Dear Friends of the National Institute —
In addition to disrupting societies, economies, and countless individuals’ lives around the world, the COVID-19 global pandemic has put the world of opera and the other performing arts on a seemingly indefinite hiatus.
Please join us for a fascinating and informative virtual discussion forum presented by National Institute Trustee Angel Blue, and featuring a diverse panel of opera professionals who will share how they have adapted to the new normal and what they expect to happen to opera in the future.
We expect this to be a lively and enlightening discussion of a timely and important topic in global society, and we invite you to join us as we search for answers.
Thursday, September 23, 2021
12:00 to 2:00 pm ET (US and Canada)
This forum is sponsored by the National Institute of Social Sciences and is free and open to the general public. In order to attend, you must click the link above to register in advance for the event. The event will be recorded for those who cannot attend it live.
We look forward to seeing you there!
Fred Larsen
President, Board of Trustees
Panelists:
Marc A. Scorca (Moderator) joined OPERA America in 1990 as president/CEO. Since then, OPERA America has awarded nearly $20 million in grants to member companies and their partners to support the creation and production of new work, encourage innovative practices in all areas of administration and production, increase civic practice and audience development activities, and promote racial justice across the industry.
Scorca conducts strategic planning retreats for opera companies and other cultural institutions internationally, and he has participated on panels for federal, state, and local funding agencies, as well as for numerous private organizations. He is a member of the Board of Directors of the Performing Arts Alliance and on the Music Advisory Board of Hunter College (CUNY), and on the Boards of the Association for Opera in Canada, Opera Europa, and Ópera Latinoamérica.
Scorca attended Amherst College, graduating with high honors in both history and music. An internship at the Metropolitan Opera lasted through his college years, after which he held positions at the Opera Company of Philadelphia (now known as Opera Philadelphia), New York City Opera, and Chicago Opera Theater before joining OPERA America.
Countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo began performing professionally at the age of 11 and has since appeared in opera, concert, recital, film, and on Broadway. He is a GRAMMY nominee, a recipient of the 2020 Beverly Sills Award from the Metropolitan Opera, a winner of the 2020 Opera News Award, and Musical America’s 2019 Vocalist of the Year. This coming season, he returns to the Metropolitan Opera in his acclaimed performance of the title role in Akhnaten, as well as in Rodelinda. His second album, a collaboration with Justin Vivian Bond, will be released this winter on Decca Gold. Costanzo has appeared with many of the world’s leading opera houses and has performed at a wide-ranging variety of venues. Costanzo has begun working as a producer and curator in addition to his singing.
He graduated Magna Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Princeton University, where he has returned to teach, and received his Masters of Music from the Manhattan School of Music, where he now serves on the board of Trustees.
Denyce Graves, recognized worldwide as one of today's most exciting vocal stars, continues to garner unparalleled acclaim in performance around the world. Highlights of the 2018-2019 season include Ms. Graves’ highly anticipated return to the Metropolitan Opera in Nico Muhly’s new opera Marnie, revisiting her signature role of Carmen performing the opera in concert with the Richmond Symphony, and singing a gala recital presented by Annapolis Opera Company in the spring. In the 2017-2018 season, she was seen in recital at Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires before going on to perform with the Washington National Opera and Palm Beach Opera. Ms. Graves has worked with the finest symphony orchestras and conductors in a wide range of repertoire and has been a prolific recording artist for nearly two decades.
Ms. Graves is a native of Washington, D.C., where she attended the Duke Ellington School for the Performing Arts. She continued her education at Oberlin College Conservatory of Music and the New England Conservatory. In 1991, she received the Grand Prix Lyrique, awarded once every three years by the Association des amis de l’opéra de Monte-Carlo, and the Marian Anderson Award, presented to her by Miss Anderson. Ms. Graves’ dedication to the singers of the next generation continues to be an important part of her career and recently she joined the voice faculty of the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore.
David Lomelí joined The Dallas Opera in 2014 as artistic coordinator and was named director of artistic administration in 2018. He was also recently named casting director for Bavarian State Opera, effective in 2021. As the first manager of Dallas Opera’s Hart Institute for Women Conductors, Mr. Lomelí recruited over 400 conductors from more than 30 countries to apply, as well as 50 US women administrators.
Before joining The Dallas Opera, Mr. Lomelí performed as a tenor with many of the world’s leading companies. He earned an undergraduate degree in computer science engineering at the Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey in Mexico, and a graduate degree in international marketing from la Universidad Politecnica de Catalunya in Barcelona, Spain. He is a recipient of the National Youth Prize in the Arts, presented by the Mexican government, and won first prize in the categories of opera and zarzuela in Plácido Domingo’s 2006 Operalia.
American stage director James Robinson is Artistic Director at the Opera Theatre of St. Louis where he has mounted productions including Blitzstein’s Regina, the world premieres of Jack Perla’s Shalimar the Clown, Blanchard’s Champion and Fire Shut Up in My Bones, Adams’ The Death of Klinghoffer and Gordon’s The Grapes of Wrath. Robinson has directed new productions for the Santa Fe Opera, Houston Grand Opera, San Francisco Opera, New York City Opera, as well as the Wexford Festival and Seattle Opera. In the 2020-21 season, he directs Rigoletto for Tulsa Opera, and Pagliacci, La bohème and Die Zauberflöte for Palm Beach Opera. In 2021-22 he co-directs Fire Shut Up in My Bones with Camille A. Brown for the Metropolitan Opera.
Other recent engagements include a new production of Porgy and Bess and new productions for Houston Grand Opera and the Canadian Opera Company. Robinson directed the critically acclaimed world première of Champion by jazz and film composer Terence Blanchard for the Opera Theatre of St. Louis.