Joseph Kaiser News

Houston Grand Opera presents SHOW BOAT, which opened January 18. BroadwayWorld has a first look at highlights from the show below.

Houston Grand Opera opened their Winter Repertory offerings with an impressive and rousing production of Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II's iconic book musical SHOW BOAT. The musical historically changed the face of American Musical Theatre and introduced a genre of entertainment that many feel OKLAHOMA perfected and solidified. Despite it's classification as a musical, the show's score is incredibly operatic and requires many classically trained voices to effectively pull off a production.

Houston Grand Opera (HGO)-the only opera company with two Grammys, two Emmys, and a Tony - continues to raise the bar for American opera with next season's gripping new line-up.

The Canadian Opera Company Ensemble Studio, Canada's premier training program for young opera professionals, welcomes six outstanding new Canadian artists for the 2013/2014 season. Bass-baritone Gordon Bintner, mezzo-soprano Charlotte Burrage, soprano Aviva Fortunata, baritone Clarence Frazer, tenor Andrew Haji and mezzo-soprano Danielle MacMillan were among the 10 finalists who competed for the highly coveted Ensemble Studio positions at the Second Annual Ensemble Studio Competition in November 2012. Bintner, Haji and Burrage were top prize winners at the 2012 competition with Bintner securing the first-place and audience-choice awards, Haji receiving second-place honours and Burrage taking the third-place award.

With rehearsals underway this week, Houston Grand Opera welcomes Lara Teeter to the role of Cap'n Andy in the new production of SHOW BOAT opening January 18. Teeter takes on the role after Tommy Tune stepped down because he is on vocal rest.

Anthony Dean Griffey, a tenor internationally renowned for his portray of the title role of Britten's Peter Grimes, and Emalie Savoy, a 2011 George London Award winner who is one of New York's fastest rising young sopranos, perform the second George London Foundation Recital of the season with pianist Ken Noda on Sunday, January 13, 2013, at 4:30 PM at The Morgan Library & Museum. The George London Foundation Recital Series presents pairs of outstanding opera singers, many of whom were winners of a George London prize early in their careers or are recent George London Award recipients.

The Canadian Opera Company hosts its second annual Ensemble Studio Competition today, November 29, 2012 in the intimate Richard Bradshaw Amphitheatre at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts. The Ensemble Studio Competition is the final round of national auditions for the COC Ensemble Studio, Canada's premier training program for young opera professionals. Today, November 29, Canada's finest young opera singers will compete in front of a public audience for four cash prizes and the offer of a coveted position in the 2013/2014 Ensemble Studio.

A quickly-rising star who is already one of the opera world's most sought-after vocalists, soprano Susanna Phillips has filled the upcoming season with an exciting schedule of engagements. Phillips returns to New York's Metropolitan Opera for her fifth consecutive season, makes her Carnegie Hall solo recital debut, and taps into her Southern heritage as Stella in Andre Previn's A Streetcar Named Desire with Renee Fleming in performances at Carnegie Hall and Lyric Opera of Chicago.

American tenor Anthony Dean Griffey will join soprano Emalie Savoy (2011 George London Award winner) and pianist Ken Noda on the bill of the second George London Foundation Recital of the season on January 13, 2013, at The Morgan Library & Museum. Mr. Griffey replaces the originally-announced Matthew Polenzani, who has had to withdraw because of a scheduling conflict-he has assumed the role of Leicester in Donizetti's Maria Stuarda at the Metropolitan Opera. Mr. Polenzani will participate in the George London Foundation Recital Series next season.

With rave reviews for Puccini's La boheme and Rossini's Italian Girl in Algiers to its credit, Houston Grand Opera's season is up and running. Starting in January, the company offers productions of Mozart's Don Giovanni and Kern and Hammerstein's classic American musical Show Boat, which bring with them the company debuts of conductor Trevor Pinnock, bass Morris Robinson, baritone Adrian Erod, Broadway legend Tommy Tune, and more. They will be followed in March by HGO's original and highly acclaimed production of Cruzar la Cara de la Luna / To Cross the Face of the Moon, a mariachi opera by Jose "Pepe" Martinez and Leonard Foglia. Tickets are on sale now and moving quickly for this winter repertory period, which accounts for 14 of the season's 44 performances, a 38 percent increase from an average of 32 performances in recent seasons. This increase, as well as HGO's 34 percent growth in subscription sales and more than $112 million fundraising effort over the last five years, clearly identifies HGO as today's most successful American opera company.

The Dallas Opera has announced that single tickets for Giacomo Puccini's final masterpiece, TURANDOT, as well as a new production of the company's first world premiere commemorating the 25th anniversary of Dominick Argento's THE ASPERN PAPERS will go on sale Wednesday, November 14, 2012 beginning at 10:00 a.m.

Canadian Opera Company has announced its upcoming productions in February 2013. Full details below!

Houston Grand Opera, with Music Director Patrick Summers and Managing Director Perryn Leech, announces its 2012-13 season, headlined by four new productions. The first of these is Puccini's La boheme, which launches the new season with a new staging by award-winning British director John Caird. To honor 2013's joint bicentennials of Wagner and Verdi, the coming season juxtaposes Tristan und Isolde - starring Ben Heppner and Nina Stemme in a new contemporary staging by Christof Loy - with a revival of Steven Lawless's unforgettable take on Il trovatore. British conductor Trevor Pinnock leads a strong international cast in Mozart's ensemble masterpiece Don Giovanni, while Francesca Zambello's new production of Kern and Hammerstein's Show Boat brings together stars of Broadway and the opera house in a celebration of America's own contribution to the art. For a more intimate experience, Daniela Barcellona and Lawrence Brownlee star in Rossini's dramma giocoso, The Italian Girl in Algiers.

A quickly-rising star who is already one of the opera world's most sought-after vocalists, soprano Susanna Phillips has filled the upcoming season with an exciting schedule of engagements. Phillips returns to New York's Metropolitan Opera for her fifth consecutive season, makes her Carnegie Hall solo recital debut, and taps into her Southern heritage as Stella in Andre Previn's A Streetcar Named Desire with Renee Fleming in performances at Carnegie Hall and Lyric Opera of Chicago.

The Canadian Opera Company has announced that, after four months of negotiations, the company's offer to the membership of Canadian Actors' Equity Association and the Toronto Musicians Association has been rejected. An agreement would have allowed the COC to continue to produce, in partnership with the CBC, broadcasts of the COC's entire 2012/2013 season on CBC Radio 2 and Radio-Canada's Espace Musique. These broadcasts have been in place since the fall of 2009.

According to the Houston Chronicle, nine-time Tony Award winner, Broadway performer, choreographer and director Tommy Tune is set to play 'Cap'n Andy Hawks' in the Houston Grand Opera production of Show Boat, opening January 18, 2013.

The Dallas Opera announced today that the key role of Juliana Bordereau in the company's 25th Anniversary production of Dominick Argento's THE ASPERN PAPERS will be sung by Canadian-born French soprano Alexandra Deshorties. Ms. Deshorties made her Dallas Opera debut in October of 2009 as Desdemona in Giuseppe Verdi's Otello, in the production that opened the Margot and Bill Winspear Opera House at the AT&T Performing Arts Center.