Opera Rebels Savoyards & Bohemians: UNLV Opera announces 2015-16 season University of Nevada,

Volume 4, Issue 1
UNLV OPERA THEATER NEWSLETTER
Fall, 2015
Opera Rebels
University of
Nevada,
Las Vegas
Opera Theater
Director
Savoyards & Bohemians: UNLV Opera announces 2015-16 season
Fresh off its double win at the
2015 National Opera Associa-
 Dr. Linda Lister
 [email protected]
tion Collegiate Opera Scenes
Competition (in both opera
and musical theatre categories), UNLV Opera is ready
Tickets
for an exciting new season.
 UNLV Box Office
The year begins November 1213 with a double bill of one-
 (702) 895-ARTS
act operas: a Gilbert and Sulli-
Inside this issue:
UNLV Opera’s 2015-16 1
Season
Gilbert and Sullivan
and Shore
2
Alumni Appearances
2
UNLV Opera welcomes 3
New Coach
Viva Italia
3
Summer Endeavors
3
Save the Dates
4
van classic (Trial by Jury) with a
The highlight of the spring semester will be Puccini’s be-
contemporary work by Boston-
loved La bohème, playing March 17-19. Finally, the season
based composer Dan Shore
concludes with a scenes program on April 22 called Cross-
(The Beautiful Bridegroom).
Then on December 3, Opera
ing Over, which asks the question: is it an opera or a
Workshop presents Viva Italia:
and passionate Bohemians as we showcase the many tal-
Scenes about Italy.
ented singers of the UNLV School of Music.
Broadway musical? Join us for a season of silly Savoyards
Opera Rebels
Page 2
ALUMNI
APPEARANCES
Gilbert and Sullivan, and Shore
A pair of bridal-themed one-act operas will be featured in UNLV Opera’s November 12-13 performances in Dr. Arturo Rando-Grillot Recital Hall. Gilbert and Sullivan’s Trial by Jury tells the story
of abandoned bride Angelina (Heather Elise and Olivera Gjorgoska) who takes her groom
(Gianni Becker and Alex Price) to court. The Judge is played by Phillip Harris and Christopher
Brian Myer will debut with Florida
Grand Opera this
season, singing Figaro in The Barber of
Withrow, while Christophe Kennedy sings the Usher, Rabuel Aviles is the Counsel to the Plaintiff, and Jesse Law is the Foreman. Barry Abarquez, Daveon Bolden, and Kurt Sedlmeir serve on
the jury, while Angelina’s bridesmaids are Kelly Hawes, Dawn McCollum, Crystal Miller, and
Jasmine Walker. Pianist Jae Ahn-Benton and Assistant Director Bonita Bunt round out the student production staff for this Savoyard endeavor.
Seville. He recently
played Yamadori in
The Gilbert and Sullivan will be joined by Dan Shore. Based on a Danish play by Ludvig Holberg,
Madama Butterfly
with Opera Las Vegas.
twist. Widow Terentia (Nichole Jarlson) seeks help from matchmaker Madame Kirsten (Eliysheba
Dominick Chenes
made his European
debut last month as
Shore’s The Beautiful Bridegroom is a charming neo-classical pastiche piece with an amusing plot
Anderson and Breanna Lesure), ostensibly for her daughters Laurentia (Bethany Smith) and Leonora (Lacy Burchfield). The plot thickens, thanks to the machinations of their sassy maid Pernille
(Bonita Bunt) and the arrival of the beautiful bridegroom himself, Captain Frands von Frauenliebe (Maia Thielen and Nicole Thomas). Paying delightful homage to Mozart, Schumann, Strauss
and others, Shore’s music and libretto won the 2009 National Opera Association Chamber Opera
Competition.
Faustino Solis conducts the instrumen-
Alfredo in La Travi-
tal ensemble while Aldo Perrelli serves
ata with Opera på
Skäret in Sweden.
This fall, he will sing
as Assistant Director. Composer Dan
Iopas in Les Troyens
at the Grand Théâtre
de Genève in Switzerland. In 2016,
Palm Beach Opera
will feature
Dominick as Don
José in Carmen, a role
he first sang with
UNLV Opera in
2012.
Shore will be an Artist-in-Residence at
UNLV during production week, giving
students the important opportunity to
work with a living operatic composer.
Eliysheba Anderson (Madame Kirsten)
Nicole Thomas (Captain von Frauenliebe)
Volume 4, Issue 1
Page 3
UNLV Welcomes New Opera Coach Dr. Christina Wright
SUMMER
ENDEAVORS
UNLV Opera is pleased to welcome Dr.
Christina Wright-Ivanova to the faculty.
Nicole Thomas was a
young artist at the
Houston Grand
Opera Vocal Academy
in Texas.
Hailed by critics as “a brilliant collaborative pianist" (Wiener Zeitung) and “an
ideal partner" (Huffington Post), Christina Wright-Ivanova is a pianist, vocal
coach, and chamber musician. She was a
faculty member and vocal coach at the
Boston University Tanglewood Institute
in the summer of 2015. She was previ-
Bonita Bunt was a
Stage Directing Intern
at the Druid City
Opera Workshop in
Alabama.
ously on faculty at the American Institute of Musical Studies (AIMS) in Graz,
Austria and the Franco-American Vocal
Academy (FAVA) in Salzburg, and was a
vocal coach at Boston University.
As an opera pianist, she has worked with Boston Opera Collaborative, Commonwealth Lyric
Theater in Boston, Handel & Haydn Society, and Pacific Opera Victoria. She will continue to
serve as the Artistic Director for the North End Performing Arts Concert Series in Boston in the
2015/16 season. The 2015/16 season includes an all Schubert-Beethoven Lieder recital, a Trio
recital featuring Czech and Slavic music at Boston’s Steinert Hall, and a song and piano duo recital pairing food and wine with music. In 2016, she will appear for the second time as a Crear
Scholar in Scotland with Malcolm Martineau, focusing on opera and art song, and will perform
in New York, Massachusetts, Canada, Greece, Bulgaria and Italy. Her writings include The Total
Alexander Baskin
sang multiple roles in
Die Zauberflöte at the
Hawaii Performing
Arts Festival.
Janáček in Pohádka: Function of Theatrical and Musical Structure in A Fairy Tale. She holds
degrees from the University of Texas at Austin (DMA), New England Conservatory (MM) and the
University of Victoria, Canada (BM).
Alfredo Martirena
Viva Italia: Opera Workshop Scenes about Italy December 3
sang Ferrando in Così
Viva Italia! Long live Italy and
its operatic inspiration. Our
soprano aria “O mio babbino
operetta (the Italian Street
fan tutte with the International Lyric
caro.” Naples is the setting for
Song from Victor Herbert’s
Academy in Italy.
opera workshop performance
operatic excerpts from Ros-
Naughty Marietta) and musi-
on December 3 in Dr. Arturo
sini’s Il turco in Italia and Don-
cals. Adam Guettel’s The
Rando-Grillot Recital Hall at
izetti’s Il campanello, while we
Light in the Piazza transports
7:30 pm will be a tribute to the
travel to Rome for scenes
us back to Florence, in a
country where opera began.
from Mozart’s La clemenza di
Broadway musical that is
The Italian tour begins in Flor-
Tito and Robert Ward’s Ro-
sung partly in Italian. Don’t
ence, with scenes from Gianni
man Fever. Italy has also been
miss this musical treat and
Schicchi including the famous
the muse for composers of
trip through Italia.
Maia Thielen attended the American Institute of Musical Studies (AIMS) in Austria.
Save the dates!
Fall 2015 Performances
November 12-13
UNLV Opera Theater:
Gilbert & Sullivan’s Trial by Jury
Dan Shore’s The Beautiful Bridegroom
December 3
UNLV Opera Workshop:
UNLV OPERA THEATER
Opera Rebels
Editor: Linda Lister
Viva Italia
UNLV Opera Theater’s 2015 production of Le nozze di Figaro :
Sheronda McKee as the Countess and Christopher Withrow as the Count
(Photo by Shamith Dilan Gamage)