Tribune story by Pam Kragen (August 14, 2019).

On August 26, 2020, OPERA America co-hosted an Opera Hack webinar, showcasing how our three (3) winning teams used their awards for research and development, as well as their results. That webinar may be viewed below.

Opera Hack’s winning ideas were exceptional, as were the equally-impressive thirteen (13) proposals in competition with them, including: wardrobe databasing; an automated winch system as an education tool; a budgeting app for technical directors; a conductor’s baton to automate light cues; a sensory accessibility headset for those with autism; and creative, new suggestions for enjoying opera on-demand at home or at the community level. All proposals are viewable here.

San Diego City Councilmember (District 1) Barbara Bry chatting with an Opera Hack participant. From her July 27, 2019 tweet.

Overall, our first hackathon was considered successful, but our biggest takeaway was that we’d essentially created an event for people to make up their own problems to solve rather than using the expertise in the room to solve the problems that we already had.

We knew that if we had the opportunity to do another Opera Hack, we’d approach it differently and more efficiently. Fortunately, we’re grateful to be doing just that, with assistance of a second OPERA America Two (2)-year Innovation Grant. We’re very excited for the 2021 iteration of our event, which has been redesigned to address our current cultural context and pandemic emergency. Opera Hack 2.0 will:

1) Conduct an industry-wide survey to identify specific, pre-existing challenges facing our industry;

2) Select the Top Ten (10) Challenges and hold an online-based, industry-wide hackathon to discover technological solutions;

3) Award a total of $15,000 USD to three (3) winning solutions selected by our Advisory Panel, and;

4) Provide an online platform to host all submissions so that companies and other interested parties may contact and further develop solutions with respective creators.

• Special note: all participants will have rights over their intellectual property and full discretion over the option to share their concepts via our online platform.

Want to get involved? Let’s collaborate!

Opera Hack’s goal is to use technology to create new efficiencies while bringing us closer together as collaborators. To achieve this, we need help from our community to identify problems to solve, recruit participants for our upcoming 2021 hackathon and develop meaningful work partnerships with other companies. Here’s how you can help:

1) Help us identify specific problems to solve together. We hope to uncover new issues that have yet to be exposed or realized. One of the most important elements of Opera Hack 2.0 will be bringing these new problems and challenges to the attention of all. If you work in the industry and have ideas in mind, please email us.

2) Participate in Opera Hack 2.0, Summer 2021. Our open call for hackathon participants will be deployed in early 2021. As of this writing, we haven’t yet announced dates for this one-of-a-kind online experience, but please join our mailing list to receive important updates.

3) Partner and Collaborate with Opera Hack 2.0. San Diego Opera cannot possibly solve all of our industry’s problems and challenges alone - we are but one company. But do you represent an opera organization that supports our mission and wants to get involved? Or are you perhaps a person of influence at a tech company, interested in the opportunity to shape the future of opera and theater?

Simply email us to arrange a phone call - we’d love to discuss how your organization could:

• Sponsor Opera Hack research, the development of current Opera Hack proposals as well as new ideas;

• Provide resources for Opera Hack participants;

• Provide a platform for us to grow our one-of-a-kind community of experts.

We’d also like to encourage everyone in the theater industry to use past and future Opera Hack results as conversation starters with potential corporate sponsors. Once we’ve fully identified upcoming Opera Hack 2.0 problems to address, we’ll begin strategically building new relationships, expanding our Opera Hack business ecosphere.

In closing, I’d like to recognize and thank San Diego Opera General Director David Bennett, SDO’s Director of Institutional Grants Justin Dake, OPERA America’s staff, the Opera Hack advisory panel (as above) and all Opera Hack participants for the open criticism, guidance and community-building they’ve each provided, ensuring that Opera Hack serves not only its mission but a greater purpose. Let’s get to work!

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In addition to being Opera Hack’s Project Manager, Angel Mannion splits his time onstage and behind-the-scenes working on community music projects. After studying music at San Diego State University, Angel founded Folklore Guild to bring high school, college, and professional singers together to record music for video game and television soundtracks. Folklore Guild may be heard on Chef's Table (Netflix) and Lamplight City (Grundislav Games). In 2018 and 2020, Angel successfully proposed and acquired two (2) $150,000 OPERA America Innovation Grants (via the Anne and Gordon Getty Foundation), funding San Diego Opera’s Opera Hack project and funding San Diego Opera’s Opera Hack project and securing Microsoft Corporation as a lead sponsor. As a baritone and conductor, Angel frequently performs with professional choirs, symphonies, recording studios, and churches in San Diego and Los Angeles.

Connect with Angel via LinkedIn.

Follow Angel on Instagram.

Stagetime Aims To Level Opera's Playing Field

Mobile and full-screen renderings for soprano Alexandra Smither’s Stagetime domain. Photo: Jennie Moser

(Santa Fe, NM) - In August, I came across an opera-singing friend on Instagram who was lauding a new platform called Stagetime, which she was proudly beta-testing prior to its public launch. Directed at opera singers, companies, agents and management firms, my initial assessment was a beautifully designed business ecosphere for opera industry individuals and entities (it’s actually more, but hold that thought). I also knew of Stagetime’s founder Jennie Moser and her graphic and website design achievements across opera. It took us a little while to connect, but when we did so last month, our chat was a delight. As hoped, Jennie was open to sharing her experience as the female founder of a VC-funded startup in the opera space. If contemplating your own startup or already on the entrepreneurial path, read on for insights and takeaways from an opera innovator forging her own path. JM

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By Jennie Moser

My year at the intersection of tech startups and classical music has been exciting and strange. When I looked around for other female founders in the art, technology, and venture capital space, my pool of peers was pretty much nonexistent, which meant that the frame of reference when I walked into a room to pitch lent me no support. No investor looks at me and thinks, “ah yes, we saw an excellent financial return last time we invested in a young woman with a background and market of classical music. This pitch is going to be great.” Don’t get me wrong — they don’t want me to fail either, but imagine giving someone your grocery list and then realizing that they don’t even know what a grocery store is. I have about 30 seconds to make sure that instead of an ill-informed tech wannabe with music degrees and subpar Excel skills, I come across as an articulate, multi-disciplinary professional whose diverse background makes my case stronger, not weaker. 

My case - the case for Stagetime - was not born on a white-board in an MBA classroom. It came through the repetition of helping artists and arts organizations become digital by building their websites (which I’ve now done 126 times), a process that takes me and my team around 100 hours and costs our clients thousands of dollars, while the rest of the world has long been connected via LinkedIn at a nominal cost.

When we place the burden of large-scale digital problem solving on individual artists and regional arts organizations, we set the financial barrier to entry damningly high. When we cut artists and the arts out of the conversation about technology and data, a disservice is done to everyone. 

Innovation is creative at its core, and I know that my tech and entrepreneurial colleagues would only benefit from having creative minds contributing to the future of the technology that is shaping reality before our eyes. Similarly, I see firsthand how my artist colleagues have more time to hone and distribute their craft when technology has the ability to make administrative tasks quicker and easier. Automation and digitization are not the enemy here — they free up invaluable resources, time, and labor, so that the arts can focus on, well, the arts.

When the arts are reliant upon manual, in-person processes to build bridges from the arts to the rest of the world, and vice versa, we create an insular vacuum. Our primary task is to find a digital home that shows us at our professional best as individuals, so that we can spend more of our time leveraging that technology to establish professional relationships that become symbiotically beneficial — first within our own industry, but ultimately, with the rest of the digital, professional world, which determines the technology and consumer-driven products that increasingly shape our global future.

So, how do creatives join the conversation?

“Siri, what is ‘venture capital?’”

“Alexa, what is 0.67% of 1.5 million?”

“Google, can you teach me how to sing?”

One of these questions is not like the other. In a world where data is queen, I felt alienated walking into meetings heavy on tech lexicon and MBA slang. I’ve watched the Khan Academy videos on venture capital a truly embarrassing number of times, I’ve had to text advisors at 11pm to ask how a pitch deck is different from a super fancy powerpoint presentation (spoiler alert: it’s not), and my social media confidence plummets when I realize I should share a recent pitch competition win on LinkedIn because, well, I don’t really know how to use LinkedIn.

If we’ve been on a Zoom call in the past year, you can pretty much guarantee my right hand was out of frame writing down words I’d need to look up later. “They didn’t teach us this in music school,” I say, followed by a smile. This happens more than I’d like, but it tends to remind people that I’m not ill-prepared or naive — I’m just hyper-trained in something totally different.

More importantly, all of those things I just mentioned are attainable via Google, textbook, calculator, or Khan Academy video. Numbers and jargon are automatable, replicable, search engine optimize-able. The way that I learned to sing isn’t. The creative side of my brain can’t be replaced by Google. 

Securing venture capital is tricky enough and my particular profile as a female classical musician made my job even harder. After our first meeting, one investor texted a mutual colleague “I think the opera girl might be onto something.” I had to find ways to go from “opera girl” to “potential colleague,” so I spent a lot of time figuring out how to equate our experiences (we can talk about the 'girl' part of this in another article).

The first few months of my path to investment were spent endlessly explaining the music industry and gig economy to people who were “familiar” with something called “the arts.” In this context, I’ll define “the arts” as the subconscious action of reducing creative-driven careers that don’t fit a typical corporate structure into a lump sum commodity containing vague job titles, zany creatives, big personalities, and bohemians waiting to be “discovered”. I maintain that if you go to music school to become mainstream famous, you should perhaps try another line of work.

“I remind the venture capitalists in the room that although I have degrees from the same institutions as they do, my career has never appeared in their LinkedIn feed. ”

Photo: FAYMOUS Studios / Fay Fox

My job was to become really good at painting a different picture for investors. My business pitch was mostly centered around my ability to provide context and draw parallels to the professional experiences of the investors in the room. “The arts” started to take the shape of opera and ballet companies with administrative and production staff. They had roles, titles, and pedigree just as structured as that of the investors in the room. It shifted from nameless singer/songwriters and piano lessons for their kids to a realization that, yes, there are indeed buildings where Chief Financial Officers and principal violinists do their work under the same roof, for the same organization. They were surprised to learn that a set designer was not a high school woodshop fanatic who jumped into the professional trade at 18, but someone with an MFA in Set Design from Yale.

That’s when the fun part starts. I remind the venture capitalists in the room that although I have degrees from the same institutions as they do, my career has never appeared in their LinkedIn feed. I remind them that although we’ve been discussing my pedigree and career for the better part of the hour, they still don’t know what I sound like - and how would they be able to glean that from my LinkedIn? Sure, I have a website, but how would they ever come across me in a professional context? They aren’t going home and stumbling across my website after some late night just-for-fun pre-professional opera singer Googling, I can promise you that. Pain points become apparent, and I go from “opera girl” to “colleague” with education and experience in an industry that is different than theirs, but that still has value.

www.stagetimearts.com

Our investments thus far have come from Elevate Ventures and the IU Angel Network who, once they had relatable insight into the arts industry, saw the value in investing in the arts via Stagetime. I win pitch competitions because Stagetime meets the requirements for technology, business model, market size, and financial projections, sure, but it’s also just...fun, and it looks good. The arts excite people. Whether it’s through their home city opera house or their favorite Netflix show, every one of my investors has a relationship to the product. Once they realize that, they start to feel an attachment to Stagetime, an emotional investment — and they like that. More than the capital, I’m excited that Stagetime has the resource of these investors’ experience in building viable, successful technology products. These are insights that are invaluable to the performing arts ecosystem, as the digital world is one where we have some undeniable catching up to do.

The best part about my job is that I don’t have to choose between the structure that makes a business successful and the subjective elements like attractive design and beautiful media — Stagetime is viable because both of those seemingly dichotomous things strengthen the product from opposite ends of the spectrum. I wouldn’t give up my music degrees or my financial models for anything. In fact, I’m really proud to have both sitting on my desk right now.

Learn more about Stagetime on Instagram and LinkedIn.

Visit stagetimearts.com

Parea Virtual Recitals: Contactless Personal Connection In Action

Parea Virtual Recital Series Co-Founders Will Meinert and Emily Misch.

(Santa Fe, NM) - As the pandemic continues to interrupt our ability to gather for live performance, opera singers around the world are actively meeting the moment. Over the last six months, many have applied their energies and imaginations to various virtual initiatives that, in no uncertain terms, pave the way to what could become standard across the performing arts - equally-weighted live and virtual programming running side by side. The Santa Fe Opera’s General Director Robert K. Meya said as much in a recent Associated Press article, highlighting the company’s well-received Songs from Santa Fe virtual opening nights.

Two singers who’ve taken up this digital / virtual challenge are soprano Emily Misch and bass Will Meinert. Based in Herndon, Virginia, Emily was set to be a Glimmerglass Festival young artist this summer, while Will was scheduled for his second season as a Santa Fe Opera apprentice artist. As their summers and lives changed, they began executing an ambitious plan. The results thus far are impressive; as of this writing, the Parea Series format appears to be the only one of its kind online. Viewers are treated to wonderful, longer form recitals with expert guest conversation around a given topic. Parea’s shorter form Instagram promotional videos also deliver maximum interest - and bang - at around three minutes (see below). If you’re seeking classical music entertainment with interesting, connected conversation in uncertain times, look no further. - JM

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By Emily Misch and Will Meinert

How do we maintain personal connection without personal contact? 

As opera singers, my partner Will and I have become experts at nurturing connections over physical distance. Our biggest success story may be our relationship: we met while performing Derrick Wang’s Scalia/Ginsburg together in 2018, then spent most of our first year as a couple on opposite sides of the country in different opera residencies. But we stayed connected.

Musicians get to be very good at this. One of the most maddening but also wonderful aspects of our profession is how we’re constantly traveling and forming new communities. It’s maddening because these communities are physically fleeting—at the end of a production, we generally go our separate ways—but wonderful because the ties we create often grow and strengthen over years of working together in different contexts. 

However, with the current public health crisis, those same ties can feel stretched thin. We no longer have the promise of “see you next season,” because none of us know when we’ll really be back in the theater. As the distance settles in and begins to seem more permanent, how do we nurture these personal connections? 

For Will and me, the answer was to create something new: virtual recitals in a unique format that allows us to look deeply and differently at the music we perform, safely collaborate, and strengthen our connections with musical friends.

In our Parea Series, Will and I perform music and then discuss it with expert Guest Artists in short video interviews. Our full-length recitals put these different perspectives in conversation to create a concentrated fusion of music and discussion available on a “pay what you want” and “watch when you want” basis. No in-person contact is involved in our work; our productions are completely COVID-safe for both audiences and artists. 

We believe that the personal connections involved in making music are just as interesting and important as the music itself, and that these ties bring us closer together, even while we’re physically apart.

CLICK IMAGE TO WATCH: Parea Series’ “Crisis as Catharsis” virtual recital promo and preview via Instagram.

Our Guest Artists are friends and mentors from a wide variety of our musical communities; while it would be rare for these people to all meet in person, our remote format allows us to have deeper conversations with a wider range of perspectives than would be possible at an in-person recital.

In case you’re wondering, we’ve taken our name from the Greek word parea, a concept deeply rooted in Greek culture. Parea suggests that personal connections and lively conversations with circles of friends are meaningful, valuable, and indispensable parts of life. In our work so far, this has proven to be very true. 

In our first recital, we performed music centered around themes of despair and hope, defiance in the face of oppression, and humor—all ways one might seek relief during a maddening and confusing time. We interviewed five of our musical friends: director Alison Moritz, Yale professor Richard Lalli, opera factotum Rob Ainsley, and coaches Vera Danchenko-Stern and Ken Weiss. For our second recital, we’re performing Menotti’s The Telephone, a short comic opera that, at its core, is about the ways that people communicate, connect, and adapt to reach each other. We’re interviewing friends old and new: composer Bruce Adolphe, pianist Anna Betka, baritone Trevor Neal (Artistic Director of Newport Music Festival) and, of course, our director—the phenomenal Audrey Chait, who directed us in that production of Scalia/Ginsburg two years ago!

Although we’re physically separated from our musical communities, our ideas about and passion for the music we perform keeps us in conversation, and deeply connected to each other. With the Parea Series, we invite you to join our circle of friends, and experience the personal connection that music—making it, talking about it, listening to it—can bring.

Visit Emily and Will at Pareaseries.com

Follow Parea Virtual Recital Series on Instagram.