Merola Opera Program Reveals 2026 Season, Including Two Operas and More
The Festival begins June 25 with L’Anima Napoletana, a vocal/piano recital featuring Neapolitan songs from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
San Francisco’s acclaimed Merola Opera Program has unveiled its 2026 season. The Summer Festival will feature a Neapolitan-inspired vocal/piano recital, two operas, and the annual Grand Finale concert. This year, 28 artists were selected from a pool of more than 1,500 international applicants to participate in the program. The 2026 cohort of participants hail from Australia, China, South Korea, Türkiye, and the United Kingdom, as well as from across North America, including the United States, Mexico, and Canada.
San Francisco Opera Center Artistic Director Carrie-Ann Matheson and General Manager Markus Beam (Merola ’02), who lead Merola’s artistic programming, shared, “This season's repertoire is ambitious, and we look forward to watching our artists rise to its challenges. These are works that demand a great deal from a young artist — technically, dramatically, and emotionally — and that is precisely the intention. We have designed the summer around the belief that real artistic growth occurs when meaningful challenge is backed by solid support, and we are eager to see our 2026 artists take creative risks, deepen their artistry, and forge lasting relationships with themselves, one another, and our audiences.”
The 2026 Merola Summer Festival begins June 25 with L’Anima Napoletana, a vocal/piano recital featuring Neapolitan songs from the late 19th and early 20th centuries. This program captures the warmth, passion, and emotional richness of Southern Italy through folk-inspired melodies and romantic harmonies. The Festival continues July 9 and 11 with Peter Brook’s La Tragédie de Carmen, a condensed adaptation of Bizet’s most famous opera. This intimate production explores the intense psychological conflict between Carmen’s fierce independence and Don José’s obsessive love, unfolding as a stark, inevitable tragedy, accompanied by the San Francisco Opera Center Orchestra. On July 30 and August 1, Merola presents Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos, a fully staged production where tragedy and comedy collide. A grieving heroine, abandoned on a deserted island, is interrupted by a mischievous troupe until the arrival of the god Bacchus transforms her despair into transcendent love. All three programs – L’Anima Napoletana, La Tragédie de Carmen, and Ariadne auf Naxos – take place at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music’s Caroline H. Hume Concert Hall. The season culminates on August 15 with the Merola Grand Finale, a spectacular concert celebrating opera’s rising stars. Held at the War Memorial Opera House, this exhilarating program features arias and ensembles with a full orchestra. Following the performance, guests can attend an exclusive reception with the artists at The Wilsey Center for Opera (separate admission: $85).
Individual performance tickets will be available to Merola members Tuesday, April 14, with remaining tickets available to the public beginning Friday, May 1. For more information on how to become a member, visit merola.org/membership. Patrons can also save on tickets by purchasing the full four-production Merola Summer Festival package. Members receive 20% off when buying between Tuesday, April 14 and Thursday, April 30, or 10% off when purchasing between Friday, May 1 and Wednesday, June 24.
The 2025 Merola Summer Festival performance schedule:
L’Anima Napoletana
7:00pm, Thursday, June 25, 2026
San Francisco Conservatory of Music’s Caroline H. Hume Concert Hall
50 Oak St., San Francisco
Curated by Merola faculty member Mario Antonio Marra, L’Anima Napoletana presents a selection of Neapolitan songs that celebrate the lyrical beauty, emotional depth, and distinctive character of Southern Italy. Spanning the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, these works combine folk-inspired melodies with refined Romantic harmonies, exploring themes of love, longing, joy, and nostalgia. This vocal/piano recital captures the warmth, passion, and rhythmic vitality of Southern Italy, offering an intimate portrait of a musical tradition that bridges popular song and classical art music. The program will be performed in Italian and Neapolitan dialect with English supertitles.
Peter Brook’s La Tragédie de Carmen
7:00pm, Thursday, July 9 & 2:00pm, Saturday, July 11, 2026
San Francisco Conservatory of Music Caroline H. Hume Concert Hall
50 Oak St., San Francisco
With two Merola alumnae at the helm, Conductor Stephanie Rhodes Russell (Merola ’09) and Director Mo Zhou(Merola ’15) will lead La Tragédie de Carmen, a condensed and starker adaptation of Bizet’s Carmen created by Peter Brook, Jean-Claude Carrière, and Marius Constant. This version strips the opera down to its core characters, focusing intensely on the psychological tension between Carmen’s insistence on absolute freedom and Don José’s obsessive love. Prioritizing inevitability and emotional intensity over spectacle, this production presents an intimate tragedy propelled by desire, jealousy, and fate. The opera will be performed in French with English supertitles. This production is by arrangement with Boosey & Hawkes, Inc., Sole Agent in the US, Canada, and Mexico for Editions Salabert, a Universal Music Publishing Group company, publisher, and copyright owner.
Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos
7:00pm, Thursday, July 30 & 2:00pm, Saturday, August 1, 2026
San Francisco Conservatory of Music Caroline H. Hume Concert Hall
50 Oak St., San Francisco
Ariadne auf Naxos, composed by Richard Strauss with a libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal, and conducted by conductor Ann-Katrin Stöcker under the direction of director Omer Ben Seadia (Merola ’14), blends mythological tragedy with comic opera in two parts. The work opens with a prologue that shows a clash between serious and comic performers forced to share the stage, while the main opera depicts Ariadne’s despair after abandonment on Naxos. She is countered by Zerbinetta’s playful view of love, until the god Bacchus brings renewal and transformation. Celebrated for its inventive structure, virtuosic vocal writing, and seamless fusion of contrasting styles, the work holds an important place in the operatic canon as a sophisticated meditation on the relationship between art, emotion, and theatrical form. The opera will be performed in German with English supertitles.
Merola Grand Finale
7:30pm, Saturday, August 15, 2026
War Memorial Opera House
301 Van Ness Ave., San Francisco
The Merola Grand Finale marks the culmination of the summer season, bringing together participants for a vibrant showcase of operatic selections at the War Memorial Opera House. Conducted by William Long and directed by 2026 Merola Stage Director Claire Choquette, this electrifying performance features arias, ensembles, and scenes from across the repertoire, highlighting the technical skill and artistic growth the artists have achieved throughout the program. Audiences will celebrate the artists’ progress in a capstone demonstration of their work in the home of San Francisco Opera. Following the performance, join the Merola artists for a celebratory reception at the Wilsey Center for Opera (separate ticket required). Performed with English supertitles.
Videos