Houston Grand Opera News

Next up this summer at the Finger Lakes Musical Theatre Festival (FLMTF) is Irving Berlin's Holiday Inn. The show runs August 1 through August 22 at the Merry-Go-Round Playhouse in Emerson Park.

San Francisco Opera announces updated casting for its 96th Season, which opens Friday, September 7, with the double bill of Pietro Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana and Ruggero Leoncavallo's Pagliacci, and two galas, Opera Ball 2018: ¡Viva La Noche! and the BRAVO! CLUB Opening Night Gala. The 2018-19 Season features eight productions that are new to the War Memorial Opera House stage, including a new staging of Giacomo Puccini's Tosca and the West Coast premiere of Jake Heggie's It's a Wonderful Life. Highlights also include Placido Domingo in Concert on October 21 and a roster of returning artists, debuting soloists and conductors.

Houston Grand Opera's (HGO) managing director, Perryn Leech, has been named one of Houston's most admired business leaders in the nonprofit category by the Houston Business Journal, (HBJ). A panel of judges chose 35 for-profit leaders and 13 non-profit leaders to receive this new inaugural award. The 48 individuals will be recognized in a special edition of HBJ in the Aug. 24 issue and at a luncheon on Aug. 23 at the Hilton Americas Hotel downtown.

San Francisco Symphony (SFS) Executive Director Mark C. Hanson today announces the appointment of David Chambers as Chief Revenue and Advancement Officer. In this role, Chambers will serve as a key member of the Symphony's senior leadership team and will guide the institutional vision for the organization's philanthropic, audience, and volunteer development goals. Chambers begins his new post on October 22, 2018.

Yes, it's still the Leonard Bernstein centennial and what better way to celebrate than at the Glimmerglass Festival with WEST SIDE STORY. It remains a unique creation, the collaboration of four geniuses: Bernstein himself, of course, Jerome Robbins (choreographer-director), Arthur Laurents (book) and then-newcomer Stephen Sondheim (lyricist/co-lyricist). Directed here with a deft hand by Francesca Zambello, the Festival's Artistic & General Director, and choreographed by Julio Monge

From August 17 - September 1, 2018, Horse Head will present WE'RE GONNA DIE by Young Jean Lee at nine unique Houston concert venues. Catch the show at your favorite music spot, including The Secret Group, Fitzgerald's, Spruce Goose and more.

For fourteen seasons, Hawaii Performing Arts Festival (HPAF) has continued to bring world-class music to Hawaii Island and this season is no exception. The festival, which was founded in 2005, has established an international reputation as a premiere training and performance program for aspiring young artists worldwide. Each season, HPAF assembles an exceptional roster of faculty artists who provide instruction and appear in a series of free concerts for the Big Island community.

Cincinnati Opera, today announced the repertoire and casting for Cincinnati Opera's 2019 Summer Festival, which will run from June 13 to July 28. The company's 99th season begins with a charming production of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro in Music Hall's Springer Auditorium.

Casting has been announced for Cameron Mackintosh's spectacular new production of Andrew Lloyd Webber's THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA for its highly anticipated return to Seattle's Paramount Theatre from August 8 - 19. With newly reinvented staging and stunning scenic design, this new version of PHANTOM is performed by a cast and orchestra of 52, making this one of the largest productions on tour in North America.  To purchase tickets, visit STGPresents.org, Ticketmaster.com, by calling 1-800-982-2787 or in person at The Paramount Theatre Box Office (Monday through Friday, 10am to 6pm). Tickets start at $35.

MN: What would you like operagoers to know about DR ATOMIC? RMcK: I hope folks are able to arrive with an open heart and mind. As with any librettist Peter Sellars and composer John Adams collaboration, what we are creating is not traditional opera. In this case, it almost feels like a kind of ceremony-a celebration of this land and a display of mourning for what happened here in the desert 75 years ago.

Evans Mirageas, The Harry T. Wilks Artistic Director of Cincinnati Opera, today announced that the company has commissioned a new evening-length opera, Castor and Patience, from composer Gregory Spears and librettist Tracy K. Smith, poet laureate of the United States. Castor and Patience will premiere at the Corbett Theater in the School for Creative and Performing Arts in July 2020, highlighting Cincinnati Opera's centennial season. It will be Spears' second work for the company, following the extraordinary critical and popular success of Fellow Travelers, with librettist Greg Pierce, in 2016. Smith, winner of the 2012 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for her collection Life on Mars, is one of the most lauded poets of her generation; her original story for Castor and Patience is both timeless and topical, setting a prototypical family conflict against the backdrop of recent events.

Lyric Opera of Kansas City today announced a partnership with Teens in Transition to create a new community project culminating in the creation of a street mural reflecting the themes of the 61st season-opening production of West Side Story. The artwork created here will be included in a growing, "in-progress" traveling exhibition of West Side Story-themed murals from Houston Grand Opera and The Glimmerglass Festival; the exhibition will continue to grow as it travels with this production of West Side Story to future engagements at Atlanta Opera and Lyric Opera of Chicago.

Ravinia Festival has announced casting for its July 28 production of Leonard Bernstein'sMass. Conductor Marin Alsop has resurrected this overlooked work with performances around the world. This production reunites her with director Kevin Newbury (who recently won raves for directing the opera Fellow Travelers and the spectaculars as New York's Park Avenue Armory) after earning a Grammy nomination for their recording of Mass, which the New York Times praised as 'one of the best events of the year.'

Good morning BroadwayWorld! Today's top stories: check out photos of Audra McDonald, Idina Menzel, Chita Rivera, and many more performing at Concert For America, and more!

In an onstage presentation following the July 1 performance of Richard Wagner's Gotterdammerung, San Francisco Opera General Director Matthew Shilvock presented former general director David Gockley with the San Francisco Opera Medal, the Company's highest honor. An industry pioneer who helped shape the operatic repertory and build new audiences for the artform, Gockley served ten years at the helm of San Francisco Opera and is currently the Company's General Director Emeritus.

Porchlight Music Theatre's Mainstage 2018 - 2019 season launches with Gypsy, A Musical Fable, October 12 - November 25, at The Ruth Page Center for the Arts, 1016 N. Dearborn Street, with book by Arthur Laurents, music by Jule Styne and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim.  Porchlight Music Theatre's Gypsy stars E. Faye Butler as "Rose," is directed by Michael Weber, music directed by David Fiorello and choreographed/associate directed by Chris Carter.

Single (non-subscription) tickets are now on sale for San Francisco Opera's 96th Season. Tickets for each of the eight productions featured at the War Memorial Opera House during the 2018-19 Season may be purchased online at sfopera.com; in-person at the San Francisco Opera Box Office, located at 301 Van Ness Avenue in San Francisco; and by phone at (415) 864-3330 during Box Office hours. Full Series subscriptions of 6, 7 or 8 operas and Half Series packages of 3 or 4 operas are also available.

Porchlight Music Theatre's Mainstage 2018 - 2019 season launches with Gypsy, A Musical Fable, October 12 - November 25, at The Ruth Page Center for the Arts, 1016 N. Dearborn Street, with book by Arthur Laurents, music by Jule Styne and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim.

For fourteen seasons, Hawaii Performing Arts Festival (HPAF) has continued to bring world-class music to Hawaii Island and this season is no exception. The festival, which was founded in 2005, has established an international reputation as a premiere training and performance program for aspiring young artists worldwide. Each season, HPAF assembles an exceptional roster of faculty artists who provide instruction and appear in a series of free concerts for the Big Island community.

Maestro Hans Graf will return for his first Houston conducting appearance since winning the Grammy Award earlier this year when he presents an all-Shostakovich program Saturday, June 30 for the Grand Finale of the 29th Annual Immanuel and Helen Olshan TEXAS MUSIC FESTIVAL (TMF). The international music residency brings 95 of classical music's rising stars to the University of Houston Moores School of Music (MSM) to study and perform with world-class conductors, soloists and faculty artists for the month of June.