Opera Saratoga 2015 Summer Festival Program by Opera Saratoga

WHERE DREAMS SING

2015 SUMMER FESTIVAL

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Welcome from The Mayor of Saratoga Springs

OUR MISSION

Welcome from The President of Opera Saratoga

Welcome from The Artistic and General Director

Remembering Anne Palamountain

Opera Saratoga serves the communities of Saratoga Springs, the Lower Adirondack and New York State Capital areas by providing access to worldclass opera through the production of an annual Summer Festival, as well as year-round activities including extensive educational programs, mentorship of emerging operatic artists, and unique opportunities for the public to experience opera in both our home theater and non-traditional venues that leverage and embrace the unique cultural, historic, and natural resources of the area.

Board of Directors 7 Administrative and Artistic Staff

Seasonal Artistic Staff 7 Seasonal Production Staff

Orchestra 7 Chorus 7 A Brief History of Opera Saratoga

Opera Saratoga / Lake George Opera Repertory

The Friends of Opera Saratoga

Opera-to-Go 15 Saratoga Sings! 15 Season Artwork 16 The KeyBank Concert Series

La Cenerentola 18 Dido and Aeneas 22 The Long Walk 26 Guest Artist Profiles 36 Conductors and Music Staff Profiles

OUR VISION 1. T o be a valued community partner and asset; 2. To provide access to a wide variety of high-quality opera programs for diverse audiences throughout the region throughout the year; 3. T o be a trusted curator of all things operatic for our constituents; 4. To be a recognized and highlyrespected destination for opera lovers from around the country; and o serve the opera field by providing 5. T ongoing opportunities for emerging operatic artists to reach their fullest potential through participation in our programs.

Production Profiles 44

OPERA SARATOGA

Dancer Profiles 48

19 Roosevelt Drive, Suite 215 Saratoga Springs, NY 12866

Young Artist Profiles 49 Child Artist Profiles 52

518.584.6018 operasaratoga.org

Acknowledgments 53 Support Opera Saratoga 54 With Gratitude to our Donors

facebook.com/operasaratoga twitter.com/operasaratoga instagram.com/saratogasings

WELCOME FROM THE MAYOR OF SARATOGA SPRINGS

Welcome to Saratoga Springs and Opera Saratoga. Not only is it an honor to have Opera Saratoga in our city for all of the cultural and artistic value it brings, but there is no doubt that Opera Saratoga contributes to our community in many ways, attracting audiences from around the country to enjoy not only the opera, but also the many wonderful assets our city has to offer. While the Summer Festival is likely the best known of Opera Saratoga’s contributions to the region, they are many. The Company’s year-round programs, including Opera-to-Go and Saratoga Sings! provide free access to opera for audiences of all ages. Another major contribution made by Opera Saratoga is the company’s Young Artist Program, which provides important professional development opportunities for emerging singers, conductors and directors. It is my great pleasure to welcome the many artists from around the globe who have come to Saratoga Springs to make Opera Saratoga their home for the summer. You add so much to the creativity and vibrancy to our city. It is also my distinct honor to welcome Lawrence Edelson in his first year as the new Artistic and General Director of Opera Saratoga. I am confident that he will lead the company in a direction that will only enhance this already wonderful organization and rich art form. Congratulations to Opera Saratoga for expanding the Summer Festival in 2015 to present a wide variety of concerts and special events throughout Saratoga Springs. Of particular note, this summer, Opera Saratoga will be presenting its first world premiere in 27 years. Enjoy everything that Saratoga Springs and Opera Saratoga’s Summer Festival has to offer!

Sincerely,

Joanne D. Yepsen Mayor

WELCOME FROM THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Welcome! We are thrilled to have you join us for our 2015 Season – the first Festival under the direction of our new Artistic and General Director, Lawrence Edelson. Since joining Opera Saratoga last summer, Larry has led us to be much more a part of our community. We have increased our commitment to our in-school program, Opera-to-Go, touring to over 60 schools in the region this past winter, and we have introduced exciting new opportunities for audiences to enjoy opera throughout the year in a variety of venues – initiating new partnerships with diverse venues including the Albany Institute of History and Art, and The New York State Military Museum in Saratoga Springs. This year, our Summer Festival truly has something for everyone. Our season is longer than it has been in many years, with new productions of three different operas, and ten concerts throughout the months of June and July. We have expanded our nationally acclaimed Young Artist Program to now serve twenty-eight of the most talented emerging singers, conductors, pianists and directors in the country. And, for the first time, we are also overlapping a bit with the Racing Season. We hope this schedule provides more opportunity for visitors to the region to enjoy our performances.

Our opera productions this year are beautifully varied. La Cenerentola is a fairy tale for all ages, featuring Rossini’s beautiful music and virtuoso bel canto singing. Dido and Aeneas is the first Baroque opera we have ever produced. This opera features dance, and we are delighted to collaborate with The National Museum of Dance to present this unique production in the museum’s courtyard. Finally, we are offering the world premiere of a new opera, The Long Walk. This is based on an acclaimed memoir of a soldier’s return from Iraq. The opera was commissioned by American Lyric Theater, with whom we are proud to partner for the premiere. Whether you are a first time member of our audiences, or a long time friend, we are so happy to have you with us. We encourage you to come often, to try new things, and to bring your friends! Introducing new people to opera is one of the great joys of the Summer Festival. Please help us spread the word about this great company we have in our community. Opera Saratoga is your opera company. We cannot do any of this without you and we are deeply grateful for your support and enthusiasm. Enjoy the Festival!

Rosemarie V. Rosen President Board of Directors

WELCOME FROM THE ARTISTIC AND GENERAL DIRECTOR

It is my pleasure to welcome you to Opera Saratoga’s 2015 Summer Festival! When I arrived in Saratoga Springs last summer, one of the first questions I asked people was why Opera Saratoga exists. The answer I most frequently heard was some version of “to produce opera.” I would argue that is the wrong answer. What we do is produce opera, but WHY we do what we do is to serve our community. From Albany to the Lower Adirondacks, Opera Saratoga is the only professional opera company in the region – and it is a treasure that everyone should be able to enjoy. The Summer Festival is the culmination of our year-round activities, including our Opera-to-Go Education Tour, and Saratoga Sings! - a new program we launched this year to bring live opera events into the community. Opera Saratoga is so much more than a Summer Festival, but as we are now in the midst of summer, we certainly should celebrate this very special time of year! I am often asked how I put together a season. There are so many operas… how do I choose from all of the options? My goal is to provide opportunities for audiences to enjoy what they love, while also providing opportunities to make new discoveries. For me, it is important to keep in mind that there is not really one single audience for opera, nor is there one kind of opera. The repertoire is as diverse as the community we serve. I feel that my job is to curate an experience that allows us to present works that show the breadth and depth of what makes opera as exciting today as it has been for centuries. That means a bit of the old, a bit of the new, and always, something you might not be expecting... Every summer, I promise that we will continue to present a beloved classic – a piece that has delighted and moved audiences throughout the years. This year, that favorite is Rossini’s La Cenerentola – a fairy tale for all ages. Our production of Dido and Aeneas, in partnership with the National Museum of Dance, is not only the first baroque opera we’ve ever presented, but also reflects a new area of exploration for the company – operas that incorporate a significant amount

of dance. Finally, the choice of the third opera of the season, the world premiere of The Long Walk, is a reflection of my belief that every opera company has an obligation to present contemporary work. This is an obligation not only to our audiences, but also to our art form. Opera companies cannot be museums that only present great works from the past. While we have no intention of abandoning the masterpieces of earlier eras - as I trust is evidenced by our presentation of two such masterpieces this summer - Opera Saratoga is making a renewed commitment to presenting an American opera every season. In addition to our three very different opera productions, this summer we are presenting a wide variety of concerts and special events in June and July throughout the region. I hope you will join us for some of these additional events – many of which are free. Our productions and concerts would be nothing without the artists and skilled technicians who bring the Festival to life, and I would like to take this opportunity to thank them all for making Saratoga Springs their artistic home this summer. It is particularly exciting for me to be able to present the company debuts of some incredibly exciting singers, conductors, directors and designers this year. But all of this talent would mean nothing without you. To have world-class opera in our own backyard is a thrill, and to be able to share a summer full of opera and song with you is truly an honor. I want to thank everyone who is joining us for performances this season, and to extend special gratitude to those of you who have helped to make our programs possible through your generous philanthropic support. Opera has the amazing ability to bring dreams to life in song. This season, our operas celebrate dreams of love and forgiveness, hope and heartbreak, family and brotherhood. I look forward to sharing these dreams and the thrill of great opera with you this summer. With all best wishes,

Lawrence Edelson Artistic and General Director

REMEMBERING ANNE PALAMOUNTAIN

Opera Saratoga mourns the passing of Anne Tonnesen Palamountain, who died on January 24 in Saratoga Hospital of complications from pneumonia. She was 91 years old. Anne was a beacon of joy at Opera Saratoga for many years. A former President of the Board when the company operated as Lake George Opera, Anne returned to serve on the Board of Opera Saratoga again more recently, and was extremely active with the company through the time of her death. Anne came to Saratoga Springs in 1965, accompanying her husband, Joseph C. Palamountain Jr., when he became the fourth president of Skidmore College. Whether at the side of her husband, or through her own initiatives as a fundraiser and liaison to the community, she played a pivotal role in the life of the college and its hometown of Saratoga Springs. While Joe’s tenure at Skidmore repositioned the school as the academic and community leader it is today, Anne’s involvement in the life of Skidmore is a story in its own right. Her greatest passion at the college was building an endowment for financial aid, which she saw as the most effective way to make a college education accessible to all students. In 1979 she spearheaded the launch of one of the college’s major fundraising events – the annual Palamountain Scholarship Benefit – now a highlight of Saratoga’s renowned summer scene. She presided over the event for 35 years, helping the Joseph C. and Anne T. Palamountain Scholarship Fund reach a total of $5.8 million.

Anne was named an honorary alumna of Skidmore’s class of 1973 and received an honorary doctorate from the college in 1997. In 1986 she received an alumni award for outstanding service to Skidmore and in 1987 received the college’s Denis B. Kemball-Cook Award from the board of trustees. She was a member of the advisory committee for the development of Skidmore’s Tang Teaching Museum, which opened its doors in 2000, and the museum’s Palamountain Gallery was named in her honor. In 2004, she was awarded Skidmore’s Lucy Scribner Medal, given for selfless service to others and a commitment to the community. Within the greater Saratoga Springs community, Anne was a visible and active leader whose work was recognized by a wide range of organizations. In 1994 she received the President’s Award of the Hudson Mohawk Association of Colleges and Universities, and in 1999 she was presented with the Woman of the Year Award from Soroptimists International of Saratoga County. In 2001 she received the Kathryn Starbuck Award for community service and in 2003 was honored by the Saratoga Springs Rotary Education Foundation for her commitment to education and the community. Anne was a recipient of the Liberty Bell Award of the Saratoga County Bar Association and was twice honored with resolutions of the New York State Assembly. In addition to her leadership with Lake George Opera / Opera Saratoga, she served as a board member for the artists’ retreat Yaddo and for WMHT public television. Over the years, she was affiliated with Planned Parenthood, the Saratoga Springs League of Women Voters, the Saratoga Performing Arts Center Action Council, and the National Museum of Racing. She regularly attended events supporting charities and nonprofit organizations in the Saratoga Springs region. Fond of international travel, Anne served as U.S. delegate to the Pan-Pacific South East Asia Women’s Association, attending meetings and conferences in various countries of South East Asia. She attended White House State events during the Kennedy, Johnson, and Carter administrations and in 1969 was a guest at New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller’s dinner honoring Neil Armstrong and the Apollo 11 astronauts. Anne’s first jobs were in the fashion industry, starting with the executive training squad of R.H. Macy’s in 1944. That same year she was named Miss New York City Subway and Miss R.H. Macy. She became a fashion buyer for Macy’s in New York City and Slattery’s in Boston. From 1948 to 1953 she was buyer for Bonwit Teller in Boston. Anne Palamountain is survived by two sons, Bruce K. Palamountain and Bromley C. Palamountain. Anne, we will miss you greatly. Your Opera Saratoga family is deeply grateful for your passion, your generosity, your sense of humor, and your commitment to making Saratoga Springs such a wonderful place to live, work, study and visit.

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

ADMINISTRATIVE AND ARTISTIC STAFF

SEASONAL PRODUCTION STAFF

ORCHESTRA

CHAIRMAN Robert C. Miller

ARTISTIC AND GENERAL DIRECTOR Lawrence Edelson

TECHNICAL DIRECTOR Jeremy Littlefield

VIOLIN Charlotte Merkerson, Concertmaster Robert Lawrence, Assistant Concertmaster Marya Columbia, Principal Second Patricia Karakas Claudia Saslow Alexander Vselensky

PRESIDENT Rosemarie V. Rosen VICE PRESIDENT Frank Pusateri TREASURER Christine McDonald SECRETARY Martha Strohl DIRECTORS Jeff Altamari Ron Bentley Christopher A. Cernik Robert Desio Lawrence Edelson (ex-officio) Susan Rosko Fogarty Victoria A. Graffeo George R. Hearst III Judith Killeen Guy Mastrion Joel Moss Daniel P. Nolan Sam Palazzole Dr. Denise F. Polit Christine Rowe-Button Ellen Riley (ex-officio) Kenneth Ritzenberg Tom Selfridge Dr. Anthony Tartaglia Michael Vild Dr. Norbert Woods GENERAL DIRECTOR EMERITUS David Lloyd CHAIRMAN EMERITUS Theodore F. Newlin III HONORARY BOARD MEMBERS Dominic Cossa Sherrill Milnes Maria Zouves DIRECTORS EMERITI Louise S. Desormeau Betty Dodds Sofia Dooley Arthur Silverman

DIRECTOR OF FINANCE AND ADMINISTRATION Patricia Finnerty

ASSISTANT TECHNICAL DIRECTOR Christopher Orenstein

DIRECTOR OF EXTERNAL AFFAIRS Christopher Patregnani

STAGE MANAGER AND SCHEDULER Kristen Barrett

DIRECTOR OF MUSIC STAFF AND YOUNG ARTIST PROGRAMS Laurie Rogers

STAGE MANAGERS Victoria Frank Angela Turner

PRODUCTION MANAGER Steven Grair

ASSISTANT STAGE MANAGERS Ashleigh-Dawn Kriegh-Fleming Melissa Robilotta Sarah J. Stewart

PUBLICISTS Susan Bardack, Buzz Media Solutions Michelle Tabnick Communications ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT Kaila Harrienger ADMINISTRATIVE INTERNS Kate Bullock Colleen Craven

SEASONAL ARTISTIC STAFF CONDUCTORS Steven Osgood Nicole Paiement Gary Thor Wedow STAGE DIRECTORS Karole Armitage Lawrence Edelson David Schweizer SCENIC DESIGNERS Mimi Lien Garett E. Wilson COSTUME DESIGNERS Glenn Avery Breed Nancy Leary Peter Speliopoulos LIGHTING DESIGNER Jeff Bruckerhoff HAIR AND MAKEUP DESIGNER Sondra Nottingham AUDIO DESIGNER AND ENGINEER Jay Maury CHORUS MASTER Laurie Rogers REPETITEURS Christopher Cano Djordje S. Nesic Kirk Severtson GUEST PIANIST Peter Dugan MASTER TEACHER Joan Dornemann FESTIVAL PHOTOGRAPHER Gary David Gold

FESTIVAL WARDROBE SUPERVISOR Adrienne M. Webber WARDROBE ASSISTANTS Ashley May King Mari Taylor

VIOLA Kathleen Foster, Principal Julie Goodale CELLO Lowell Adams BASS Brian Cassier FLUTE/PICCOLO Tyler Menzel OBOE David Kossoff CLARINET/BASS CLARINET Eileen Mack

PROPERTIES MASTER Grace Muñoz

BASSOON Gilbert Dejean

PROPERTIES ASSISTANT Robert Klein

HORN Paul Riggio, Principal Joseph Demko

WIGS AND MAKEUP ASSISTANT Steve Young MASTER ELECTRICIAN Rose A. Nuchims ASSISIANT MASTER ELECTRICIAN Devin McFarlane ELECTRICIANS Justin Beets Kelley Finn CARPENTERS Kelly Raven Brooks Robert Ortiz Jake Siekman HOUSE MANAGER Joan Sussman PRODUCTION INTERNS Grayson Basina Nicki Berger Shannon Drummond Julia Novack Jacourtney Williams Meaghan Wilson

TRUMPET Terry Szor, Principal Bruce Hall TROMBONE Lisa Albrecht BASS TROMBONE Jeffrey Nelson PERCUSSION David Coash GUITAR Adam Cockerham, Principal ( Electric Guitar, Theorbo & Baroque Guitar) Brendon Randall-Myers (Electric Guitar & Baroque Guitar)

CHORUS Sydney E. Anderson Aaron J. Casey Dominick Corbacio Steven Eddy Courtney Elvira Alaysha Fox Keeley Futterer Cara Gabrielson Matthew Hill Brian Mextorf Dylan Anthony Morrongiello Jesús Vicente Murillo Omar Najmi Ashly Neumann Johanna Nordhorn Elizabeth Perry Tim Petty Jill Phillips Bryan Pollock Scott Purcell Vera Savage Aidan Smerud Brian Yeakley

A BRIEF HISTORY OF OPERA SARATOGA Lake George Opera, now Opera Saratoga, began with a production of Die Fledermaus at the Diamond Point Theatre on July 5, 1962, playing to an audience of 230 people. The company now calls Saratoga Springs home and performs for more than 25,000 people annually. To date, the company has performed over 90 different fully staged works by 57 different composers, including 40 works by American composers and 8 world premiere productions. Throughout its history, the company’s continued success has been shaped by visionary leaders, talented artists, and critically acclaimed productions. Fred Patrick, with his wife soprano Jeanette Scovotti, established the company in Lake George, seeking a permanent seasonal repertory company that presented opera in English and showcased young, talented American singers. An ambitious first season included 46 performances in eight weeks, fully staged, with two pianists providing accompaniment. Growing audiences and performances with orchestra quickly followed, and in 1965, the Opera moved to the newly completed auditorium at the Queensbury High School in Glens Falls. That year also saw the formation of the company’s first Board of Directors and the loss of Fred Patrick to cancer at just 37 years old. Then current artistic director, David Lloyd was appointed general director, a post he held until 1980. During Lloyd’s tenure, the company gave its first contemporary and American operas, Menotti’s The Telephone in 1965 and Robert Ward’s The Crucible in 1966, and four world-premiere productions: David Amram’s Twelfth Night and Robert Baksa’s Aria da Capo, both in 1968, The Child by Jose Bernardo in 1974, and Alva Henderson’s The Last of the Mohicans in 1977. He formed the Contemporary American Opera Studio in 1980 and introduced Opera-on-the-Lake in 1972. From 1981 through 1985, Paulette Haupt-Nolen served as artistic director, initiating collaborations with the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center to workshop new operas and Proctor’s Theatre for a production of Man of La Mancha. She produced the company’s first opera at the Spa Little Theater in Saratoga Springs, the world premiere of The Adventures of Friar Tuck by Glenn Paxton, and introduced the traveling Opera-On-Wheels Program in 1985. The late 1980s welcomed artistic directors Brian Lingham (1986-87) and John Balme (1988-91), inaugurated the Opera-to-Go education program in 1986, and saw the world premiere of Mark Houston’s Hazel Kirke, an opera set in the Hudson River Valley in the 1840s. The 1989 and 1990 seasons were performed at Adirondack Community College, while the Queensbury High School Auditorium underwent renovations. In 1991, Susan T. Danis was appointed to the newly established post of managing director and the company returned to Queensbury. 1993 was a transitional year, with David Lloyd returning as interim artistic director, and during which the Opera featured many alumni in three gala concerts, but performing no fully staged productions. Joseph Illick became artistic director for the next five summers, programming a variety of works that included

Rossini’s La Donna del Lago, Massenet’s Cendrillon, Jorge Martin’s Tobermory, Richard Wargo’s The Music Shop, and Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the latter featuring the Boys Choir of Harlem as the Spirits in the Forest. 1998 brought major changes for Lake George Opera. Due to renovations at the Queensbury High School, the company performed its summer season in the Spa Little Theater on the grounds of Spa State Park in Saratoga Springs. The 500seat theater proved a perfect venue for intimate opera, and though the move was initially intended to be temporary, it has remained the company’s main performance space since then. In 1998, the company also began performing operas in their original languages with projected supertitles. In 1999, the company hired conductor Daniel Beckwith and stage director Marc Verzatt as co-artistic directors. Shortly thereafter, William Florescu joined the company as artistic director. The new team established a brand of intimate opera theater that would characterize the company’s productions going forward. Important projects during this period included notable productions of Ariadne auf Naxos in the Spa Little Theater, Madama Butterfly in partnership with the Saratoga Performing Arts Center in SPAC’s outdoor amphitheater, and the initiation in 2000 of a five-year Opera-to-Go education tour cycle of operas by John Davies. In 2002, William Florescu assumed both executive and administrative leadership responsibilities. During the next three years, he reintroduced American operas into the repertory, showcased Apprentice Artists in concert programs with orchestra, initiated the Lake George Opera Summer Camp, and, along with event Chairs Ted and Carol Newlin, initiated the company’s annual Opera Ball. In 2005, Florescu moved to the Florentine Opera in Milwaukee, and Curtis Tucker became the company’s eighth artistic director. In 2006, Tucker guided an expanded summer season that included the professional premiere of Ned Rorem’s Our Town and a semi-staged Apprentice Artist performance of Menotti’s The Medium. Tucker served in leadership roles for the company for nine seasons, overseeing the 50th season in 2011, and the formal name change to Opera Saratoga that same season. Among the successes of Tucker’s tenure were many critically acclaimed performances of works by Gilbert and Sullivan. In 2014, the Board of Directors appointed Lawrence Edelson as the new artistic and general director of Opera Saratoga, effective July 1, 2014. Edelson’s leadership marks a new chapter in the company’s history, plans for which include greatly expanded community partnerships throughout the year, diversification of the company’s repertoire, and a reaffirmed commitment to both the presentation of American opera and the mentorship of emerging artists as core activities in the company’s programs each season. The 2015 summer season marks the first festival under his leadership.

OPERA SARATOGA / LAKE GEORGE OPERA REPERTORY AMRAM Twelfth Night 1968 (WP)

HOIBY Summer and Smoke 1976, 1978

PASATIERI Black Widow 1972

ARGENTO The Boor 1985 Postcard from Morocco 1972

HOUSTON Hazel Kirke 1987 (WP)

PAXTON The Adventures of Friar Tuck 1983 (WP)

SULLIVAN H.M.S. Pinafore 1964, 1983, 2001, 2013 The Mikado 1963, 1978, 1987, 2005 The Pirates of Penzance 1989, 2008 Trial by Jury 1996, 2012

PORTER Kiss Me, Kate 1983

THOMSON The Mother of Us All 1971 VEHAR Eleanor Roosevelt 2009

LEIGH Man of La Mancha 1981

PUCCINI Gianni Schicchi 1969, 1995, 2008 La Bohème 1962, 1965, 1970, 1971, 1977, 1984, 1994, 2007 Madama Butterfly 1964, 1966, 1975, 1980, 1989, 2000, 2009 Tosca 1963, 1967, 1972, 1973, 1986

LEONCAVALLO I Pagliacci 1965, 1982, 2006

PURCELL Dido and Aeneas 2015

LOEWE My Fair Lady 1991

RAVEL L’heure Espagnole 1969

MARTIN Tobermory 1997 (WP)

RODGERS Carousel 1986

MASSENET Cendrillon 1995 Manon 1976, 1990 Werther 1983

ROMBERG The Student Prince 1980

WARGO The Seduction of a Lady 1985 (PP) The Music Shop 1996

ROREM Our Town 2006 (PP)

WEILL The Threepenny Opera 1972

BECK The Long Walk 2015 (WP) BERNARDO The Child 1974 (WP) BERNSTEIN Candide 2004 BIZET Carmen 1963, 1964, 1977, 1981, 1991, 2010 BRITTEN Albert Herring 1969 Les Illuminations 1970 A Midsummer Night’s Dream 1968, 1997 The Rape of Lucretia 1972 CHING Buoso’s Ghost 2008 CIMAROSA The Secret Marriage 2000 Il Maestro di Cappella 2006 DONIZETTI The Daughter of the Regiment 1985, 1992, 2002 Don Pasquale 1969, 1977, 1998, 2009 The Elixir of Love 1964, 1987, 2004 Lucia di Lammermoor 1983, 2013 Viva la Mamma 2010 FLOYD Susannah 1980, 2003 GERSHWIN Porgy and Bess 1976, 1992 GESNER Faust Counter Faust 1971 GIANNINI The Taming of the Shrew 1965, 1966 GOUNOD Faust 1978 Romeo and Juliet 1968, 1985 HAYDN L’Infedeltà Delusa 1970, 1971 HENDERSON The Last of the Mohicans 1977 (WP)

HUMPERDINCK Hansel and Gretel 1963, 1964, 1990 LEHAR The Merry Widow 1979, 1988 LEHRMAN The Birthday of the Bank 1988 (WP)

MECHEM Tartuffe 1982, 2007 MENOTTI The Consul 1984 The Medium 2006 The Old Maid & the Thief 1995 The Telephone 1965, 2011 MOORE The Ballad of Baby Doe 1967 MOZART Abduction from the Seraglio 1981, 2002 Così fan tutte 1962, 1965, 1976, 2000, 2011 Don Giovanni 1964, 1970, 1979, 1989, 1999 The Magic Flute 1974, 1975, 1991 The Marriage of Figaro 1963, 1967, 1978, 1984, 1990, 1996 The Pledge Drive 1997 Il Re Pastore 2001 NICOLAI The Merry Wives of Windsor 1968 OFFENBACH La Périchole 1975 Le 66 2012 The Tales of Hoffmann 1982, 1992 La Vie Parisienne 1989, 2007

VERDI Aida 1992 Un Ballo in Maschera 1990 Falstaff 1975, 1976, 1990 La Traviata 1963, 1967, 1974, 1991, 1998, 2008 Otello 1997 Rigoletto 1964, 1965, 1973, 1987, 1995, 2012 WARD The Crucible 1966, 1967, 1973

ROSSINI The Barber of Seville 1962, 1963, 1 966, 1973, 1974, 1979, 1988, 1999, 2006 La Cenerentola 1982, 1995, 2003, 2015 The Italian Girl in Algiers 1971, 2005 The Lady of the Lake 1994 Otello 1968 SCHUMAN The Mighty Casey 2012 SHADLE Friends and Dinosaurs 1990 SILVERMAN Elephant Steps 1970 SMETANA The Bartered Bride 1996 STRAUSS, J. Die Fledermaus 1962, 1966, 1974, 1986, 2011 STRAUSS, R. Ariadne auf Naxos 1969, 1990, 2001 STRAVINSKY The Rake’s Progress 1975 WP = World Premiere PP = Professional Premiere

THE FRIENDS OF OPERA SARATOGA When looking over the energetic programs and operatic delights that Opera Saratoga’s new director, Larry Edelson, has brought to us, the Friends of Opera Saratoga are more eager than ever to help make it all happen! The “Friends“ offer mailing, event, artist transportation and housing assistance throughout the year. We also sponsor a Meet & Greet on the first day of rehearsal for the company’s young artists, a Cast Picnic to socialize with performers and crew during an afternoon of casual dining and baseball, as well as the option of a cold drink on a hot night from our Concession Stand during the opera season. This year the Friends sponsored two educational Opera-to-Go performances – the first, a collaborative community partnership with The Children’s Museum and Saratoga Arts Council, and then for the senior community at Woodlawn Commons. Our 2015 Pasta & Puccini, an annual fundraiser that we do in partnership with Opera Saratoga, was again a most enjoyable sell-out event. To become a member of The Friends of Opera Saratoga costs only $20 per year. However, that small membership fee allows us to provide many hours of much needed volunteer and financial support to promote opera education as well as our beloved Opera Saratoga. Please visit www.operasaratoga.org/friends if you would like more information about becoming a member!

Ellen Riley President The Friends of Opera Saratoga

The Friends of Opera Saratoga wish to thank their volunteers for their commitment and involvement this past year: Tanya Allen Walter & Paula Auclair Bea Barrett Jennifer Beaulac Sue Benedetti Karin Borrelli Anthony Cirillo Donna Clement Bobbie Cromer Bob Desio Marie Erkes Patricia Fox Mary Jane Hale Sally Harsha Lois & Gary Heller Mary Hogan Harriet Kalejs Barbara & Jerry Kass Cathy King Carol Klopotowski Ken & Karen Klotz Julianne Kopa Melodee Kopa Rhona Koretzky Ursula MacAffer Carol Markley Virginia McMorris Anne & James Morrissey Andy & Kathy Nolte Ellen Riley Chris Rowe-Button Joseph Sala Anna Saville Nan Scinta Sandy Serafini Don Sevits Karen Smith Christine Turley Dorothy Vieira Michael Vild Patricia Wheeler Joanna Zangrando

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP Rosemarie V. Rosen, Ellen Riley, and Mayor Joanne Yepsen at Pasta & Puccini; A guest having a good time at Pasta & Puccini; Members of the Young Artist Program greet guests at Pasta & Puccini.

OPERA-TO-GO

SARATOGA SINGS!

In a world where the default forms of entertainment for children are primarily television, video games and the Internet, Opera Saratoga’s Opera-to-Go program provides youth with an all-too-rare opportunity to experience the visceral thrill of the live performing arts, up close and personal! Each year, Opera Saratoga tours an Opera-to-Go production to more than 50 public and private schools throughout the greater Capital and lower Adirondack regions of NY, western Massachusetts, and southern Vermont. The performances feature charismatic professional artists who love to share their joy of music and theater through the opera, as well as through question and answer sessions where students have the opportunity to meet the artists and learn about the music and what it takes to put on a performance. In 2015, between February 23rd and March 27th, Opera Saratoga toured The Three Little Pigs, incorporating music from operas by Mozart, to almost 20,000 children in the region. In addition to performances at over 50 schools, our Opera-to-Go artists performed for audiences at area libraries, The Children’s Museum in Saratoga Springs, and the Center for Disability Services in Troy. In 2016, Opera Saratoga will present a new production for young audiences, Operation Superpower – an exciting new opera that encourages children to use their talents - their superpowers - for good. Five core elements are highlighted in the production - courage, hope, honesty, imagination, and friendship - to approach the topic of bullying and to help children understand how to develop their own superpowers. Reservations are currently being accepted for the 2016 Winter Opera-to-Go Tour. Please visit www.operasaratoga.org/ opera-to-go for more information.

Saratoga Sings! is a new initiative of Opera Saratoga launched in the fall of 2014 to increase opportunities for the public to experience live opera year round. Saratoga Sings! offers free concerts and other performance events leading up to the company’s Summer Festival. These programs take place at locations that are unique to the area, and that provide opportunities for the public to connect to opera in familiar settings. This past fall, we launched the program with Saratoga Sings for Seniors, a week-long performance tour at retirement communities, senior centers and assisted living facilities throughout the region, which coincided with National Opera Week. We know that many older adults aren’t able to attend performances at concert halls or theaters due to limited income, mobility or other health issues. Saratoga Sings for Seniors is our way to break down all of these barriers, and bring the joy of great singing right to their door. Saratoga Sings for Seniors included over a dozen concerts, from Albany to Queensbury, featuring a variety of beloved arias, duets and songs, including a preview from Opera Saratoga’s production of Rossini’s Cinderella (La Cenerentola). The program continued this winter with Saratoga Sings of War and Homecoming, our first event to introduce the community to the The Long Walk and the people behind the creation of the opera, which was hosted by the New York State Military Museum. This free event included a discussion with author and veteran Brian Castner, moderated by Lawrence Edelson, about why he wrote his memoir, and how The Long Walk relates to the museum’s Oral History Program, which collects interviews of New York State Veterans from all eras. The event also featured readings from both Castner’s memoir and excerpts from the upcoming world premiere opera, performed by Daniel Belcher and Heather Johnson, as well as a discussion with composer Jeremy Howard Beck and librettist Stephanie Fleischmann about how the opera was developed at American Lyric Theater in New York City. Our final program this spring was Saratoga Sings of Art and Inspiration, a series of concerts at three of the region’s most important visual arts organizations: The Frances Young Tang Teaching Museum in Saratoga Springs, The Lower Adirondack Regional Arts Council in Glens Falls, and The Albany Institute of History and Art in Albany. This program featured featuring vocal music inspired by great artists and works of art, including music by Granados, Poulenc, Wolf, Britten, Sondheim and more. Thanks to a very generous grant from OPERA America, Opera Saratoga is thrilled to announce the expansion of Saratoga Sings! for the upcoming 2015-16 season. Every month, from October through May, Opera Saratoga will present new and unique opportunities to enjoy live opera throughout the year in even more unexpected places throughout the region. Further details will be posted at www.operasaratoga.org/saratoga-sings in September. TOP An Opera-to-Go performance of The Three Little Pigs enchants young audience members. BOTTOM Saratoga Sings for Seniors during National Opera Week brought opera singers into over a dozen retirement communities and assisted living facilities in the region.

SEASON ARTWORK MEET CHRISTOFFER RELANDER Opera Saratoga is honored to feature the photography of Christoffer Relander to represent the three operas that comprise the 2015 Summer Festival Season. Christoffer is best known for his multiple exposure images between man and nature, which he blends in camera. Christoffer was born in Finland in December 1986, and is based in Raseborg, his home town. He became interested in art at an early age. When he served in the Finnish Marines between 2008-2009, he fell in love with photography. In recent years, he has become a highly collected young fine art photographer with commissions from national and international clients. His work is listed on Oprah’s blog as “something to be grateful for” and the LA Times calls his work simply “awesome”. During your visit to the Spa Little Theater this summer for Opera Saratoga performances, we invite you to visit the exhibition of Christoffer’s work. Signed, limited edition photographs are available for purchase, a portion of the proceeds from which benefit Opera Saratoga. For more information about Christoffer Relander, please visit his website at www.christofferrelander.com

Autumn Self Portrait by Christoffer Relander

THE KEYBANK CONCERT SERIES STARS OF TOMORROW! Saturday, June 6 at 8 PM Dee Sarno Theater Saratoga Arts Center 320 Broadway Saratoga Springs *Free Event

A ROSSINI MASTER CLASS with Joan Dornemann Sunday, June 14 at 2 PM Helen Filene Ladd Concert Hall Arthur Zankel Music Center Skidmore College 815 North Broadway Saratoga Springs *Ticketed Event

MR. TAMBOURINE MAN at Caffè Lena with soprano Caroline Worra and pianist Djordje Nesic Friday, June 19 and Saturday, June 20 at 8 PM Caffè Lena 47 Phila Street Saratoga Springs *Ticketed Event

IF IT AIN’T BAROQUE... Sunday, June 21 at 2 PM Mr. and Mrs. Ronald A. Riggi Theater The National Museum of Dance 99 South Broadway Saratoga Springs *Free Event

SONGS OF LONGING AND DESIRE with mezzo soprano Jennifer Johnson Cano and pianist Christopher Cano Friday, June 26 at 8 PM Picotte Recital Hall Massry Center for the Arts Albany *Ticketed Event

OF ARMS AND THE MAN I SING Sunday, July 12 at 2 PM Dee Sarno Theater Saratoga Arts Center 320 Broadway Saratoga Springs *Free Event A WORLD WAR I TRIBUTE with baritone John Brancy and pianist Peter Dugan Thursday, July 16 at 8 PM Dee Sarno Theater Saratoga Arts Center 320 Broadway Saratoga Springs *Ticketed Event

2016 SEASON PREVIEW Thursday, July 23 at 2 PM Spa Little Theater 21 Roosevelt Drive Saratoga Springs *Free Event

Opera Saratoga’s summer concerts and special events have been made possible in part through the generous support of KeyBank.

DREAMING OF A PRINCE TO HOLD MY HAND FOREVER...

LA CENERENTOLA First Performance January 25, 1817, Teatro Valle, Rome Five performances: July 2, 11m, 14m, 18m, 26 Music by Gioachino Rossini Libretto by Jacopo Ferretti Based on the fairytale by Charles Perrault

CAST, IN ORDER OF VOCAL APPEARANCE CLORINDA Ashly Neumann* TISBE Vera Savage* ANGELINA (CENERENTOLA) Sandra Piques Eddy ALIDORO Ryan Kuster DON MAGNIFICO David Kravitz DON RAMIRO Andrew Owens DANDINI John Brancy THE OPERA SARATOGA ORCHESTRA AND MEN’S CHORUS

PRODUCTION CONDUCTOR Gary Thor Wedow DIRECTOR Lawrence Edelson SCENIC DESIGNER Mimi Lien

(1817)

*Member of Opera Saratoga’s Young Artist Program New production, sung in Italian with English projected text There will be one intermission. The performance will last approximately two hours and forty-five minutes.

COSTUME DESIGNER Glenn Breed

Costumes provided by Wardrobe Witchery

LIGHTING DESIGNER Jeff Bruckerhoff

Orchestral reduction by Tony Burke © Pocket Publications

WIG AND MAKEUP DESIGNER Sondra Nottingham SUPERTITLES Celeste Montemarano YOUNG ARTIST COACH Jesse Leong* ASSISTANT DIRECTOR Cara Consilvio* CHORUS MASTER Laurie Rogers PRINCIPAL COACH / CONTINUO Kirk Severtson STAGE MANAGER Kristen Barrett ASSISTANT STAGE MANAGER Ashleigh-Dawn Kriegh-Fleming

Opera Saratoga’s production of La Cenerentola has been made possible in part through the generous support of Adirondack Trust.

ONCE UPON A TIME… IN ROSSINI’S MASTERFUL HANDS

Portrait of Gioachino Rossini by Francesco Hayez.

Mention the name Rossini and it immediately conjures images of Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd running through a barbershop or tutu-wearing hippos dancing in Fantasia. Some may even think of Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange, which uses the Overture to La gazza ladra to accompany images of the protagonist Alex and his friends causing mayhem. If Rossini’s music holds a special place in popular culture, the reason is simple: its catchy melodies, exuberant crescendos and galloping rhythms have never failed to please the public. Gioachino Rossini (1792–1868) wrote thirty-eight operas that capture the spirit of their time and have just as much to say today. He revolutionized the pre-existing genres of opera, both serious and comic, bringing greater energy to the former and greater sophistication to the latter. He was born in Pesaro, Italy, to theatrical parents: his mother Anna was a singer and his father Giuseppe played the horn for the orchestras of the theaters in which she sang. Gioachino showed musical talent early, singing as well as mastering the cello, horn, and harpsichord, and soon began composing. In 1810, at age 18, Rossini wrote his first major comic opera, La cambiale di matrimonio (The Bill of Marriage). In 1812, he received his first commission from a major opera house, La Scala in Milan, for which he wrote La pietra del paragone (The Touchstone), the first work to feature his trademark ‘Rossini crescendo’: a gradual increase not only of dynamics but of harmonic and rhythmic intensity, combined with ingenious orchestration, all precisely calibrated to build up to

a musical frenzy, often at the end of an opera’s first act. In La Cenerentola, the ‘Rossini crescendo’ may be found in the overture, and again at the end of Act I to illustrate each character’s reaction to Cinderella’s arrival at the ball. La Cenerentola, like all of Rossini’s operas, epitomizes bel canto (literally, “beautiful singing”), the dominant operatic style of his day: a tuneful, singer-centric type of music which affords vocalists golden opportunities to show off their prowess in both fast, florid passages and in long-breathed, lyrical lines. It’s little wonder that the bel canto era gave rise to the terms ‘diva’ and ‘prima donna’ to describe the star singers with their vocal acrobatics; this is opera as a spectator sport. The title character’s show-stopping final aria, ‘Non più mesta’, is a prime example of bel canto at its finest. La Cenerentola, which premiered at Rome’s Teatro Valle in 1817, is one of Rossini’s three most popular operas, alongside Il barbiere di Siviglia (1816) and L’italiana in Algeri (1813), all three of which are comedies. However, Cenerentola stands out among them for its mix of comedy and pathos, a quality which likens it more to Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore and Bellini’s La sonnambula, examples of the genre called opera semiseria then coming into vogue. Many operas have been based on the famous Cinderella story, including Massenet’s beautiful French version, Cendrillon, but Rossini’s La Cenerentola is certainly the best-known of them, if not the most typical retelling of the age-old rags-to-riches story. Rossini’s librettist Jacopo Ferretti based its text on the libretto of Cendrillon (1810), by Rossini’s French contemporary Nicolas Isouard, which was somewhat loosely based on the beloved fairytale from Charles Perrault’s 1698 collection Tales of Mother Goose. Consequently, some of the story’s most salient features are missing in Rossini’s version. There is no glass slipper; the evil stepmother becomes an evil stepfather, Don Magnifico; and instead of a fairy godmother, it is the Prince’s tutor Alidoro (whose name means ‘golden-wings’) who benevolently aids Cinderella. Though mortal and lacking magical powers, Alidoro functions as a sort of fairy godfather or guardian angel. The changes in the story make this version less of a magical fairy tale centered on a quest for true love and more of a comedy in which certain characters jockey for social positions and others make fun of their efforts. Despite these new twists, La Cenerentola still tells a beloved story with the happiest of endings. This, and its endlessly tuneful and energetic score, continue to endear it both to new operagoers and diehard fans, and to both the young and the young at heart.

Gregory Moomjy writes for New Jersey Monthly and Pro Ópera, and also serves as a grant writer and researcher for Gotham Chamber Opera. He received a Master of Science degree from Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and a Bachelor of Arts degree in musicology at Fordham University in New York City, where he currently resides.

LA CENERENTOLA SYNOPSIS ACT I Angelina, nicknamed ‘Cenerentola’ (Cinderella), is forced to work as a maid in the home of her stepfather Don Magnifico. When a beggar comes calling (actually Alidoro, Prince Ramiro’s tutor, in disguise), Cenerentola’s stepsisters, Clorinda and Tisbe, shun him, but Cenerentola offers him sustenance. Courtiers arrive to announce that Prince Ramiro is on his way, seeking the most beautiful young woman in the land to be his bride. Having been told by Alidoro that there is a young woman in this house worthy to be a princess, Ramiro arrives, disguised as his own valet, and is immediately smitten with Cenerentola, as she is with him. Finally, the ‘Prince’ arrives (actually Dandini, Ramiro’s valet in disguise) and the stepsisters fawn all over him. Dandini invites Magnifico’s daughters to the ball at the royal palace where the new princess will be chosen, but Magnifico forbids Cenerentola to go along with her sisters. Ramiro notices how cruelly she is treated. Alidoro arrives seeking Magnifico’s third daughter, but Magnifico claims that she is dead. Left alone with Cenerentola, Alidoro identifies himself as a member of Ramiro’s court, promises to take her to the ball, and tells her that heaven will reward her pure heart.

Cinderella by Joseph Henri François Van Lerius.

At the royal palace, Dandini tells Ramiro how awful Magnifico’s daughters are, but Ramiro is confused, since Alidoro had spoken glowingly of one of the daughters. Clorinda and Tisbe arrive, demanding that Dandini declare his ‘princely’ choice of wife. When he offers his ‘valet’, Ramiro, as husband to the sister the prince does not marry, the sisters are outraged at the thought of marrying a servant. Alidoro announces the arrival of a beautiful unknown lady. Everyone senses something familiar about her.

ACT II

Cinderella at the Kitchen Fire by Thomas Sully.

Still at the royal palace, Don Magnifico worries that the beautiful stranger may threaten his daughters’ chances to marry the Prince. Cenerentola, weary of Dandini’s wooing, confesses that she is in love with his valet. Ramiro appears and declares his love for her, but she leaves, giving him one of a pair of matching bracelets and telling him that if he really loves her, he will find her. Encouraged by Alidoro, Ramiro resolves to search for her. Meanwhile, Magnifico presses Dandini to decide which of his daughters he will marry, so Dandini confesses that he is really Prince Ramiro’s valet. Magnifico is furious, and Dandini orders him out of the palace. At Magnifico’s house, Cenerentola, is back in her rags. Magnifico, Clorinda, and Tisbe return from the ball in a vile mood and order Cenerentola to prepare their supper. As a thunderstorm rages, Alidoro arranges for Prince Ramiro’s carriage to break down right outside Magnifico’s home. Dandini and Ramiro arrive seeking refuge. Cenerentola and Ramiro recognize one another, he spots her bracelet, and the lovebirds are at last united. Ramiro threatens to punish Magnifico, Clorinda and Tisbe for their cruelty to Cenerentola, but Cenerentola asks him to pardon them. As Cenerentola leaves with her prince, Alidoro thanks heaven for the happy outcome. At the royal palace, Ramiro and Cenerentola celebrate their wedding. Magnifico now tries to curry favor with his stepdaughter, but she asks only to be acknowledged at last as his daughter. Cenerentola marvels at her reversal of fortune, invites her family to join her, and declares that her days of toiling by the fire are over.

FOREVER IN MY HEART, FOREVER IN MY DREAMS...

DIDO AND AENEAS First Performance Believed to be in 1689 at Josias Priest’s Boarding School for Young Ladies, London Four performances: July 6, 12, 19, 21 Music by Henry Purcell Libretto by Nahum Tate Presented in Partnership with The National Museum of Dance Raul Martinez, Director

CAST, IN ORDER OF VOCAL APPEARANCE BELINDA, DIDO’S SISTER AND HANDMAIDEN Christine Suits* DIDO, QUEEN OF CARTHAGE Jennifer Johnson Cano 2ND WOMAN, ANOTHER HANDMAIDEN Cara Gabrielson* AENEAS, TROJAN PRINCE Brian Mextorf* SORCERESS Kate Farrar* FIRST WITCH Keely Futterer* SECOND WITCH Johanna Nordhorn* SAILOR Dominick Corbacio* SPIRIT, IN THE FORM OF MERCURY Bryan Pollock*

(1688)

DANCERS, IN ORDER OF APPEARANCE

WIG AND MAKEUP DESIGNER Sondra Nottingham

Members of Armitage Gone! Dance

ASSISTANT CONDUCTOR / CHORUS MASTER Laurie Rogers

PROLOGUE Izabela Syzlinska Cristian Laverde-König CUPID Ahmaud Culver RAVENS Izabela Syzlinska with Ahmaud Culver Cristian Laverde-König Randall Smith STAG Randall Smith

PRINCIPAL COACH / CONTINUO Christopher Cano STAGE MANAGER Victoria Frank ASSISTANT STAGE MANAGER Melissa Robilotta

*Member of Opera Saratoga’s Young Artist Program

DIANA Megumi Eda

New production, sung in English.

ACTAEON Cristian Laverde-König

The performance will last approximately sixty minutes, with no intermission.

SEA SPIRIT Megumi Eda

Performance by arrangement with G.Schirmer, Inc., publisher and copyright owner.

RAVEN DUET Izabela Syzlinska Randall Smith with company THE OPERA SARATOGA ORCHESTRA AND CHORUS PRODUCTION CONDUCTOR Nicole Paiement DIRECTOR AND CHOREOGRAPHER Karole Armitage ENVIRONMENTAL SCENIC DESIGNER Garett E. Wilson COSTUME DESIGNER Peter Speliopoulos LIGHTING DESIGNER Jeff Bruckerhoff

Opera Saratoga’s production of Dido and Aeneas has been made possible with generous support from members of The General Director’s Council.

A 17TH CENTURY MASTERPIECE FOR COURTYARD PERFORMANCE

Portrait of Henry Purcell by George Zobel, after John Closterman.

Henry Purcell (1659-1695) had a brief life but he left behind works of great significance. He has been characterized as “the English Mozart” due to his ability to create technically perfect compositions which at the same time offer an abundance of musical pleasure. The importance of his contributions to English music, and even to wider European culture, has been recognized by successors including Ralph Vaughan Williams, Gustav Holst, Benjamin Britten, and Michael Tippett, who characterized him as a genius. Purcell wrote for the stage, the court, the church, and for private occasions, but is perhaps most significant for his unique brilliance at setting the English language to song. Purcell studied under John Blow, whom he regarded as “one of the greatest masters in the world,” and whose impact is deeply felt in Dido and Aeneas. Blow was a leading composer in the tradition of the English Masque—a long, loosely-organized staged entertainment which included singing, spoken word, and dancing, as well as luxurious costumes. But in 1682, Blow presented a very different work, ‘A Masque for the Entertainment of the King’ entitled Venus and Adonis, the only known through-composed English stage work before Purcell’s. Its continuous music, tight dramatic structure and brief length clearly led toward Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, the first true opera written in the English language. Little is known about the circumstances regarding the composition and premiere of Dido and Aeneas. The earliest surviving copy tells us that the opera was presented sometime before December 1689 in a boarding school in Chelsea, London, run by Josias Priest, a famous dancer and choreographer. The work was written to be performed in the courtyard of the school and timed to be no longer than one hour. Although we can say with certainty that this performance took place we cannot be sure that this was the premiere of the opera. The librettist Nahum Tate based the text of Dido and Aeneas on his own tragedy Brutus of Alba or The Enchanted

Lovers (1678) and on the fourth book of Virgil’s Aeneid. The original story presents Aeneas, after the destruction of Troy, fleeing from his homeland with his followers and sailing for Italy, where he is destined to found a new state, Rome. After fighting the waves for seven years, Aeneas and his men take harbor at Carthage, which is ruled by Queen Dido. Dido, a widow who had sworn to remain celibate, falls in love with Aeneas. She resists her emotions until the gods Juno and Venus intervene to bring about the union of the couple, eventually consummated in a cave where they had taken shelter during a fierce storm. Nevertheless, their happiness does not last long, as Jove reminds Aeneas of his destiny to found the kingdom of Rome. Aeneas departs, despite Dido’s pleas. In his version of the story, librettist Nahum Tate made a number of significant changes. The number of characters is reduced, and the portrayal of the relationship between Dido and Aeneas is significantly different. Here, the Roman gods and goddesses are replaced by witches, so Aeneas departs as the result of their trickery and not divine intervention. And in Tate’s libretto, Dido’s final fate is left ambiguous. Whoever hears Dido and Aeneas must admire the unity of the composition and the expression of human passion by characters so human and real. Purcell, through declamatory airs (songs with speech-like rhythms), extensive descriptive word painting, and the use of chorus in the manner of the Greek tragedy, succeeds in transmitting a vast range of emotions. Equally important to the conveyance of the drama and the articulation of the story is the use of dance. Purcell, following Blow’s example and the tradition of the Masque, incorporates dances in his opera in moments of significant dramatic tension. The 1689 libretto contains indications for eleven dances, a later version from 1700 lists six, and finally only four dances appear in the score: the Triumphing Dance, the Echo Dance of the Furies, the Sailor’s Dance, and the Witches Dance. At first glance, we might conclude that the number of dances was reduced, but a closer look at the score reveals that the supposed ‘omitted’ parts are still included, folded into texted movements of the opera. This realization sheds light on two significant musical features of the opera: that there are two different kinds of choruses (the ones meant only to be sung and ones that can be danced as well) and two different kinds of dances (formal ones with patterned and regular steps, or freely pantomimed ones). The uniquely extensive use of dance in Dido and Aeneas naturally inspired Opera Saratoga to invite the world-renowned choreographer and director Karole Armitage to create a very special site-specific production of this classic work. The natural beauty of Saratoga Springs and the summer night sky will provide the ideal scenery for the revival of the greatest operatic achievement of seventeenth-century England.

Antigoni Gaitana is a classical singer, theatre scholar, and aspiring dramaturg based in NYC.

DIDO AND AENEAS SYNOPSIS The lady-in-waiting Belinda attempts to cheer Dido, the lovelorn Queen of Carthage. Dido admits that she loves the Trojan hero Aeneas, who has been shipwrecked in Carthage on his way to Italy. Aeneas arrives to court Dido, and Belinda and the chorus encourage Dido to accept his marriage proposal. Meanwhile, a Sorceress and her minions are plotting the downfall of Dido and of Carthage. The Sorceress conjures a storm to break out while Dido and Aeneas are out hunting, which drives Dido back to her court. Aeneas, left alone, is visited by a spirit impersonating the god Mercury, sent by the Sorceress, who urges him to leave right away and fulfill his destiny to found Rome as the new Troy. The following day, Aeneas’s sailors prepare to sail for Rome, to the delight of the witches. After Aeneas bids Dido farewell, she is overcome by grief, while mourning cupids lament.

Aeneas tells Dido about the fall of Troy by Pierre-Narcisse Guérin.

ARMITAGE GONE! DANCE Over the past 30 years, Karole Armitage and her dancers have shaped the evolution of contemporary dance through the creation and performance of new works. The most recent incarnation of the company, Armitage Gone! Dance, was launched in 2004 when Karole Armitage returned to the U.S. after 15 years of working abroad. Dedicated to redefining the boundaries and perception of contemporary dance, the company extends the mandate of innovation that characterizes both her earlier Armitage Ballet, founded in 1985, and her first full time company, Armitage Gone!, founded in 1979. Armitage’s interests are wide ranging, mixing the popular with the esoteric and the traditions of ballet and modern dance. AG!D is known for its collaborations with innovators in music, science, and the visual arts. AG!D has created works on a wide range of subjects from African aesthetics to commedia dell’arte, as well as fashion and popular dance forms with a strong commitment to work inspired by science.

THE NATIONAL MUSEUM OF DANCE The National Museum of Dance & Hall of Fame was established in 1986 as the only museum in the nation and one of the few in the world that is dedicated entirely to the art of dance. The Museum is located in the former Washington Bathhouse, a

historic building in the Saratoga Spa State Park. Under the direction of Raul Martinez, the Museum’s archives house a growing collection of photographs, videos, costumes, documents, biographies and artifacts that honor all forms of dance throughout history. Available to the public is a Resource Room, which offers thousands of books, periodicals, and print items for dance research. Throughout the building’s many galleries are a variety of yearly rotating exhibits and three permanent exhibits including the Mr. and Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney Hall of Fame. Opened in 1987, it honors dance pioneers of all types whether they are choreographers, composers, writers, dancers, or patrons. In 2014, The Mr. and Mrs. Ronald A. Riggi Theater was opened to present public programs by the Museum, as well as to provide an intimate venue for the presentation of performances by community partners. The Museum campus also includes the Lewis A. Swyer Studios, a building constructed specifically for the purpose of keeping live dance as part of the Museum’s offerings. The Swyer Studios welcome frequent master classes, lecture/ demonstrations, residencies, and other programs, as well as the Museum’s very own dance school, the School of the Arts, which offers dance classes to all ages, levels, and interests. The Museum also offers a wide selection of special programs, events, and workshops throughout the calendar year.

DREAMS THAT HAUNT US, AND CHANGE US FOREVER... 26

THE LONG WALK World Premiere July 10, 2015, Opera Saratoga, Spa Little Theater

IRAQI WOMAN / PERNEATHA / YOGINI Donita Volkwijn

Four performances: July 10, 13m, 17m, 25

THE OPERA SARATOGA ORCHESTRA

Music by Jeremy Howard Beck Libretto by Stephanie Fleischmann Based on the book The Long Walk: A Story of War and the Life that Follows by Brian Castner

PRODUCTION

CAST, IN ORDER OF VOCAL APPEARANCE BRIAN, AN EXPLOSIVE ORDNANCE DISPOSAL UNIT CAPTAIN, HOME FROM IRAQ FOR ALMOST 2 YEARS Daniel Belcher JESSIE, BRIAN’S WIFE Heather Johnson MARTIN, THEIR SON Erich Schuett VIRGIL, THEIR SON Robert Wesley Hill SAM, THEIR SON Henry Wager JEFF, A SOLDIER IN BRIAN’S UNIT Justin Hopkins CASTLEMAN, A SOLDIER IN BRIAN’S UNIT Javier Abreu RICKY, A SOLDIER IN BRIAN’S UNIT David Blalock AUNT SARAH / IRAQI WOMAN / SHRINK Caroline Worra

CONDUCTOR Steven Osgood DIRECTOR David Schweizer SCENIC DESIGNER Mimi Lien COSTUME DESIGNER Nancy Leary LIGHTING DESIGNER Jeff Bruckerhoff WIG AND MAKEUP DESIGNER Sondra Nottingham SUPERTITLES Cara Consilvio* COPYIST Matthew Maslanka ASSISTANT CONDUCTOR Joshua Horsch*

(2015)

*Member of Opera Saratoga’s Young Artist Program World Premiere Production, sung in English with English projected text There will be one intermission. The performance will last approximately two hours and thirty minutes. The Long Walk was commissioned by and developed at American Lyric Theater, under the auspices of the Composer Librettist Development Program. Commission and development support at ALT was generously provided by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, The National Endowment for the Arts, OPERA America / The Opera Fund, The New York State Council on the Arts, and The New York City Department of Cultural Affairs. Jeremy and Stephanie wish to extend special thanks to dramaturg Cori Ellison, composer/librettist Mark Adamo, librettist Mark Campbell, and ALT’s Producing Artistic Director Lawrence Edelson for their mentorship and support. The World Premiere Production of The Long Walk is a co-production of Opera Saratoga and Utah Opera & Symphony.

ASSISTANT DIRECTOR Cara Consilvio* PRINCIPAL COACH Djordje Stevan Nesic STAGE MANAGER Angela Turner ASSISTANT STAGE MANAGER Sarah J. Stewart

Lead Funding for the World Premiere Production of The Long Walk has been generously provided by The MAP Fund, supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Aaron Copland Fund for Music. Additional support has been provided by OPERA America / The Opera Fund, to provide education and audience enrichment programs throughout the community leading up to the World Premiere.

MAKING “THE CRAZY” SING From Monteverdi’s Il combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda (1624) and Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria (1639) through Berg’s Wozzeck (1925) and Britten’s Billy Budd (1951), to Silent Night (2011) by Kevin Puts and Mark Campbell, opera composers and librettists have sought to dramatize the devastating effects of war on humankind. To these tales of the Trojan War, the Crusades, the French Revolutionary Wars, and World War I, Opera Saratoga now adds a story from our own time, the story of a man whose home is a mere four-and-a-half hour drive from here. The Long Walk is based on the harrowing but poignant memoir (subtitled A Story of War and the Life that Follows) of the same name by Brian Castner, a former US Air Force officer who was deployed to Iraq in 2005 and 2006 to lead an Explosive Ordnance Disposal unit, a team charged with disarming IEDs (improvised explosive devices), the deadly “roadside bombs” favored by terrorist groups. When robots and other remote means failed, Castner or one of his team would be obliged to don an 80-pound Kevlar suit and take “the long walk” to disarm a bomb manually. Castner’s brutally vivid book describes not only the carnage he witnessed but how it damaged his mind and his life. When he returned home, he faced a fresh war with an inner demon he dubbed “the Crazy.” In July 2012, composer Jeremy Howard Beck and librettist Stephanie Fleischmann received a commission for a full-length opera from American Lyric Theater in New York

City, an organization devoted to educating and mentoring gifted emerging operatic composers and librettists and to commissioning and developing new American opera. Stephanie and Jeremy, both alumni of ALT’s Composer Librettist Development Program, scoured fiction and non-fiction, movies and plays, to find a story that cried out to be sung and which would also hit the “sweet spot” between the introspective, poetic Stephanie and the emphatic, thrill-seeking Jeremy. After two months of fruitless searching, Jeremy finally found the perfect vehicle in Castner’s hot-off-the-press memoir, published in August 2012. Stephanie recalls, “We were both moved by the subject matter. By our distance from Brian’s experience and the intimacy, the closeness to it we experienced through the book. The love and the potential for destruction. The fallout that comes from an injury you can’t see—blast-induced traumatic brain injury. We were both grabbed by the imagery, and by the presence of refrain within the text, the music of that. Brian’s voice felt like a voice in my ear from the very first page of his book, like a friend talking to me.” Brian Castner was astonished to receive a request to turn his book into an opera, but had readily consented by October 2012. “Brian gave us his blessing to do with it what we needed to do, while still always hewing to the truth he had expressed in his book,” recalls Stephanie. Castner not only graciously granted the rights to his book, but has remained involved in the opera’s development every step of the way, attending libretto and musical workshops, participating in outreach efforts, and, perhaps most importantly, generously inviting Stephanie to his home near Buffalo to meet and talk with his family. Says Stephanie, “I went up and interviewed both Brian and his wife Jessie for hours, my goal being to get inside the experience of the family. We listened

LEFT Lawrence Edelson, Jeremy Howard Beck, and Stephanie Fleischmann in the 2014 developmental workshop of The Long Walk at American Lyric Theater.

to the sounds of Brian’s and Jessie’s voices. I wanted to get even closer than the voice of Brian’s book, to understand his sometimes contradictory impulses regarding being at war and being at home and the pull between the military brotherhood and the family.” Stephanie’s contact with the Castner family led to a significant departure from the book: the opera has become Jessie’s story as much as Brian’s. It is, in Stephanie’s words, “the story of this family’s struggle, particularly Jessie’s complex relationship to what it is Brian does. Ultimately, we figured out (with a little help from Jessie) that what we were making was a vehicle by which family members who’d gotten their soldier back in one piece might be able to mourn the loss of the loved one they knew before he or she went off to war, so that they could move forward. And that music was the key.” As inspired as they felt, Stephanie and Jeremy both recognized the challenge of finding the right dramatic shape for Castner’s purposefully nonlinear story, which in the book bounces back and forth free-associatively between his troubled homecoming and his traumatic memories, mirroring his chaotic mind. Observes Stephanie, “The chronology was slippery indeed. We parsed every moment of the book, looking closely at the shape of those moments in all their scope and specificity, especially the places in the book where every moment came back and back, reverberating through the text, like music. We mapped all the images, all the characters, all the time frames, in an elaborate Excel document we taped together that was as tall as Jeremy. We made choices.” When the draft libretto was done, ALT held a public reading in February 2013 in which actors spoke all of the roles. Castner was there, listening. Stephanie recalls, “He was moved in a way he wasn’t expecting. His soldier friends who had accompanied him to the reading spoke about how true it felt to what he’d written as well as to their EOD experience.” With the libretto done, Jeremy began composing, with the musical structure stemming directly from the carefully plotted dramatic structure. Jeremy explains, “I knew I would need three different musical worlds: one for Home, one for War/Memory, and one for ‘the Crazy’. And I knew from the beginning that the orchestration/sound-color would be one of the major ways I’d establish the boundaries between those three worlds and keep them distinct—until they crash into each other, which I hope actually feels like worlds colliding.” “From our very first meetings,” Jeremy continues, “Stephanie and I talked about using the electric guitar as the sound of Home, the world we live in, since our story takes place in the present day and in the U.S. and we wanted the opera to sound of the present in an immediately identifiable way. But the electric guitar has an incredibly diverse range of possible sounds, so I knew it would also help me create the other two sound worlds. “’The Crazy’ also functions differently from the Home and War sound worlds: It’s more a mode of orchestral behavior. That’s because I needed it to be able to surface anywhere, in any context, just as Brian’s ‘Crazy’ feeling always caught him

Brian Castner in Kirkuk.

by surprise. So novelty and unpredictability are important to how ‘the Crazy’ functions musically.” The guitar’s sound and capabilities grew so important that Jeremy decided to use a pair of them, as well as an electric bass (played by a doubling acoustic bass player), alongside the score’s other 15 more conventional instruments (flute/ piccolo), clarinet/bass clarinet, horns, trumpets, trombone, bass trombone, percussion, keyboard, violins, viola, and cello. Says Jeremy, “Having two guitars instead of one came from the purely practical consideration that so much of this opera is about worlds colliding and interrupting each other. Two guitars allows me to switch between sound colors immediately, and to have two different sounds in rapid alternation or simultaneous, which isn’t something I’d be able to do with just one. And the electric bass underpins the ‘running’ music, which is one of the major architectural linchpins of the show, and which, along with the ‘Crazy’ music, travels between the Home world and the War world.” As Jeremy composed, first in piano-vocal score, musical workshops were held in June 2013 and June 2014. Brian and Jessie and some of Brian’s EOD brothers attended, and baritone Daniel Belcher (Brian) and mezzo-soprano Heather Johnson (Jessie) had the extraordinary experience of meeting their real-life counterparts. Listening to the opera, Brian and his EOD brothers flashed back. Further revisions, paring, and tightening led up to a final orchestral workshop this past March. These premiere performances represent the final step of the three-year “long walk” from inspiration to fruition of this vital new opera, a testament not only to the horrors of war but to the resilience of the human spirit and the redemptive power of love.

Cori Ellison, Dramaturg at Glyndebourne Festival Opera, had the pleasure of assisting in the development of The Long Walk as a core faculty member and mentor at American Lyric Theater.

JEREMY HOWARD BECK Composer

STEPHANIE FLEISCHMANN Librettist

Jeremy Howard Beck (b. 1985 Huntington, NY) is an award-winning composer whose adventurous, eclectic and emotionally immediate music—recently described as “sparse and haunting” by NPR’s Weekend Edition, and hailed by the American Composers Forum for its “thrilling aural twists and bends”—has been performed throughout the country: at Opera America’s National Conference, the Bang on a Can Marathon, InsightALT, Eastern Trombone Workshop, International Trombone Festival, the Norfolk and Bang on a Can Summer Festivals, and throughout New York City. His works for trombone quartet have received a 2012 JFund/ACF grant (In Wait) and a 2011 ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Award (Awakening). Recent commissions include the evening-length opera The Long Walk, with a libretto by Stephanie Fleischmann based on the memoir of the same name by Iraq veteran Brian Castner (American Lyric Theater), which recently received support from The MAP Fund for its world premiere at Opera Saratoga; ROAR (Gaudete Brass Quintet); In Wait (The Guidonian Hand) and Annunciation (Choral Chameleon). Jeremy is a Resident Artist with American Lyric Theater and a Composer-in-Residence with the Guidonian Hand trombone quartet, whose recording of Awakening is now available on iTunes, Amazon, and bandcamp. He studied with John Corigliano and Christopher Rouse at The Juilliard School and with Mark Adamo and Deniz Hughes at NYU. Stephanie Fleischmann is a librettist and playwright whose work has been presented internationally and across the U.S. Opera libretti include: The Root of the Wind is Water (working title), music by David Hanlon, for Houston Grand Opera’s HGOco; The Property, music by Wlad Marhulets, for Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Lyric Unlimited; and a new opera with Christopher Cerrone, forthcoming. Music-theater works include: Red Fly/Blue Bottle (HERE; Noorderzon, NL; EMPAC) and The Secret Lives of Coats (Red Eye, the Kilroys), both with music by Christina Campanella; The Greeks and The Americans (Juilliard); The Flax, music by Saskia Lane. Selected plays: Tally Ho (Round House, London), The World Speed Carnival (Soho Rep), What the Moon Saw (Son of Semele), Eloise & Ray (New Georges), The Street of Useful Things (Act 2). Additional venues include: Exit Festival (Paris), Theater for One, Asolo Rep, Roadworks, Synchronicity, Prelude, Ojai Festival and more. Textual collaborations: Brian Mertes/Melissa Kievman’s Chekhov at Lake Lucille; Andy Dawson’s The Russian Doctor (Mass MoCA, Birmingham Rep). Published by Play, a Journal of Plays; playscripts.com. Stephanie teaches playwriting at Skidmore College, and holds an MFA from Brooklyn College. She is currently a 2014–15 Howard Foundation Fellow in Playwriting, and a Resident Artist at American Lyric Theater. She has received 2 NYSCA Individual Artist Commissions, NEA Opera/Music-Theater Commission, 2 NYFA fellowships, as well as support from the Greenwall Foundation, NY State Music Fund, Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation, and the Frederic Loewe and Whitfield Cook Awards. Residencies: New Dramatists, MacDowell, HARP, Playwrights Center, Hedgebrook, Mabou Mines/Suite. Tennessee Williams Fellow in Playwriting (Sewanee). Brian Castner is the author of “The Long Walk,” an Amazon Best Book of 2012 and Chautauqua Scientific & Literary Circle selection for 2013. Previously, he served as an Explosive Ordnance Disposal officer in the US Air Force from 1999 to 2007, deploying to Iraq to command bomb disposal units in Balad and Kirkuk in 2005 and 2006. After leaving the active military, he became a consultant and contractor, training Army and Marine Corps units prior to their tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. His writing has appeared in a number of national and regional publications, including Wired, The New York Times, The Daily Beast, The Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, Foreign Policy, Publishers Weekly, and Garry Trudeau’s The Sandbox anthology. Brian lives outside of Buffalo, New York with his wife and four sons.

BRIAN CASTNER Author

THE LONG WALK SYNOPSIS ACT I A figure runs along the Niagara River in Buffalo, New York. It is Brian Castner, a former Explosive Ordnance Disposal Captain in the U.S. Air Force. As he runs, he is haunted by memories of Iraq. Brian’s wife, Jessie, recalls her grandmother’s prophecy: even if her husband returns from combat, the war will no doubt kill him at home. At dinner with his family, Brian is besieged by another memory of Iraq, imagining that soldiers are invading the Castner family kitchen. Brian’s son Martin asks his father to read him a bedtime story. Later that night, Brian wakes in terror, and Jessie urges him to get help. The next morning, Brian struggles to get the kids ready for school. Longing to escape the challenges of the everyday, Brian flashes back to his Explosive Ordnance (EOD) training prior to his service in Iraq, and the brotherhood he found there, “the Brotherhood of the Crab.” That afternoon, at his son’s seventh birthday party, Jessie urges Brian to try to be present for the sake of the children. Brian struggles to connect with what’s happening all around him, and to remember minute details of his family’s past, and fails. He retreats to the garage, where he attempts to arm the family minivan in order to keep his boys safe on their way to school. His son Martin finds him there. Brian takes off, attempting to outrun “the Crazy,” but is assaulted by a barrage of memories of Iraq, culminating in the moment he came close to shooting a cluster of keening Iraqi women. When the memories fade away, he finds himself back at home, staring into the mirror. He mounts the stairs and then sits, rifle in hands, guarding his sleeping boys.

ACT II Jessie appeals to Brian to seek help, giving him an ultimatum of sorts. Brian descends into another horrific memory of Iraq, one which persuaded him to go home. Brian visits a shrink at the VA, who gives him a diagnosis. Later, at the funeral of a fallen EOD man, Jessie mourns the loss of the man she married. Back at home, the boys sing about their father. The Shrink asks Brian: Why is the war still in your house? At a yoga class for veterans, Brian, faced with yet another Iraq memory, manages to remain in the present. Some time later, Jessie and the boys are playing before Brian’s return from a trip. He panics at the airport and phones Jessie, who talks him down. Brian asks her to remind him of details of the family life he’s forgotten. They connect over their shared past. The Shrink tells Brian he’s making progress. Brian accompanies his son to the Mite Hockey championship. Seeing his son suiting up, he breaks down, flashing back to the memory of one of his “brothers” suiting up to take the Long Walk. He then has another flashback: The men in their humvee returning from a mission before dawn. A pigeon lands on the humvee. Back in Buffalo, Brian runs along the Niagara River, through memories of war and present moments of peace, past his EOD brothers, towards his wife and children, and on, into the future.

AMERICAN LYRIC THEATER Based in New York City, American Lyric Theater (ALT) was founded in 2005 by Lawrence Edelson to build a new body of operatic repertoire for new audiences by nurturing composers and librettists, developing sustainable artistic collaborations, and contributing new works to the national canon. Many opera companies commission and perform new works; but ALT is the only company in the United States that offers extensive, full-time mentorship for emerging operatic writers. The Composer Librettist Development Program (CLDP), ALT’s flagship initiative, provides tuition free training for emerging operatic writers selected through an open, competitive application process. The CLDP includes a core curriculum of hands-on workshops with some of the country’s leading working artists, including composer/librettist Mark Adamo, composers Anthony Davis and Paul Moravec, librettists Mark Campbell and Michael Korie, and dramaturg Cori Ellison. In addition to the CLDP, ALT commissions and develops new opera and collaborates with opera companies nationally to facilitate their production. Operas developed through the CLDP and by CLDP alumni have been presented by a wide variety of companies, including Houston Grand Opera, Tulsa Opera, Fort Worth Opera, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, Fargo Moorhead Opera, Urban Arias, Center City Opera, San Francisco Conservatory, New York City Opera VOX, and Beth Morrison Projects. Currently, ALT is developing five new operas for future production: The Life and Death(s) of Alan Turing by Justine F. Chen and David Simpatico; La Reina by Jorge Sosa and Laura Sosa Pedroza; J.F.K. by David T. Little and Royce Vavrek, a co-commission with Fort Worth Opera; and two new full length operas for family audiences to be announced later this summer.

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GUEST ARTIST PROFILES

JAVIER ABREU Castleman in The Long Walk Opera Saratoga Debut Season Sponsored by Donna & Michael Vild

DANIEL BELCHER Brian in The Long Walk Lake George Opera Debut 1999 as Figaro in Il Barbiere di Siviglia Sponsored by Judy & Jeff Killeen

DAVID BLALOCK Ricky in The Long Walk Opera Saratoga Debut Season Sponsored by Bob & Marcia Miller

Puerto Rican tenor Javier Abreu has been described as a commanding force on stage, incorporating a rich, sweet and agile voice, with ample dramatic skills. In the 2014-2015 season Javier returned to Nashville Opera in Florencia en el Amazonas, debuted with Virginia Opera in Sweeney Todd, appeared with Opera Santa Barbara as Lindoro in L’italiana in Algeri, and sang First Elder in Handel’s Susanna with the Collegiate Chorale. In concert he appeared with the Louisville Orchestra for Carmina Burana and the Jacksonville Symphony for Mozart’s Requiem. Other recent engagements include his debut with Atlanta Opera as Almaviva in Il barbiere di Siviglia, Tonio in La fille du régiment with Madison Opera, appearances with the Phoenix Symphony and Lexington Philharmonic for Handel’s Messiah and the Philadelphia Ballet for Orff’s Carmina Burana. The 2012-13 season brought debuts with Nashville Opera as Ramiro in La Cenerentola, Opera Santa Barbara as Ernesto in Donizetti’s Don Pasquale, Phoenix Symphony in their rendition of Carmina Burana as well as with The Jacksonville Symphony in Handel’s Messiah. Summer of 2013 brought a reading of the new opera La Reina with American Lyric Theater and performances of Almaviva with Central City Opera. Additionally, he is featured in two recent recording releases: John Musto’s The Inspector with the Wolf Trap Opera and the Five Borough Songbook with the Five Borough Music Festival.

Winner of a 2010 Grammy Award, baritone Daniel Belcher has performed in many of the world’s music capitals, including Paris, London, New York, San Francisco, Berlin, Stuttgart, Amsterdam, Geneva, Toronto, Tokyo, Seoul and Houston. With a 50-role repertoire, Belcher has championed roles from the Baroque to those composed expressly for him. He came to international attention in 2004 creating the role of Prior Walter in Peter Eötvös’ Angels in America for the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris and recently created the role of Robert Kennedy in Robin de Raaff’s Waiting for Miss Monroe for The Netherlands Opera and Holland Festival. Other world premieres include John Brooke in Mark Adamo’s Little Women (released on the Ondine label and recorded by PBS “Great Performances”), Andy Warhol in Michael Daugherty’s Jackie O (released by Decca on the Argo label) and Tod Machover’s Resurrection (released on the Ondine label), all with Houston Grand Opera. World premieres in development include Thomas Morse and Ken Cazan’s Frau Schindler, and The Scarlet Letter by Lori Laitman. In 2014-15, he debuted in Norway at the Trondheim Chamber Music Festival with both Sombre and L’amour de Loin by Kaija Saariaho, returned to the Portland Opera for its 50th Anniversary season as Eisenstein in Die Fledermaus, Opera Colorado as Papageno in The Magic Flute, and Lyric Opera of Kansas City in his role debut as Father Palmer in Silent Night. Tenor David Blalock, recipient of a 2014 Career Development Award from the Sullivan Foundation, recently made his role and house debut with North Carolina Opera as Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni. He began the 2014-15 season by returning to Virginia Opera to sing Toby in Sweeney Todd, followed by a debut with Madison Opera as Jaquino in Fidelio. David then sang his first performances of Jonathan Dale in Silent Night, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for music, with Lyric Opera of Kansas City. In June, David made another role debut as Count Almaviva in On Site Opera’s production of Il barbiere di Siviglia, composed by Paisiello. As an Emerging Artist with Virginia Opera in 2013-14, he was seen as Remendado in Carmen and as Brighella in Ariadne auf Naxos. In 2013, David made his Fort Worth Opera debut as Young Thompson in Tom Cipullo’s Glory Denied. Opera News described his performance as “appealingly brash and defiant in the face of the unspeakable.” Other credits include Bertram in La donna del lago with Santa Fe Opera, First Prisoner in Oscar with Santa Fe Opera, and Rodolfo in La bohème with Greenville Light Opera. After receiving his undergraduate degree from UNC Greensboro, David spent two years as a member of the Maryland Opera Studio in College Park. David has performed as a young artist with Santa Fe Opera, Central City Opera, Seagle Music Colony, and Ash Lawn Opera.

JOHN BRANCY Dandini in La Cenerentola, Recitalist Opera Saratoga Debut Season Sponsored by George & Christine Hearst

JENNIFER JOHNSON CANO Dido in Dido and Aeneas, Recitalist Opera Saratoga Debut Season

In the 2014-2015 season, baritone John Brancy’s debuts included Opera San Antonio as the title role in Tobias Picker’s The Fantastic Mr. Fox along with a gala appearance at the opening of San Antonio’s new Tobin Center; Edmonton Opera as Papageno in Die Zauberflöte; and Opera Lyra Ottawa as Figaro in Le nozze di Figaro. His numerous concert engagements included his debut with Musica Sacra in Handel’s Messiah at Carnegie Hall, where he also performed a recital with pianist Ken Noda for “The Song Continues”. He made his recital debut at the Kennedy Center with Vocal Arts DC, and reprised the same program with CAIC (Collaborative Arts Institute of Chicago), and Société d’art vocal de Montréal. He also returned this season to the New York Festival of Song (NYFOS) performing at Merkin Hall. Future seasons include a debut with the Glyndebourne Festival Opera Tour, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, and a return to Carnegie Hall in recital as part of their “Evening of Song Series”. Last season Mr. Brancy made important debuts at Oper Frankfurt as Sonora in La fanciulla del West, Gotham Chamber Opera in Charpentier’s La descente d’Orphée aux Enfers, and Pacific Opera Victoria as Harlekin in Ariadne auf Naxos. Mr. Brancy’s concert and recital engagements for the year included performances with the Saskatoon and Regina Symphonies, San Francisco Symphony, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Brooklyn Art Song Society, and Carnegie Hall.

Mezzo Soprano Jennifer Johnson Cano is a 2012 Richard Tucker Career Grant and George London Winner who joined The Lindemann Young Artist Development Program at The Metropolitan Opera in 2008 and made her Met debut in 2009-2010. As First Prize winner of the 2009 Young Concert Artist International Auditions, she has given recital debuts with husband Christopher Cano in New York at Carnegie Hall, in Washington, DC at the Kennedy Center, in Boston at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and in Philadelphia at the Kimmel Center. Over the last two seasons, Ms. Cano has debuted as Meg Page in Falstaff, Bersi in Andrea Chenier, Marguerite in Berlioz’s La Damnation de Faust, The Sharp Eared Fox in Janacek’s Cunning Little Vixen with Franz Welser-Möst and Diana in La Calisto. She has recently performed Hansel, Nicklausse, and Mercédès at the Metropolitan Opera and Donna Elvira at the Boston Lyric Opera. Her 2015-2016 season will include Emilia with the Metropolitan Opera, Donna Elvira with Arizona Opera, Verdi’s Requiem with the Atlanta Symphony, Handel’s Messiah with the Cleveland Orchestra, Brahms’ Alto Rhapsody with the Monterey Symphony, and Beethoven’s Ninth with both the Minnesota Orchestra and the Kansas City Symphony.

Sponsored by Bob & Marcia Miller

CONDUCTORS AND MUSIC STAFF PROFILES

CHRISTOPHER CANO Repetiteur, Continuo (Dido and Aeneas), Recital Pianist Opera Saratoga Debut Season

Seasoned recitalist and orchestra soloist, pianist Christopher Cano has performed in Europe, across the US, Mexico, Israel and the Far East. Mr. Cano has won numerous awards including the Green Valley Scholarship Competition, Emilio Osta Scholarship Competition, Tucson Symphony Orchestra Young Artist Competition, and is a recipient of the Theodore Presser Scholarship. He is also a two-time winner of the University of Arizona President’s Concert Concerto Competition. As a collaborative artist, he has played in the Master Classes of the late Fedora Barbieri, the late Anna Moffo and for master classes of Marilyn Horne in New York City at Carnegie Hall. As a studio pianist, Mr. Cano has had the distinct privilege of working with some of the great artists and teachers of singing including Marilyn Horne, Sherrill Milnes, Luciano Pavarotti, Marni Nixon, Patricia McCaffrey, Joan Patenaude-Yarnell, Rita Shane and Diana Soviero. Mr. Cano has performed as a guest soloist and chamber musician at the Killington Music Festival in Vermont, the Alamos Music Festival of Sonora, Mexico, and has participated and performed with the International Vocal Arts Institute in Tel Aviv, Israel and Blacksburg, Virginia. Mr. Cano has been a member of the music staff at the Festival Lyrique en Mer in Belle Isle, France, Toledo Opera, San Diego Opera, Utah Festival Opera, Opera Company of North Carolina, Florida Grand Opera, and Opera Theatre of Saint Louis. Mr. Cano has served on the faculties of The Intermezzo Music Festival, Manhattan School of Music Summer Voice Institute, and V.O.I.C.Experience, a summer program for promising young singers in New York City, Orlando and Savannah under the Artistic Direction of renowned baritone Sherrill Milnes. Mr. Cano and his wife, Mezzo Soprano Jennifer Johnson Cano currently reside in New York City where he was a full-scholarship student in the Professional Studies Program of Vocal Accompanying at the Manhattan School of Music. He currently serves on the vocal coaching faculty of that institution where he was a student of renowned pianist Warren Jones.

JOAN DORNEMANN Guest Master Teacher Opera Saratoga Debut Season

PETER DUGAN Recital Pianist Opera Saratoga Debut Season

DJORDJE STEVAN NESIC Repetiteur, Keyboard (The Long Walk), Recital Pianist Opera Saratoga Debut Season

Joan Dornemann is one of the most highly respected opera coaches in the world today. In her position as Assistant Conductor with the Metropolitan Opera, she prepares the most prominent international artists for their performances at the Met. She has worked with such singers as Luciano Pavarotti, Plácido Domingo, Montserrat Caballé, Mirella Freni, José Carreras, Sherrill Milnes, Kiri Te Kanawa, Leo Nucci, Renee Fleming, Aprile Millo, Deborah Voigt, Neil Shicoff, Juan Diego Flórez, and Anna Netrebko, among others. In addition, she has collaborated with outstanding opera singers as an accompanist for many solo performances. She has been associated with the Gran Liceo in Barcelona, the Spoleto Festival, and the New York City Opera. At the Metropolitan Opera, she has collaborated with such conductors as James Levine, James Conlon, and Carlos Kleiber. Ms. Dornemann prepared the singers of the Kirov Opera in Russia for a recording of La Forza del destino and performances of Carmen and Aida under the baton of Valery Gergiev. She was in charge of musical preparation for La Bohème and La Cenerentola at the Opéra de Paris. Ms. Dornemann has been awarded an Emmy for her contribution to the highly acclaimed “Live from the Met” first telecast of La bohème with Luciano Pavarotti and Renata Scotto. A great supporter of young singers, Ms. Dornemann teaches master classes throughout the U.S. as well as Israel, New Zealand, Canada, Mexico, Russia, China, Japan, and France. She is also the author of Complete Preparation: A Guide to Auditioning for the Opera, and is the Founder and Artistic Director of the International Vocal Arts Institute, which has enjoyed enormous success with programs in Tel Aviv, Israel, and Blacksburg, Virginia, and continues to have programs in Montreal, Canada, and most recently New York City. She was honored last summer by the city of Tel Aviv, which issued a commemorative stamp bearing her picture, and this fall she received an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Montreal. Pianist Peter Dugan, hailed “a formidable soloist” by the Washington Post after his Kennedy Center debut this season, has been praised by the Baltimore Sun as “spellbinding” and by the Palm Beach Daily News as “superb.” Prizing versatility as the key to the future of classical music, Mr. Dugan is equally at home in classical, jazz, and pop idioms. He has appeared as a soloist throughout the United States, including performances in New York’s Carnegie Hall and Alice Tully Hall. He has also performed internationally in Canada, South America, the Cayman Islands, and across Europe. This season, Mr. Dugan appeared as a soloist with the New World Symphony in its Season Opening Concert under the baton of Michael Tilson Thomas. A sought-after crossover artist, Mr. Dugan recently performed duos with violinists Itzhak Perlman and Joshua Bell in memorial concerts for Marvin Hamlisch at the Peter Jay Sharp Theater in New York and The Delacorte Theater in Central Park. He has performed his solo arrangements of Hamlisch tunes in tribute concerts on Broadway and at the Public Theater’s annual gala in Central Park. Mr. Dugan holds Master of Music and Bachelor of Music degrees in solo piano performance from the Juilliard School, where he studied under Matti Raekallio. Dugan teaches sight reading for pianists at Juilliard and serves on the faculty at St. Thomas Choir School in New York. Djordje Stevan Nesic’s pianism has been described as artful, assertive, sensitive and quietly virtuosic, and his career highlighted by recital, concerto, chamber, and collaborative performances. Recent activity includes an appearance at the Opera America Conference in San Francisco, a teaching residency at the National Theater in Belgrade, and performances at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, as well as a live performance on A Prairie Home Companion with Garrison Keillor. Djordje recorded seven newly commissioned art songs for OPERA America’s Songbook CD, performed at Carnegie’s Weill and Zankel halls, Ravinia Festival’s “Rising Star Series”, and participated in the Midwest-Emmy winning PBS broadcast of “This Little Light of Mine”, also issued on DVD. Other venues include Lincoln Center, the United Nations General Assembly Hall, the Mann Performing Arts Center in Philadelphia, and FUJI TV in Japan. He has ample operatic experience from the Aspen Music Festival, the Tanglewood Festival, Glimmerglass Opera, Houston Grand Opera, the Greenwich Music Festival, and the Phoenicia International Festival of the Voice. Djordje Stevan Nesic, a roster member of the Swiss Global Artistic Foundation, lives in New York City.

CONDUCTORS AND MUSIC STAFF PROFILES

STEVEN OSGOOD Conductor (The Long Walk) Opera Saratoga Debut 1995

NICOLE PAIEMENT Conductor (Dido and Aeneas) Opera Saratoga Debut Season

LAURIE ROGERS Director of Music Staff & Young Artist Programs, Chorus Master; Assistant Conductor (Dido and Aeneas) Opera Saratoga Debut 2011

Steven Osgood has conducted the world premieres of a dozen operas, including works by Tan Dun, Iannis Xenakis, Missy Mazzoli and Daron Hagen. The 2014/15 season included premieres of As One by Laura Kaminsky, Mark Campbell and Kimberly Reed with American Opera Projects, and The Scarlet Ibis by Stefan Weisman with the Prototype Festival. He was Artistic Director of American Opera Projects from 2001 until 2008, during which time he created the company’s renowned Composers and the Voice fellowship program. In recent seasons he has appeared with Atlanta Opera, Opera Memphis, Chautauqua Opera, Fort Worth Opera, New York City Opera, Wolf Trap Opera, Manhattan School of Music, Edmonton Opera and the Netherlands Opera. He has been a member of the music staff at the Metropolitan Opera since 2006. The 2015/16 season includes Mr. Osgood’s debut with Los Angeles Opera conducting Mazzoli’s Song From the Uproar, and the world premiere of J.F.K. by David T. Little and Royce Vavrek at the Fort Worth Opera Festival. Later in 2016 he will conduct the premiere of Gilgamesh by Paola Prestini and Cerise Jacobs with Beth Morrison Projects.

Nicole Paiement is Artistic Director and Conductor of Opera Parallèle in San Francisco where she has conducted many new productions including the world premiere of Harrison’s opera Young Caesar; the commissioned chamber version of Harbison’s The Great Gatsby; John Rea’s re-orchestration of Berg’s Wozzeck; Glass’s Orphée; Thomson’s Four Saints in Three Acts; Chessa’s commissioned opera A Heavenly Act; Golijov’s Ainadamar; the commission of De Silva’s opera Gesualdo, Prince of Madness; Poulenc’s Les mamelles de Tirésias; Weill’s Mahagonny Songspiel; and the American premiere of Gorb’s opera Anya 17. This season, Paiement has conducted Heggie’s Dead Man Walking and the American premiere of O’Regan’s Heart of Darkness with the company. Paiement is an active guest conductor and has recently been appointed Principal Guest Conductor at The Dallas Opera where she recently conducted the World Premiere of Joby Talbot’s opera Everest in February 2015. Other performances with The Dallas Opera include Machover’s Death and the Powers and Maxwell Davies’s The Lighthouse. This past year Paiement also made her debut with the Washington National Opera. She will be appearing at Glimmerglass in summer 2016. Paiement made her Korean debut conducting opera in 2008. In her interest to work on interdisciplinary projects, she has collaborated with many dancers and media artists, conducting works from the 17th to the 21st century. Paiement is also well versed in Baroque Music, having completed a doctorate degree at the Eastman School of music, which focused on the music of Handel. Paiement studied Baroque performance practice with Jens Peter Larsen, Alfred Mann and John Eliot Gardner. She has frequently appeared with the Santa Cruz Baroque Festival and been a guest-conductor numerous times at the Sherbrooke University Summer Festival where she conducted large oratorios and other works by Handel. Over the years, Paiement has conducted numerous recordings ranging from Early to Contemporary Music. Additionally, she is the Artistic Director of the BluePrint Project sponsored by the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.

Laurie Rogers has served on the music staff and as assistant conductor at the Dallas Opera for the past five seasons; last season she also was engaged on the music staff at the San Francisco Opera, Houston Grand Opera, and Washington National Opera. As a conductor she has led productions for Opera Saratoga, Poor Richard’s Opera in Philadelphia, and most recently, at Texas State University where she led performances of Poulenc’s Dialogues of the Carmelites. Ms. Rogers served as assistant conductor for the Opera Company of Philadelphia over the course of 13 seasons, also working for many years in artistic administration for that company. The Greenwich, CT native is a New England Conservatory of Music alumna and has prepared productions for San Diego Opera, Utah Opera, Atlanta Opera, Green Mountain Opera, Arizona Opera, Opera New Jersey, Michigan Opera Theatre, Washington National Opera, Wolf Trap Opera, Boston Lyric Opera, Sarasota Opera, Pittsburgh Opera, Opera Theatre of St. Louis, Glimmerglass Opera, and others. Ms. Rogers has been a faculty member and conductor for The Professional Advantage vocal studies program in Mercatello sul Metauro, Italy; she has also taught at the Lake Placid Institute for the Arts, the Chautauqua Institution Voice School and the New England Conservatory Opera Department, and accompanies regularly for the Philadelphia Orchestra and Astral Artists. She was integrally involved in the creation of Richard Danielpour’s Margaret Garner and David DiChiera’s Cyrano, as well as the world premiere of Jake Heggie’s

Moby-Dick for the Dallas Opera, including assistance in editing and preparation of the published piano-vocal score, and preparing subsequent productions of the opera in San Diego, Washington and San Francisco (where it was recorded for DVD and broadcast as part of the PBS “Great Performances” series). Most recently she prepared the world premiere of Ricky Ian Gordon’s chamber opera written for Frederica von Stade, A Coffin in Egypt. Ms. Rogers gives master classes nationwide, has judged the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, and has been published in “Classical Singer” magazine. She lives in Philadelphia, where she maintains an active coaching studio.

KIRK SEVERTSON Repetiteur, Continuo (La Cenerentola) Opera Saratoga Debut 2005

GARY THOR WEDOW Conductor (La Cenerentola) Opera Saratoga Debut Season

Pianist Kirk Severtson returns in 2015 for his tenth season on the music staff of Opera Saratoga. He has served as pianist/coach at The Dallas Opera for four recent productions, including the world premiere of Joby Talbot and Gene Scheer’s Everest, having previously coached at Opera North, the Opera Theater of Lucca (Italy), the Cincinnati Opera outreach program, the Rising Star Singers festival, Dorian Opera Theater, and as a Vocal Chamber Music Fellow at the Aspen Music Festival. He serves as vocal coach and conductor on the faculty of The Crane School of Music, in Potsdam, NY, where he chairs the Music Performance department and musically directs the Crane Opera Ensemble and Orchestra. Recent performances of the Crane Opera Ensemble under his musical direction have garnered first-place awards from the National Opera Association and The American Prize, as well as honors from the Kennedy Center’s American College Theatre Festival. He is the recipient of both the SUNY President’s and Chancellor’s Awards for Excellence in Research and Creative Endeavors, and is involved in the steering committee and as music director for the recently inaugurated Dominic J. Pellicciotti Opera Composition Prize which received its first production in November 2014. A versatile collaborative artist, he appears frequently as pianist and harpsichordist in song and chamber music recitals, with a particular interest in contemporary works of living composers. He is involved extensively with the National Opera Association, formerly as a board member, and now serving as Associate Executive Director.

Conductor Gary Thor Wedow has established an enviable reputation for dramatically exciting and historically informed performances with orchestras, opera companies and festivals throughout North America; he debuted with the New York Philharmonic in 2012 conducting Messiah and returned this season again conducting Handel’s masterpiece. A frequent guest of Seattle Opera, some of his recent successes there include the double bill of Poulenc’s La voix humaine and Puccini’s Suor Angelica, Gluck’s Orphée, Iphigénie en Tauride, Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte and Don Giovanni, and Handel’s Semele. His 2014-2015 season also included Messiah with the Santa Fe Symphony and Le nozze di Figaro for the Juilliard School directed by Stephen Wadsworth. Mr. Wedow was closely associated with New York City Opera for many years where he led their Don Giovanni in the groundbreaking Christopher Alden production and in May 2012 conducted the New York premiere of Telemann’s Orpheus. Last season included The Magic Flute with Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Messiah for the Seattle Symphony, Don Pasquale for Arizona Opera, Abduction from the Seraglio for Utah Opera and the St. Matthew Passion on tour with the Juilliard 415 Historical Performance Ensemble culminating in a performance in Alice Tully Hall that ‘caught fire and magic’. Born in LaPorte, Indiana, Wedow studied with virtuoso Jorge Bolet; he has prepared several performing editions of baroque works in collaboration with countertenor Lawrence Lipnik and is currently on the faculty of The Juilliard School.

PRODUCTION PROFILES

KAROLE ARMITAGE Director and Choreographer (Dido and Aeneas) Opera Saratoga Debut Season

Karole Armitage, director of the New York-based Armitage Gone! Dance Company, was rigorously trained in classical ballet. As a professional dancer she performed in Balanchine’s Grand Théâtre de Genève Company and in the Merce Cunningham Dance Company. Armitage is renowned for pushing the boundaries to create contemporary works that blend dance, music and art to engage in philosophical questions about the search for meaning. She joins a legacy of process-focused experimental dance that embraces the ballet and modern dance heritage as well. She directed the Ballet of Florence, Italy (1995–99) and the Biennale of Contemporary Dance in Venice (2004), and served as resident choreographer for the Ballet de Lorraine in France (1999–2004). She has created works for many companies from The Bolshoi Ballet in Moscow to the Tasmanian Dance Company in Australia. She has choreographed two productions for the New York Philharmonic, directed opera at important European opera houses from Teatro di San Carlo in Naples to Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris, two Broadway productions (Passing Strange and Hair, the latter earning her a Tony nomination), videos for Madonna and Michael Jackson, several films for Merchant Ivory productions and the Cirque du Soleil production Amaluna (2012). Ms. Armitage, the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, was awarded Commandeur de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, France’s most prestigious award in 2009, and an honorary Doctorate of the Arts from the University of Kansas in 2013. Glenn Breed owns and operates Wardrobe Witchery, an opera and theatrical costume rental company based out of Pensacola, Florida. Glenn is an Associate Professor of Design/ Technology in the Theatre department at the University of West Florida. He holds an MFA in Costume Design/Technology from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and a BA in Theatre from St. Edwards University in Austin, Texas. Glenn is in his 8th year as the Resident Costume Designer at Pensacola Opera and at the Janiec Opera Company at Brevard Music Center. Wardrobe Witchery has had its costumes seen on the stages of St. Petersburg Opera, Opera on the James, Mobile Opera, Shreveport Opera, Pacific Symphony, University of Memphis, Catholic University, University of Central Oklahoma and more.

GLENN AVERY BREED Costume Designer (La Cenerentola) Opera Saratoga Debut Season

JEFF BRUCKERHOFF Lighting Designer (La Cenerentola, Dido and Aeneas, The Long Walk) Opera Saratoga Debut 2013 (H.M.S. Pinafore)

Opera Saratoga audiences will know Jeff Bruckerhoff’s work from The Magic Flute, L’elisir d’amore, and H.M.S. Pinafore. He has also designed Le nozze di Figaro and Madama Butterfly for the Tulsa Opera, Merry Widow and Tosca for the Kentucky Opera; Lucrezia Borgia at the San Francisco Opera; and Tosca, Hansel and Gretel, Lucrezia Borgia, and Sophie’s Choice for the Washington National Opera. Recent theater credits include Into the Woods for Northern Stage; The Hour of Feeling and Bulrusher for Williams College; This Blessed Plot and Mary’s Wedding for the Weston Playhouse; and Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Musical for the Theatre for Young Audiences at the Kennedy Center. His ballet credits include The Great Gatsby, Wunderland (winner of the MetroDC Dance award for lighting design), Le Corsaire, and PASTforward for The Washington Ballet; and Le Corsaire for Ballet Nacional Sodre in Uruguay. He has enjoyed a long-standing collaboration with the Suzanne Farrell Ballet having designed Danses Concertantes, the Brahms-Schoenberg Quartet, Sonatine, and Baiser de la Fée among others. Jeff is a graduate of the Theatre School at DePaul University and resides in Clarendon Springs, Vermont.

LAWRENCE EDELSON Artistic and General Director; Director (La Cenerentola) Opera Saratoga Debut 2013 (H.M.S. Pinafore)

NANCY L. LEARY Costume Designer (The Long Walk) Opera Saratoga Debut Season

In January 2014, Lawrence Edelson was appointed Artistic and General Director of Opera Saratoga, effective July 1, 2014. The 2015 Summer Festival marks the first season under his leadership. As a stage director, Lawrence’s diverse productions have included the American premiere of Telemann’s Orpheus for Wolf Trap Opera, Philip Glass’s Hydrogen Jukebox for Fort Worth Opera, La Traviata for The Minnesota Opera, Il barbiere di Siviglia for Hawaii Opera Theater, Carmen for Toledo Opera, the world premiere of Buried Alive (Myers/ Long) for Fargo Moorhead Opera, and the New York premiere of Fauré’s rarely produced Pénélope for Manhattan School of Music. He was a guest member on the directing staff of New York City Opera, where he restaged Little Women twice: for the work’s Lincoln Center premiere and for the company’s tour to Japan. From 2008 to 2012, Lawrence was also a faculty member at the International Vocal Arts Institute in Tel Aviv, where he led seminars on American opera, and directed original productions of Little Women, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Werther, Ariadne auf Naxos, and Eugene Onegin. Before focusing on directing and arts administration, Lawrence enjoyed a performing career in both ballet and opera. He studied voice and musicology at The University of Ottawa and dance at The Joffrey Ballet School in New York City. As a dancer, he performed with Boston Ballet, Ballet West, and BalletMet Columbus. He has choreographed for ballet and opera companies around the country. As a singer, he appeared in opera, oratorio and musical theater internationally. Lawrence completed his master’s degree in performing arts administration at New York University. In the opera field, Lawrence is perhaps best known as the founder of American Lyric Theater (ALT). As Producing Artistic Director at ALT, a position he continues to hold concurrent with his position at Opera Saratoga, he coordinates the company’s diverse artistic programs including The Composer Librettist Development Program, commissioning of new works, and co-production relationships. A tireless advocate for emerging artists and the diversification of audiences for opera, Edelson serves on the Strategy Committee for OPERA America, and continues to forge collaborations with opera companies across the country.

Costume Designer Nancy L. Leary’s theatrical career spans two decades. Her costumes have appeared on the stages of Virginia Opera, Boston Lyric Opera, Opera Boston, Chautauqua Opera, Mobile Opera, Julliard Opera, and on the Boston Commons for Commonwealth Shakespeare Company. Recently she completed work in New York for Knife Edge Productions at The Abington and TGB Theatre. Nancy has also designed costumes for the regional premiere of Permanent Collection, which won an Elliot Norton, and Into The Woods, which received an IRNE award for Costume Design - both shows produced by New Repertory Theatre. Throughout the years Nancy has designed many new works, notably Our American Cousin, a glimpse into the final evening of Abraham Lincoln; Clemency, an opera focused closely on the biblical story of Abraham and his wife Sara; and Owned, a play written by Drama Desk nominee Julian Shepard, dealing with the relationship between three young New Yorkers and the means they use to get ahead in life. Other design credits include Weston Playhouse, Merrimack Repertory Theatre, Actor’s Shakespeare Project, Orlando Shakespeare Festival, Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey, North Shore Music Theatre, ART Institute, Chamber Repertory Theatre, Boston Theatre Works, and Boston Conservatory. In addition to her design work around the country, Nancy remains a full time faculty member at Boston University’s Theatre Production and Design Program.

PRODUCTION PROFILES

MIMI LIEN Scenic Designer (La Cenerentola, The Long Walk) Opera Saratoga Debut Season

Mimi Lien is a designer of sets/environments for theater, dance, and opera, based in Brooklyn, NY. Having arrived at set design from a background in architecture, her work often focuses on the interaction between audience/environment and object/performer. She is an artistic associate with Pig Iron Theatre Company and the Civilians, resident designer at BalletTech, and co-founder of JACK, a new performance/art space in Brooklyn. In 2012, she received an OBIE Award for sustained excellence in set design. Recent work includes An Octoroon (TFANA/Soho Rep), The Oldest Boy (Lincoln Center), Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812 (Kazino), A Public Reading…About the Death of Walt Disney (Soho Rep), The World is Round (RipeTime @ BAM), The Dance and the Railroad (Signature), Zero Cost House (Pig Iron), Elephant Room (St. Ann’s Warehouse), and a building-wide installation at Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center for the inaugural Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts. Her work has been presented at Lincoln Center Theatre, St. Ann’s Warehouse, Signature Theatre, Playwrights Horizons, the Public Theater, Soho Rep, The Kitchen, 13P, Ontological-Hysteric Theatre, Berkeley Rep, A.R.T., Mark Taper Forum, Wilma Theater, Long Wharf Theatre, Goodman Theater, La Jolla Playhouse, Portland Center Stage, Alliance Theatre, Playmakers Rep, and Virginia Opera, among others. Mimi’s designs for dance have been presented in the Netherlands, Russia, and Taiwan. She is a recipient of a Lucille Lortel Award and American Theatre Wing Hewes Design Award (Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812), Barrymore Award (Outrage), four Barrymore nominations, two Drama Desk nominations, an Audelco Award nomination, and a Bay Area Critics Circle nomination. She was selected to participate in the NEA/TCG Career Development Program, and was a MacDowell Colony fellow. Her design for Love Unpunished (Pig Iron) was exhibited in the Prague Quadrennial, and her sculptures were featured in the exhibition, LANDSCAPES OF QUARANTINE, at the Storefront for Art and Architecture. Education: BA (Architecture), Yale University, MFA (Stage Design), NYU Tisch School of the Arts.

With over 20 years in the beauty industry, Sondra excels in all mediums of makeup artistry and is a member of NY 798 Film Union working on Feature Film with such celebrities as Quentin Tarantino, Allison Janney, Keith Carradine, Tom Sizemore, & Danny Trejo. Her work has been featured in such national magazines as The New Yorker, Opera News, Mojo, along with a 10 page editorial fashion spread in GQ Magazine. She also toured with Paul McCartney on his “Driving the World” tour, and recently finished the US leg of the “Speak Now World Tour” where she was responsible for Taylor Swift’s makeup for each show related press & media. Sondra is based in Nashville, where she has been resident Wig & Makeup Designer for Nashville Opera since 2001. Her work has been seen at over 25 opera companies throughout the US and Canada including Michigan Opera Theatre, Florentine Opera, and Opera Ontario.

SONDRA NOTTINGHAM Wig and Makeup Designer Lake George Opera Debut 2000

DAVID SCHWEIZER Director (The Long Walk) Opera Saratoga Debut Season

David Schweizer emerged from Yale Drama School to make his New York debut at the age of twenty-four at Lincoln Center opening the brand new Mitzi Newhouse Theater with his radical version of Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida for producer Joseph Papp. And, some decades later, he returned to Lincoln Center with his acclaimed staging of Richard Rodney Bennett’s opera The Mines of Sulphur for New York City Opera. Over the years he has always directed a vastly eclectic mix of theatrically innovative work in a wide range of styles and venues. Early career highlights include world premiere productions by such playwrights as Sam Shepard, Michael Weller, Albert Innaurato, Maria Irene Fornes, Len Jenkin, Ronald Tavel, Austin Pendleton, and many others in New York City. More recent work off-Broadway includes Charles Mee’s Wintertime at Second Stage, William Hamilton’s White Chocolate at Century Playhouse, Mark Campbell’s Songs from an Unmade Bed at the New York Theater Workshop and his critically-acclaimed collaborations with composer/performer Rinde Eckert, And God Created Great Whales (OBIE Award) and Horizon (Lucille Lortel Award). His extensive work in both new and “old” opera theater includes Benjamin Britten’s Albert Herring (Gotham Chamber

Opera), Stephen Hartke’s The Greater Good (Glimmerglass Festival) and several notable Verdi productions including Macbetto at Boston Lyric Opera and Giovanna d’Arco at Chicago Opera Theater. His production of Victory Ullmann’s The Emperor of Atlantis in Boston was a ten best of the year New York Times pick. His many works for the innovative Long Beach Opera include Thomas Ades’s Powder Her Face, Michael Nymann’s The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, Antonio Vivaldi’s Montezuma and many others. He has directed extensively at most prominent regional and international theaters including Arena Stage, Trinity Rep, Yale Rep, The Mark Taper Forum, Geffen Playhouse, Children’s Theater Company (Minneapolis), Magic Theater, and Center Stage (Baltimore) where his new production of Tony Kushner and Jeanine Tesori’s Caroline or Change and Melanie Marnich’s These Shining Lives (world premiere) are notable among his many shows there, including a recent revival of Next to Normal. David has also participated in numerous international residences in Warsaw, Krakow, Lisbon, Hamburg, London (his own adaptation of Plato’s Symposium at the ICA) Stockholm (a tour of his collaboration with Theatre X, Foucalt’s A History of Sexuality) and Toga Village, Japan.

PETER SPELIOPOULOS Costume Designer (Dido and Aeneas) Opera Saratoga Debut Season

GARETT E. WILSON Environmental Scenic Design (Dido and Aeneas) Opera Saratoga Debut 2000

Peter Speliopoulos began his collaboration with Karole Armitage designing costumes for the Athens production of Aristophanes’ The Birds in the summer of 2000. Since then, he has created the costumes for the Armitage ballets Schrodinger’s Cat, Drastic Remix, Rave, Melodien, SZ110... la sonate and Sonata di Caccia (all for Ballet de Lorraine, Nancy, France); Living Toys (Rambert Dance Company, London) and Nadaswaram, Time is the echo of an axe within a wood, Ligetti Essays, Connoisseurs of Chaos, and Summer of Love (Armitage Gone! Dance, NY). For operas directed by Armitage, Speliopoulos has designed costumes for Bartok’s Bluebeard’s Castle (Opera de Lorraine, Nancy, France), Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice (Teatro di San Carlo, Naples, Italy), Rameau’s Pygmalion (Théâtre du Châtelet, Paris), Ariadne Unhinged (Gotham Chamber Opera, NY), and Ligeti”s ITUTU (Brooklyn Academy of Music, NY). Recently, he created the costumes for Hosogawa’s The Raven and Saariaho/Purcell’s The Tempest Songbook, both directed by Luca Veggetti for Gotham Chamber Opera. Speliopoulos is currently Senior Vice President of Design and Creative Director of Donna Karan New York, the position he has held since returning to New York in 2002. He was formerly Creative Director of Cerruti Arte, Paris (1997-2002) and Senior Design Director of Donna Karan New York (1993-1997). Speliopoulos is a native of Springfield, MA and received his BFA from the Parsons School of Design in 1982.

Garett E. Wilson is an Artist in Residence and the Director of the Design Program for the Skidmore College Theater Department. He was also the resident scenic designer for the Lake George Opera Festival – now Opera Saratoga for 15 years. Garett has designed scenery and lighting and has done stage work for numerous local and regional companies, including The Maine State Music Theater, The Hampton Playhouse, Portland Ballet, Capital Repertory Theater, Yale Repertory, Candlewood Playhouse, ACT, Berkshire Theatre Festival, NYSTI, and the Shadowland Theatre. Some of his favorite productions include Always Patsy Cline at Theater by the Sea, Fiddler on the Roof at Maine State Music Theater, The Fantasticks, and Sleuth at Home Made Theater, The House of Bernarda Alba at Russell Sage College, Private Eyes with Actors Collaborative, and the new musical ReUnion! with the New York State Theater Institute. Garett has designed over thirty operas for the Lake George Opera including La Bohème, Don Giovanni, The Barber of Seville, Ariadne auf Naxos, Madama Butterfly, Candide, Il Matrimonio Segreto and the professional premiere of Ned Rorem’s Our Town. He has also designed scenery, projections, and occasionally lighting, for over forty productions at Skidmore including Sweeney Todd, Machinal, Arcadia, Polaroid Stories, Museum, A Dream Play, Enemy of the People, Richard II, and Eurydice. Garett also recently completed a solo exhibition of selected design materials titled “Theatrical Space and the Design Idea,” which was selected for inclusion in the Saratoga Arts Festival.

DANCER PROFILES (DIDO AND AENEAS) AHMAUD CULVER Opera Saratoga Debut Season Ahmaud Culver, a first generation Egyptian-American, was raised in Lancaster, California. Ahmaud began his dance studies at the California Institute of the Arts where he received his BA. Ahmaud’s first professional dance company position was with the Santa Monica, California based Helios Dance Theatre at 20 years of age. In 2009 Ahmaud moved to New York City where opportunities allowed him to work with many dance companies from around the world such as the international touring company NY2Dance, Eglevsky Ballet, Augusto Solada BrazzDance, and the National Company of Colombia Danza Concerto. This is Ahmaud’s second season as a member of Armitage Gone! Dance.

MEGUMI EDA Opera Saratoga Debut Season Megumi Eda, from Nagano, Japan, has danced with the Matsuyama ballet (Tokyo), the Hamburg Ballet, Dutch National Ballet, and the Rambert Dance Company in London. She danced all the major classical ballets and worked as well with major choreographers, such as John Neumeier, Mats Ek, Christopher Bruce, Jiri Kylian, Lindsey Kemp, William Forsythe, Hans van Manen and others. In 2004 she moved to New York to join Armitage Gone! Dance and the same year received a Bessie Award for her performance. While continuing her decade-long collaboration with Karole Armitage, Megumi has begun incorporating other art forms including sculpture, video and graphics into her solo installations and performances. In May 2014, her solo multimedia work Beautiful Boy was selected for the Creative Mischief exhibition at the National Academy Museum. This is Megumi’s twelfth season with Armitage Gone! Dance.

CRISTIAN LAVERDE KÖNIG Opera Saratoga Debut Season Cristian Laverde König was born in Cali, Colombia and received his professional training at The Instituto Colombiano de Ballet (Incolballet) and The Escuela del Ballet Nacional de Cuba under a full scholarship. He has been a soloist for The Ballet Nacional de Cuba, Ballet de Cali, Hartford Ballet and Ballet Internationale, and has served as principal dancer for the Maximum Dance Company, the Milwaukee Ballet and the Slovak National Ballet. Mr. König’s repertoire includes principal roles in classical ballets such as Basilio in Don Quixote, Franz in Coppélia, Siegfried in Swan Lake, and the Grand Pas de Deux from Le Corsaire among others. He has also performed works by world-renowned choreographers such as George Balanchine, Twyla Tharp and Martha Graham. He originated principal roles on works by many contemporary choreographers. Mr. König has been the recipient of various prestigious national and international awards and currently resides in New York City. This is his second season with Armitage Gone! Dance.

RANDALL ANTHONY SMITH Opera Saratoga Debut Season Randall Anthony Smith was born in San Diego, California. He recently earned his M.F.A. in Dance from the University of California, Irvine where he also earned two Bachelor’s in Fine Arts: one in Dance Performance, the other in Choreography. Smith is Donald McKayle’s répétiteur and serves as his assistant, having performed for McKayle’s Etude Ensemble for four years. Smith also serves as visiting adjunct artistic staff for Navarre High School’s color guard and winter guard, where he designs show concepts, costumes, and choreography. Smith maintains a practice of performing, restaging and interpreting McKayle’s repertory, creating his own dance works, and teaching dance nationally. He has performed with acclaimed ballerina, choreographer, and newly appointed Vice Dean of the University of Southern California, Jodie Gates, and for jazz dance choreographer Sheron. This is Smith’s first season with Armitage Gone! Dance.

IZABELA SZYLINSKA Opera Saratoga Debut Season Izabela Szylinska began her training at age ten in the Polish National Ballet School in Warsaw. During her education she received many opportunities to increase her ballet technique with International Ballet Masters. While still a student, she was invited by the Polish Embassy in India to take part in “Dancing Through Europe” and performed in Delhi and Chennai. In 2008, Izabela won the 1st Prize in the international ballet competition “Gold Pointe Shoes” in Poland. As a graduate she received a prestigious scholarship from the Ministry of Culture for her artistic achievements. The same year she became a demi-soloist with Opera Nova in Bydgoszcz, Poland where she performed leading roles. In 2009 she joined the Polish National Ballet under the direction of Krzysztof Pastor where she worked with many internationally recognized choreographers in a wide range of works. Izabela moved to New York in 2012 where she has worked with many different choreographers and companies. This is her first season with Armitage Gone! Dance.

YOUNG ARTIST PROFILES

SYDNEY ANDERSON

AARON J. CASEY

CARA CONSILVIO

DOMINICK CORBACIO

Soprano - Studio Artist; Belinda and Spirit Cover, and Ensemble in Dido and Aeneas; Opera Saratoga Debut Season

Tenor - Studio Artist; Ensemble in Dido and Aeneas and La Cenerentola; Opera Saratoga Debut Season

Directing Fellow – Apprentice Artist; Assistant Director for The Long Walk; Opera Saratoga Debut Season

BM, University of Hartford MM Candidate, University of Houston RECENT: Adina (L’elisir d’amore), Moores Opera Center; Antonia (Les Contes d’Hoffmann), Moores Opera Center; Rosalinde (Die Fledermaus), Hartt Opera Theatre

BM, University of Houston RECENT: Snout (A Midsummer Night’s Dream), Opera on the Avalon; Sergei (Moscow, Cheryomushki), Moores Opera Center; Monastatos (Die Zauberflöte), Harrower Summer Opera