Ana Maria Martinez News

Houston Grand Opera (HGO) announced today the winners of the 31st annual Eleanor McCollum Competition for Young Singers Concert of Arias, which took place in the Cullen Theater of the Wortham Theater Center. This is the third year the Concert of Arias was streamed live on Facebook, and the second for livestreaming on YouTube. The livestream was hosted by HGO Studio alumna Andrea Carroll. She is currently performing in The Pearl Fishers as Le la and placed first in the 2012 Concert of Arias. The winners were announced during the second portion of the program.

The International Opera Awards today announces the finalists for its 2019 Awards [Tuesday 29 January 2019]. The annual red-carpet event - which celebrates achievement in opera around the globe over the 2018 calendar year - recognises excellence in a wide range of categories that cover performance, design and direction as well as education and outreach.

The International Opera Awards today announces the finalists for its 2019 Awards.

San Francisco Opera presented Placido Domingo in concert on Sunday, October 21, 2018 at 2 p.m. The legendary artist returned to the War Memorial Opera House with Puerto Rican soprano Ana Maria Martinez, Mexican tenor Arturo Chacon-Cruz and the San Francisco Opera Orchestra conducted by Spanish conductor Jordi Bernacer for this sold-out performance of operatic scenes from Giuseppe Verdi's La Traviata and Simon Boccanegra, along with arias and duets from Spanish zarzuelas.

San Francisco Opera today announced program details for the upcoming Placido Domingo concert on Sunday, October 21, 2018 at 2 p.m. The legendary artist returns to the War Memorial Opera House with Puerto Rican soprano Ana Maria Martinez, Mexican tenor Arturo Chacon-Cruz and the San Francisco Opera Orchestra conducted by Spanish conductor Jordi Bernacer for this sold-out performance of operatic scenes from Giuseppe Verdi's La Traviata and Simon Boccanegra, along with arias and duets from Spanish zarzuelas.

Houston Grand Opera (HGO) announced at its annual meeting today that its 2017-18 season, dramatically relocated after Hurricane Harvey, closed on a strong financial footing despite nearly $15 million of losses due to the storm and related costs. Lower sales income than in previous seasons was significantly offset by a Harvey recovery fundraising campaign that has raised more than $9.5 million to date. HGO presented its entire 63rd season in the HGO Resilience Theater, a temporary venue the company built in Houston's George R. Brown Convention Center after its home in the Wortham Theater Center was seriously damaged by flooding. The company will return to the Wortham in the fall with a gala benefit concert featuring Placido Domingo and Ana Maria Martinez on September 26.

When Houston Grand Opera (HGO) opened its first season in Houston's new opera house at the Wortham Theater Center in 1987, world-renowned tenor Placido Domingo starred in Verdi's Aida. Now, just over 30 years later, Domingo will again take the Wortham stage on September 26 for HGO and Placido-Coming Home!, a gala evening celebrating the company's return to its creative home after a year of displacement following Hurricane Harvey. Joined by beloved Houston soprano Ana Maria Martinez and the HGO Orchestra conducted by HGO Artistic and Music Director Patrick Summers, Domingo will perform an evening of operatic and popular musical favorites. The concert, which begins at 7 p.m., will be followed by a celebration dinner in the Ballroom at Bayou Place.

CARMEN, the title character in Georges Bizet's opera, is a young woman who wants the social freedoms nineteenth century men simply took for granted. Sung magnificently by Ana Maria Martinez, Carmen is suave and self-confident, but enroute to certain destruction. Currently, L A Opera is offering an excellent performance of this beloved opera that Angelinos should not miss.

General Director Placido Domingo has announced that due to overwhelming ticket demand, LA Opera has added a seventh performance of the company's season-opening production of Carmen, conducted by Music Director James Conlon and starring company favorite Ana Maria Martinez. Tickets for this newly scheduled performance on September 28 are on sale as of today.

LA Opera's fourth season of annual live simulcasts will continue at two locations this year. At 7pm on September 23, 2017, LA Opera's season-opening production of Georges Bizet's Carmen will be sent live in high-definition video from nine cameras at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion to large LED screens at Exposition Park (700 Exposition Park Drive, Los Angeles, 90037) and at Santa Monica Pier (200 Santa Monica Pier, Santa Monica, 90401). The performance will be conducted by Music Director James Conlon, starring soprano Ana Maria Martinez in the title role and tenor Brandon Jovanovich as Don Jose.

Classic and contemporary, opera and orchestral, the music doesn't stop when the temperatures climb in New York, whether you're in New York City, or ready to travel to one of the festivals that dot the landscape of the Northeast. Musical life doesn't stop when the Met closes its doors: Here's a look “from here to eternity”…in the first part of our series on summertime's opera/vocal venues, covering New York City and Westchester.

To launch the season, the dazzling Ana María Martínez returns to Los Angeles as opera's most delectable femme fatale in a striking production, new to Los Angeles, of Carmen, filled with sensuality, danger, and intense theatricality. Another bonus: this will be the first time the world-renowned James Conlon conducts Carmen in LA. The season continues with one of LA Opera's favorite stars, soprano Nino Machaidze, taking the stage in The Pearl Fishers, a beautifully detailed production of one of Bizet's early treasures.

This December, legendary tenor Andrea Bocelli will be returning to the U.S. for seven special concert dates in select cities, starting at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas Today Dec. 3, with additional dates in, Dallas, Houston, New York City, New Jersey and Bocelli's first appearance in Boston in more than six years.

Grammy Award-winning soprano (and Houston favorite) Ana Maria Martinez joins us to discuss about her role, Marguerite in HGO's FAUST; muse on the potential of opera to heal societal wounds; and give us some really practical advice.

The opening program for this year's Mostly Mozart Festival—the 50th--at David Geffen Hall may not have offered any new insights into the mind of the genius composer or uncovered any long-lost masterpiece not heard in 200 years. On the other hand, it was filled with wonderful music, inspired singing and total bliss for the audience, in a program that flew by, all in the name of Mozart.

Houston Grand Opera will present four pinnacles of the operatic repertoire during the company's 2016-17 season, which also features the highly anticipated world premiere of It's a Wonderful Life by composer Jake Heggie with libretto by Gene Scheer, and much-loved comedies by Donizetti and Mozart. Artistic and Music Director Patrick Summers will lead Gotterdammerung, the final installment of Wagner's epic Ring cycle, featuring a new generation of leading Wagnerians includingSimon O'Neill as Siegfried and Christine Goerke as Brunnhilde. HGO will bring back its popular production of Gounod's Faust, with the HGO debut of international star tenor Michael Fabiano in the title role partnered by Houston favorite Ana Maria Martinez as Marguerite, along with the role debut of prominent bass-baritone Luca Pisaroni as Mephistopheles. The company will celebrate the 30thanniversary of HGO's world premiere of John Adams's pivotal Nixon in China by presenting James Robinson's production, of which HGO is a co-producer, with HGO Studio alumnus Scott Hendricks as Richard Nixon and soprano Andriana Chuchman as his wife, Pat. Patrick Summers will conduct Verdi'sthrilling Requiem, which critics at the time termed "an opera in ecclesiastical robes," with soloists Angela Meade, soprano, in her HGO debut; Sasha Cooke, alto; Alexey Dolgov, tenor; and Peixin Chen, bass; and the HGO Orchestra and Chorus. HGO's 62nd season will open with a whimsical production of Donizetti's buoyant The Elixir of Love, featuring tenor Dimitri Pittas as Nemorino and HGO Studio alumna Nicole Heaston as Adina and led by the eminent English conductor Jane Glover, HGO's 2016-17 Lynn Wyatt Great Artist, in her first HGO appearance. Mozart's zany yet deeply emotive comedy TheAbduction from the Seraglio-featuring Russian coloratura soprano and HGO Studio alumna Albina Shagimuratova as Konstanze and leading American tenor Lawrence Brownlee as Belmonte in HGO's inventive 2002 co-production-will close the main-stage season.  

Although the solstice doesn't officially appear for another week or so, the summer opera clock is already ticking. There's a plethora of performances going on all over New York City, in addition to interesting, entertaining and fascinating productions that are just a hop, skip and jump away. Among them: Lincoln Center's Lincoln Center Festival and Mostly Mozart and On Site Opera's West Village venue, to the more bucolic realms of Bard SummerScape in Dutchess County (NY) for Mascagni and Caramoor in Katonah (NY) for Rossini and Beethoven.

San Francisco Opera's Summer 2016 Season at the War Memorial Opera House continues with Don Carlo, Giuseppe Verdi's grand opera of political intrigue and passion, opening on June 12. Starring an internationally renowned cast including Michael Fabiano, Ana Maria Martinez, Mariusz Kwiecie? and Rene Pape, Don Carlo is directed by Emilio Sagi and conducted by Company Music Director Nicola Luisotti. Opening on June 14, Leoš Jana?ek's riveting Jen?fa completes the summer opera season. Last presented by the Company in 2001, Jen?fa returns in an Olivier Tambosi production conducted by Ji?i B?lohlavek and featuring legendary Finnish soprano Karita Mattila, Malin Bystrom, William Burden and Scott Quinn.

This December, legendary tenor Andrea Bocelli will be returning to the U.S. for seven special concert dates in select cities, starting at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas Saturday Dec. 3, with additional dates in, Dallas, Houston, New York City, New Jersey and Bocelli's first appearance in Boston in more than six years.

After an international search, Houston Grand Opera (HGO) has chosen three new singers and one new pianist/coach for the 2016-17 HGO Studio. The artists are Yelena Dyachek, soprano, the Ana Maria Martinez Encouragement Award recipient at Concert of Arias 2016;  Zoie Reams, mezzo-soprano, the second-place prize winner at Concert of Arias 2016;  Sol Jin, baritone, the Audience Choice Award winner at Concert of Arias 2016; and Peter Walsh, pianist/coach. One of the most respected and highly competitive young artist programs in the world, the HGO Studio provides comprehensive career development to young singers, pianist/coaches, and conductors who have demonstrated potential to make major contributions to the field of opera. The HGO Studio received applications from 475 artists; of those, about 275 were heard in auditions in Houston, New York, Philadelphia, Cincinnati, and Los Angeles. For singers, the audition process culminates in HGO's annual Eleanor McCollum Competition for Young Singers, held this year on February 4.