Opera Orlando

Opera sings to every heart, connecting us to our history, to our humanity, and to our community. It is Opera Orlando’s privilege and responsibility to carry on opera’s legacy by sharing emotionally compelling and unique stories. We strive to introduce audiences new and old to the beauty and splendor of the greatest of all art forms.

Opera Orlando’s mission is to engage and entertain Central Florida audiences through the experience of opera. Opera Orlando presents high-quality relevant productions and educational programs for all ages.

Opera Orlando raised its banner in January 2016 as something genuinely new and exciting for the city. Founded with the support of the board and membership of its predecessor, Florida Opera Theater, the Company launched with a new name and a mission that belonged to no one else. General director Gabriel Preisser announced the vision plainly, “This is a boisterous rebirth for opera in Orlando.”

The first production delivered on that promise immediately. A comedic double bill of Mozart's The Impresario and Poulenc's Les mamelles de Tirésias at the Alexis & Jim Pugh Theater at Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts signaled that something different had arrived. The Orlando Sentinel's Matthew Palm agreed: "Opera Orlando promised Central Florida a 'boisterous rebirth' for opera. With its first full-scale production…the company has delivered the goods."

Opera Orlando was eight months old when the Pulse Nightclub shooting stopped the city. The Company didn't step back. It stepped forward. One Voice Orlando: A Celebration in Song — performed September 11, 2016 in the Walt Disney Theater at Dr. Phillips Center — brought together performers from across the country, a mass chorus assembled from nine Florida opera companies, and support from twenty businesses and organizations. The proceeds went directly to six charitable organizations caring for victims and their families. It was not simply a gesture, but a declaration of what community-driven means in practice — and it has defined the Company's relationship to this city ever since.

From there, Opera Orlando grew with intention. The first full season in 2016-17 presented three fully staged productions at the Alexis & Jim Pugh Theater. The second season added three additional productions at venues across Central Florida, alongside a Studio Artists program, in-school programming, and retirement center concerts. The community wasn't just the audience. It was the point.

Then came a different kind of test. When the pandemic shuttered performing arts organizations across the country in 2020, Opera Orlando refused to go dark. The 2019-20 season lost its final production The Daughter of the Regiment, but the Company came back in 2020-21 with a full season, navigating social distancing protocols, venue coordination with Dr. Phillips Center, and the sheer logistical weight of producing live opera in the middle of a global health crisis. Die Fledermaus, Hansel & Gretel, and Carmen anchored the MainStage. Death of Ivan Ilyich and the Orlando premiere of As One extended the season into the community. The Company even workshopped its first commissioned opera The Secret River during this time. Not one season was skipped. Not one year was conceded. The commitment to this city and this art form held through it all.

Everything changed in Spring 2022. Steinmetz Hall — a world-class acoustic hall built for exactly this art form — became Opera Orlando's home. The Company's audience doubled with the first production in the new space, Verdi's Rigoletto, and has never looked back. Today, Opera Orlando presents three MainStage productions each season at Steinmetz Hall, alongside a site-specific production in an unexpected Central Florida location, a community production, an elementary school touring program reaching Orange, Osceola, and Seminole counties, and a calendar of concerts, special events, and — it should be said — quite a few not-to-be-missed parties. The Company has also built an Apprentice Artists program in partnership with Stetson University and has collaborated and partnered with many of the region’s cultural organizations including The Holocaust Memorial Resource and Education Center of Florida, Bethune-Cookman University, the Orlando Museum of Art, Art and History Museums of Maitland, Casa Feliz, and Orlando Family Stage.

Opera Orlando's spirit of collaboration, creativity, and community is what sets it apart. Now in its eleventh season, Central Florida is its home. The Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra and Orlando Ballet are ongoing artistic partners. The audiences built here were discovered, invited, and earned — one performance, one conversation, one moment of connection at a time. The work is just getting started.