Act I

Scene 1 – The garden of the Commendatore

Leporello, Don Giovanni’s servant, complains of his lot in life. He’s keeping watch while Don Giovanni seduces the Commendatore’s daughter, Donna Anna. When the two appear, Giovanni is masked, but Donna Anna is holding onto his arm. Something has transpired, and she insists on knowing his true identity. She cries for help. The Commendatore appears and forces Giovanni to a duel. Giovanni slays the Commendatore and escapes with Leporello. Anna returns with her fiancé, Don Ottavio, and is horrified to see her father lying dead in a pool of his own blood. She makes Ottavio swear vengeance against the unknown murderer.

Scene 2 – A public square outside Don Giovanni’s palace

Giovanni and Leporello arrive and hear a woman (Donna Elvira) singing of having been abandoned by her lover. Giovanni starts to flirt with her, but he is the wretch she is seeking. He shoves Leporello forward, ordering him to tell Elvira the truth, and then hurries away.

Leporello tells Elvira that Don Giovanni is not worth it. His conquests include 640 in Italy, 231 in Germany, 100 in France, 91 in Turkey, but in Spain, 1,003. When she leaves, a marriage procession with Masetto and Zerlina enters. Don Giovanni and Leporello arrive soon after. Giovanni is immediately attracted to Zerlina, and he attempts to remove the jealous Masetto by offering to host a wedding celebration at his castle. On realizing that Giovanni means to remain behind with Zerlina, Masetto becomes angry. Don Giovanni and Zerlina are soon alone, and he immediately begins his seductive arts.

the still unknown murderer of Anna’s father. Anna, unaware that she is speaking to her attacker, pleads for Giovanni’s help. Giovanni, relieved that he is unrecognized, readily promises it and asks who has disturbed her peace. Before she can answer, Elvira returns and tells Anna and Ottavio that Giovanni is a false-hearted seducer. Giovanni tries to convince Ottavio and Anna that Elvira is insane. As Giovanni leaves, Anna suddenly recognizes him as her father’s murderer. Ottavio, not convinced, resolves to keep an eye on his friend.

Leporello informs Giovanni that all the guests of the peasant wedding are in Giovanni’s house and that he distracted Masetto from his jealousy, but that Zerlina, returning with Elvira, made a scene and spoiled everything. However, Don Giovanni remains cheerful and tells Leporello to organize a party and invite every girl he can find.

Zerlina follows the jealous Masetto and tries to pacify him, but just as she manages to persuade him of her innocence, Don Giovanni’s voice from offstage startles and frightens her. Masetto hides, resolving to see for himself what Zerlina will do when Giovanni arrives. Zerlina tries to hide from Don Giovanni, but he finds her and attempts to continue the seduction, until he stumbles upon Masetto’s hiding place. Confused but quickly recovering, Giovanni reproaches Masetto for leaving Zerlina alone and returns her temporarily to him. Giovanni then leads both to his ballroom, which has been lavishly decorated. Leporello invites three masked guests to the party: the disguised Ottavio, Anna, and Elvira. Ottavio and Anna pray for protection, Elvira for vengeance.

Scene 3 – Ballroom
As the merriment proceeds, Leporello distracts Masetto by dancing with him, while Don Giovanni leads Zerlina offstage to a private room. When Zerlina screams for help, Don Giovanni tries to fool the onlookers by dragging Leporello into the room and threatening to kill him for assaulting Zerlina. But Ottavio produces a pistol, and the three guests unmask and declare that they know all. But despite being denounced on all sides, Don Giovanni escapes—for the moment.

Act II

Scene 1 – Outside Elvira’s house

Leporello threatens to leave Giovanni, but his master calms him with a peace offering of money. Wanting to seduce Elvira’s maid, Giovanni persuades Leporello to exchange cloak and hat with him. Elvira comes to her window. Seeing an opportunity for a game, Giovanni hides and sends Leporello out in the open dressed as Giovanni. From his hiding place, Giovanni sings a promise of repentance, expressing a desire to return to her, while Leporello poses as Giovanni and tries to keep from laughing. Elvira is convinced and descends to the street. Leporello, continuing to pose as Giovanni, leads her away to keep her occupied while Giovanni serenades her maid. Before Giovanni can complete his seduction of the maid, Masetto and his friends arrive, searching for Giovanni and intending to kill him. Giovanni (dressed as Leporello) convinces the men that he also hates Giovanni and joins the hunt. After cunningly dispersing Masetto’s friends, Giovanni takes Masetto’s weapons away, beats him up, and runs off, laughing. Zerlina arrives and consoles the bruised and battered Masetto.

Scene 2 – A dark courtyard

Leporello abandons Elvira. As he tries to escape, Ottavio arrives with Anna, consoling her in her grief. Just as Leporello is about to slip through the door, which he has difficulty finding, Zerlina and Masetto open it and, seeing him dressed as Giovanni, catch him before he can escape. When Anna and Ottavio notice what is going on, all move to surround Leporello, threatening him with death. Elvira tries to protect the man whom she thinks is Giovanni, claiming that he is her husband and begging for pity. The other four are resolved to punish the traitor, but Leporello removes his cloak to reveal his true identity. He begs everyone’s forgiveness and, seeing an opportunity, runs off. Given the circumstances, Ottavio is convinced that Giovanni was the murderer of Donna Anna’s father (the deceased Commendatore) and swears revenge. Elvira is still furious at Giovanni for betraying her, but she also feels sorry for him.

Scene 3 – A graveyard with the statue of the Commendatore

Leporello tells Don Giovanni of his brush with danger, and Giovanni taunts him, saying that he took advantage of his disguise as Leporello by trying to seduce one of Leporello’s girlfriends. The voice of the statue warns Giovanni that his laughter will not last beyond sunrise. At the command of his master, Leporello reads the inscription upon the statue’s base: “I’m waiting for revenge against my murderer.” The servant trembles, but the unabashed Giovanni orders him to invite the statue to dinner, threatening to kill him if he does not. Leporello makes several attempts to invite the statue to dinner but, for fear cannot complete the task. It falls upon Don Giovanni himself to complete the invitation, thereby sealing his own doom. Much to his surprise, the statue nods its head and responds affirmatively.

Scene 4 – Donna Anna’s room

Ottavio pressures Anna to marry him, but she thinks it inappropriate so soon after her father’s death. He accuses her of being cruel, and she assures him that she loves him and is faithful.

Scene 5 – Don Giovanni’s chambers

Giovanni revels in the luxury of a great meal and musical entertainment while Leporello serves. Elvira appears, saying that she no longer feels resentment for Giovanni, and she begs him to change his life. Giovanni taunts her and then turns away, praising wine and women as the “essence and glory of humankind.” Hurt and angered, Elvira gives up and leaves. A moment later, her scream is heard from outside the walls of the palace, and she returns only to flee through another door. Giovanni orders Leporello to see what has upset her; upon peering outside, the servant also cries out, and runs back into the room, stammering that the statue has appeared as promised. An ominous knocking sounds at the door. Leporello, paralyzed by fear, cannot answer it, so Giovanni opens it himself, revealing the statue of the Commendatore. The Commendatore offers a last chance to repent, but Giovanni adamantly refuses. The statue sinks into the earth and drags Giovanni down with him. Hellfire and a chorus of demons surround Don Giovanni as he is carried below.

Donna Anna, Don Ottavio, Donna Elvira, Zerlina, and Masetto arrive, searching for the villain. They find instead Leporello hiding under the table, shaken by the supernatural horror he has witnessed. Giovanni is dead. Anna and Ottavio will marry when Anna’s year of mourning is over; Elvira will spend the rest of her life in a convent; Zerlina and Masetto will finally go home for dinner; and Leporello will go to the tavern to find a better master.
The concluding ensemble delivers the moral of the opera—”Such is the end of the evildoer: the death of a sinner always reflects his life.”

“On Archetypes and Allegories”
by Benjamin Fowler
Ph.D. Musicology Student

Mozart (1756-1791) and his librettist, Lorenzo Da Ponte (1749-1838) collaborated to create three operas of great significance. The second of these, Don Giovanni, premiered in Prague in 1787 and has since remained an enduring favorite of the repertoire. Audiences have been intrigued with the Don’s antics for centuries; such attention has led some to typify him as a hero, but, as we shall see, he is not. Don Giovanni actually originates from Tirso de Molina’s (1579-1648) Don Juan character in the play El burlador de Sevilla y convidado de Piedra (1630). Since Molina, Don Juan has appeared in numerous plays, romances, and operas. Major renditions of him have appeared in France, Spain, Italy, and the Americas, creating a Don Juan relevant to their culture. Molina fashioned the original character (of which there have been many imitations) and quite possibly created an allegory for his time.

If viewed through Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung’s Archetypes, Don Giovanni represents the archetypal character of the trickster—one of the original four archetypes. Existing in the “collective” unconscious—an unconscious shared by all humanity—archetypes manifests in dreams, myths, stories, and art. (Jung uses the collective unconscious to explain the repeated manifestations of related phenomena across time and culture. The coyote in some Native American traditions is another example of the trickster.) This “primordial image” is already imprinted on the mind, and Jung suggests that it is innate and universal. The trickster is cunning, possesses secret knowledge, and defies social norms but creates chaos wherever he goes. His predilection for ignoring societal rules makes him attractive, and his ability to turn even the most difficult situation to his advantage is stunning; but, in the end, the trickster will face his fate. The trickster is also traditionally a shape-shifter and uses disguise to accomplish his goals.

Although Molina established the Don Juan character, the Mozart-Da Ponte Don Giovanni owes to Bertati’s Don Giovanni, o sia Il convitato di pietra (1775). Da Ponte uses Bertati as a scaffold for his libretto while Mozart clothed his musical characteristics to show the trickster in Don Giovanni. When appearing onstage with other characters, especially those he desires to seduce, Don Giovanni matches their musical style. In the duet “La ci darem la mano” (Act I, Scene 2), he woos the reluctant Zerlina. Musically his pleadings are smooth, while Zerlina protests. He persists until finally he convinces her to marry him, at which point the music turns to 6/8, and they sing together in tenths creating a harmonious sound as Zerlina is overcome.

The aria “Deh vieni alla finestra” (Act II, Scene 1) shows Don Giovanni using music as a mask to accomplish his seduction. Don Giovanni sends Leporello in his clothes to distract the upset Donna Elvira and then scares them away so that he can pursue Donna Elvira’s chambermaid. Disguised as Leporello, he picks up the mandolin and begins to play. The mandolin paired with light string accompaniment and masterful poetry, creates a tenderness that masks the carnal desires of the trickster.

The ultimate demise of Don Giovanni shows that though he can cleverly manipulate situations to his benefit, he cannot escape justice. Following his descent, the remaining characters gather to sing the moral: “This is the end all sinners meet. All those who live by malicious deeds shall always have their life extinguished.” The religious overtones of the opera are often overlooked. Is there a hidden allegory in the Don Giovanni story?

During a time when religious beliefs were intensely debated in Europe, Molina fashioned a play that projected a Catholic-centric view; in this allegory Protestantism can only lead its adherents away from salvation. Don Juan’s individualist tendencies relate to Protestantism. The Don’s defiance shows that he does not need the Catholic Church to intervene on his behalf and willfully ignores its authority over his soul. Only in the very end of Molina’s play does Don Juan, when faced with inescapable death, call for a priest to offer final absolution. Molina shows that persisting in individualist thinking may cause an adherent to wander until it’s too late to call for a priest, who alone can offer the final rite of passage. Molina’s allegory shows the ultimate dominance of Catholicism over Protestantism.

Whether Mozart was aware of the allegory or whether it would have been understood in this way is another question. His Don Giovanni does not call for a priest or final absolution. Instead, he refuses to change even after the pleadings of Donna Elvira, Leporello, and the double invitation of the Commendatore. He resolutely remains defiant to the end. One final question remains: Why are we so intrigued with Don Giovanni? The many iterations of Don Giovanni in both theater and opera show a vivid interest in his tomfoolery. Yet, he victimizes all who cross his path. His treatment of women is shocking and disgusting. He uses his nobility to simultaneously take part in and operate outside of the bounds of society, going so far as to prey upon the lower classes. The Spanish word burlador means literally “trickster,” and so Don Giovanni remains, and we love to see the trickster get his comeuppance.

Arthur Fagen has been professor of orchestral conducting at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music since 2008, where he is currently chair of the Orchestral Conducting Department. Additionally, he has been music director of the Atlanta Opera since 2010.

Fagen was born in New York, where he began his conducting studies with Laszlo Halasz. Further studies continued at the Curtis Institute, under the guidance of Max Rudolf, at the Salzburg Mozarteum, and with Hans Swarowsky. A former assistant of both Christoph von Dohnányi (Frankfurt Opera) and James Levine (Metropolitan Opera), Fagen’s career has been marked by a string of notable appearances. He has conducted opera productions at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, Metropolitan Opera, Munich State Opera, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Staatsoper Berlin, New York City Opera, Theatre Capitole de Toulouse, Bordeaux Opera, Frankfurt Opera, Staatstheater Stuttgart, New Israeli Opera, Baltimore Opera, Edmonton Opera, Spoleto Festival, Teatro Colón Buenos Aires, Teatro Lirico di Cagliari, and Stadttheater Bozen. From 1998 to 2001, he was a regular guest conductor at the Vienna State Opera. On the concert podium, Fagen has appeared with internationally known orchestras including the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Orchèstre de la Suisse Romande, Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie, Czech Philharmonic, Munich Radio Orchestra, Tokyo Philharmonic, RAI Orchestras (Torino, Naples, Milano, Rome), Bergen Philharmonic, Prague Spring Festival, Dutch Radio Orchestra, and Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, among others.

Fagen has an opera repertory of more than 75 works. He has served as principal conductor in Kassel and Brunswick, as chief conductor of the Flanders Opera of Antwerp and Ghent, as music director of the Queens Symphony Orchestra, and as a member of the conducting staff of the Chicago Lyric Opera.

From 2002 to 2007, he was music director of the Dortmund Philharmonic Orchestra and the Dortmund Opera. Following his successful concerts with the Dortmund Philharmonic at the Grosse Festspielhaus in Salzburg, Fagen and the Dortmund Philharmonic were invited to the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Palais de Beaux Arts in Brussels, and to Salzburg, Beijing, and Shanghai. He conducted in that period, among others, new opera productions of Siegfried, Götterdämmerung, and two Ring Cycles.

Fagen conducted a new production of Turandot at the Atlanta Opera in 2007, opening the season with enormous success and inaugurating the new opera house, the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Center. Soon afterward in Atlanta, he conducted the contemporary opera Cold Sassy Tree by Carlisle Floyd.

He was first-prize winner of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra Conductors Competition, as well as a prize winner of the Gino Marinuzzi International Conductors’ Competition in Italy.
Fagen has recorded for BMG, Bayerischer Rundfunk, SFB, and WDR Cologne. He records regularly for Naxos, for which he has completed the six symphonies of Bohuslav Martinů. The Naxos recording of Martinů’s piano concertos was awarded an Editor’s Choice award in the March 2010 issue of Gramophone magazine.

David Lefkowich is an accomplished stage director and fight choreographer and has enjoyed success with companies including the Metropolitan Opera, Teatre alla Scala, San Francisco Opera, New York City Opera, Minnesota Opera, and Glimmerglass Opera. Directing credits include Don Giovanni at L’Opéra de Montréal, and Don Giovanni, Idomeneo, Le Nozze di Figaro, and L’Histoire du Soldat at the Ravinia Musical Festival with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, James Conlon conducting. Lefkowich also directed and choreographed L’Histoire du Soldat at The Juilliard School, with Conlon.

Lefkowich made his European debut directing Le Portrait de Manon at the Gran Teatre Liceu in Barcelona, Spain, and followed with The Rake’s Progressat La Monnaie in Brussels, Belgium. Other credits include directing and choreographing new productions of Carmen (Fort Worth Opera, Anchorage Opera), Lucia di Lammermoor (Eugene Opera), Simon Boccanegra (Kentucky Opera), La Bohème, The Daughter of the Regiment and Acis and Galatea(Madison Opera), Salome (Minnesota Opera), Roméo et Juliette (Florida Grand Opera, Minnesota Opera, Virginia Opera, Opera Tampa, Seagle Music Colony), Tosca (Boston Lyric Opera), Così fan tutte (Opera Saratoga), La Traviata (Opera Birmingham, San Francisco Opera, Lake George Opera), Le Portrait de Manon (Glimmerglass Opera), and Il Trovatore (New Orleans Opera, Fort Worth Opera).

He was thrilled to fight-direct the world premieres of Appomattox (Philip Glass) at San Francisco Opera and Miss Lonelyhearts at the Juilliard Opera Center, La fanciulla del West at New York City Opera, and the New York off-Broadway run of A Clockwork Orange. Lefkowich is a guest artist and performs master classes at several young artist programs, and universities including the San Francisco Opera Center Adler Fellowship Program, Atelier Lyrique at L’Opéra de Montréal, McGill School of Music, and Ithaca College. A graduate of Northwestern University with a Bachelor of Science degree in theatre, he earned a certificate from École Jacques-Lecoq in Paris, France. He is currently the artistic director of the Mill City Summer Opera in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where he directs the yearly offerings, including Pagliacci, The Barber of Seville, Tosca, The Daughter of the Regiment, Sweeney Todd, and Maria de Buenos Aires.

A Bloomington-based designer and scenic artist, Mark Frederic Smith is also the director of scenic painting and properties for the Jacobs School of Music Opera and Ballet Theater, where he has worked on over a hundred productions during the past 20 years. Design work for Jacobs-related projects includes Transformations and Maria de Buenos Aires, assistant designer on the world premiere of Ned Rorem’s Our Town, and the reworking of Max Rothlisberger’s classic design for Hansel and Gretel in 2013. In 2016, Smith designed the sets for the IU Opera Theater premiere of Daniel Catán’s Florencia in el Amazonas. In addition to his work for Indianapolis Civic Theater, Butler Ballet, and Indianapolis Ballet School, area theater goers will recognize Smith’s designs for over a dozen Cardinal Stage Company shows including Les Miserables, A Streetcar Named Desire, My Fair Lady, Big River, and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Smith earned a Master’s of Fine Art in Scenic Design from the Indiana University Department of Theatre and Drama and was a student of Jacobs professors C. David Higgins and Robert O’Hearn.

Dana Tzvetkov designs and constructs costumes for opera, ballet, and theater. Her work has recently been featured in Central City Opera’s Tosca (2016) and Carmen (2017), and the National Opera Association’s Hagar (2016). It has appeared on Indiana University’s Musical Arts Center stage in Saudade, Carmen, and Peter Grimes. She has designed rentals for Ball State Opera Theater, Mississippi Opera, DePauw University, and Butler University. She worked alongside Linda Pisano for Opera San Antonio to build costumes for a cast including Patricia Racette and Michelle DeYoung. She has been commissioned to create concert gowns for DeYoung and Sylvia McNair. Tzvetkov served as the costume shop supervisor for IU Opera and Ballet Theater from 2013 until recently, when she was promoted to shop manager. She will be returning to Central City Opera in summer 2018 to coordinate its production of Il Trovatore.

Patrick Mero has designed the lighting for many IU Opera and Ballet Theater productions, including La Traviata, H.M.S. Pinafore, Le Nozze di Figaro, Werther, Falstaff, Xerxes, Don Giovanni, Albert Herring, La Bohème, Tosca, L’Italiana in Algeri, West Side Story, Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Suor Angelica, Gianni Schicchi, Alcina, Peter Grimes, and The Music Man. He has also done extensive design work for the Jacobs School of Music Ballet Department, the IU African American Art Institute’s Dance Ensemble, and Cardinal Stage Company. In addition to his work in Bloomington, he has worked at Spoleto Festival USA. Mero is the former head of lighting for IU Opera and Ballet Theater and now lives with his family in South Carolina.

Christian Claessens was born in Brussels, Belgium, and began his ballet training with the renowned Dolores Laga and the legendary pedagogue Nora Kiss at the Conservatoire de Danse de la Monnaie. When he was 11, his family moved to Cannes, France, where he continued studies under Rosella Hightower and Jose Ferran. In 1978, Claessens came to New York as a scholarship student at The School of American Ballet and the American Ballet Theatre School, studying with Stanley Williams, Andre Kramarevsky, and Richard Rapp. After graduating, he performed with the Kansas City Ballet under the direction of Todd Bolender and with the Pittsburgh Ballet Theater under Patricia Wilde. Returning to Europe in 1984, he began his association with The Dutch National Ballet. There he had the great opportunity to expand his classical repertoire in works by Fokine, Petipa, Ashton, Tudor, Nijinska, Nureyev, and Balanchine, while working closely with contemporary choreographers such as Rudy Van Danzig, Hans Van Manen, Rudolf Nureyev, Maguy Marin, William Forsythe, Frederick Ashton, Carolyn Carlson, and Ohad Naharan, and was soon established as soloist.

Claessens toured internationally in ballet troupes such as Stars of the American Ballet, Stars of the New York City Ballet, Stars of the Hong Kong Ballet, and Kozlov and friends, among others. He has appeared on television and in film and has taught at major ballet schools throughout the United States and Canada. In 1991, he co-founded the Scarsdale Ballet Studio with Diana White of New York City Ballet (NYCB). During his 15-year run as director and master teacher, he trained dancers of all levels. In 1999, he founded the International Ballet Project with Valentina Kozlova of NYCB. In 1998, he was asked to take over the directorship of the Purchase Youth Ballet, a division of the Conservatory of Dance at The State University of New York under the directorship of Carol Walker, dean of dance. In 2011, Claessens joined the faculty at Ballet Tech, official public school for dance in New York City, under the direction of Eliot Feld. An important and critical interest of Claessens’ has been the development of programs which have been therapeutic for special needs and challenged young people. He designed and taught curriculums for this at New Rochelle High School, Steffi Nossen School of Dance, and Scarsdale Ballet Studio.

His students trained from childhood to professional status are now prominent in major companies, such as New York City Ballet, American Ballet Theatre, Boston Ballet, San Francisco Ballet, and others.
Currently, Claessens teaches at the Jacobs School of Music as an adjunct faculty member as well as principal teacher and curriculum advisor for the Pre-College Ballet Program and Summer Intensive. He has choreographed for both IU Opera Theater and IU Ballet Theater. He is also on the faculty of the IU Department of Theatre, Drama, and Contemporary Dance under the direction of Elizabeth Shea, teaching courses on the Somatic approach to classical ballet.

Walter Huff is associate professor of choral conducting and faculty director of opera choruses at the IU Jacobs School of Music. He served as chorus master for the Atlanta Opera for more than two decades, leading the renowned ensemble in more than 125 productions, with critical acclaim in the United States and abroad. Huff earned his Bachelor of Music degree from the Oberlin Conservatory and his Master of Music degree from Peabody Conservatory (Johns Hopkins). He studied piano with Sarah Martin, Peter Takács, and Lillian Freundlich, and voice with Flore Wend. After serving as a fellow at Tanglewood Music Center, he received Tanglewood’s C. D. Jackson Master Award for Excellence. Huff served as coach with the Peabody Opera Theatre and Washington Opera, and has been musical director for The Atlanta Opera Studio, Georgia State University Opera, and Actor’s Express (Atlanta, Ga.). He also has worked as chorus master with San Diego Opera. He served on the faculty at Georgia State University for four years as assistant professor, guest lecturer, and conductor for the Georgia State University Choral Society.

He was one of four Atlanta artists chosen for the first Loridans Arts Awards, given to Atlanta artists who have made exceptional contributions to the arts life of Atlanta over a long period of time. While serving as chorus master for The Atlanta Opera, Huff has been the music director for The Atlanta Opera High School Opera Institute, a nine-month training program for talented, classically trained high school singers. He has served as chorus master for IU Opera Theater productions of Don Giovanni, The Merry Widow, Akhnaten, Le Nozze di Figaro, Lady Thi Kính, H.M.S. Pinafore, La Traviata, The Italian Girl in Algiers, La Bohème, The Last Savage, South Pacific, Die Zauberflöte, The Barber of Seville, Dead Man Walking, Die Fledermaus, Carmen, Oklahoma!, The Daughter of the Regiment, Florencia en el Amazonas, Madama Butterfly, Peter Grimes, and The Music Man. In the summers of 2014, 2015, and 2017, Huff served as choral instructor and conductor for IU’s Sacred Music Intensive, a workshop inaugurated by the organ and choral departments at the Jacobs School. In addition, he maintains a busy vocal coaching studio in Atlanta. In the summer of 2016, he conducted Arthur Honegger’s King David for the Jacobs Summer Music series with the Summer Chorus and Orchestra.

Pianist Kevin Murphy, a leading figure in the world of classical vocal music, has served as director of coaching and music administration for Indiana University Opera Theater and professor of practice at the IU Jacobs School of Music since 2011. He recently joined Anne Epperson at the Jacobs School in creating the new Collaborative Piano Program. In 2011, he was appointed director of the program for singers at Ravinia’s Steans Music Institute and marked his first season as artistic consultant for the Tucson Desert Song Festival. Previously, he was director of music administration and casting advisor at New York City Opera (2008-12) and director of musical studies at Opéra National de Paris (2006-08).

Murphy was the first pianist and vocal coach invited by Maestro James Levine to join the prestigious Lindemann Young Artist Program at the Metropolitan Opera, and from 1993 to 2006, Murphy was an assistant conductor at the Met. In his capacity as a member of the Met’s music staff, he played continuo harpsichord for many productions and toured Japan with the company. He also performed in Carnegie Hall with the Met Chamber ensemble and Met Orchestra and has frequently played chamber music with members of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra.

In addition to his on- and off-stage partnership with his wife, soprano Heidi Grant Murphy, he has collaborated in concert and recital with artists such as Michelle DeYoung, Thomas Hampson, Danielle de Niese, Lawrence Brownlee, Marcelo Alvarez, Nadine Sierra, Morris Robinson, Angela Brower, Iestyn Davies, Bejun Mehta, Gary Lakes, Kathleen Battle, Nathan Gunn, Elina Garanča, Matthew Polenzani, Cecilia Bartoli, Frederica von Stade, Plácido Domingo, Paul Groves, Renée Fleming, Gerald Finley, Kiri Te Kanawa, Wolfgang Brendel, Christine Brewer, and Pinchas Zuckerman. He is sought after for his work as a private vocal coach and teacher and has guest taught at San Francisco Opera’s Merola Program, International Vocal Arts Institute in Israel and Italy, Glimmerglass Opera, Tanglewood, Aspen Music Festival, Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, and The Juilliard School. He assisted Maestro Seiji Ozawa in his Mozart/Da Ponte opera festival in Japan and has been a guest opera coach at companies such as the Netherlands Opera and Canadian Opera Company as well as the Ravinia Festival.

In addition to playing and teaching, Murphy recently added conducting to his musical activities. He led and produced a staged concert performance of Mozart’s Der Schauspieldirektor at IU and conducted the Schwabacher concerts at San Francisco Opera’s Merola program. He was on the podium for Robin Guarino’s production of Emmanuel Chabrier’s opera L’Étoile at Cincinnati’s College Conservatory of Music and conducted Mahler’s Kindertotenlieder for IU Ballet Theater.

Murphy’s other chamber music and concert credits include appearances at Isaac Stern Auditorium and Weill Hall at Carnegie Hall, Salzburg’s Mozarteum, London’s Wigmore Hall, the Edinburgh Festival, Ravinia, Tokyo’s Suntory Hall, La Jolla’s Summerfest, Music@Menlo, the Vin et Musique Festival in Burgundy, France, Spivey Hall in Atlanta, Edinburgh Festival, and many other venues in the United States and abroad. He has appeared on The Tonight Show with Gary Lakes, Good Morning America with Cecilia Bartoli, and The Today Show with Renée Fleming. He has been featured on NPR’s All Things Considered and in The New York Times, and has recorded for the EMI, Centaur, Arabesque, and Koch labels. He is a frequent adjudicator for competitions, including the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, where he also has served as official accompanist on stage at the Met.

A native of Syracuse, New York, Murphy earned his Bachelor of Music in Piano Performance from Indiana University and his Master of Music in Piano Accompanying from the Curtis Institute of Music. He resides in Bloomington, Indiana, with his wife and their four children.

“Kevin Murphy is in the vanguard for Americans who have turned song accompaniment into an art. The pianism was so absorbing, the singer’s entry seemed like an intrusion. There can be no finer compliment.” – San Francisco Examiner

Daniela Siena brings many years of experience in teaching Italian diction and language to singers. She was introduced to operatic diction by Boris Goldovsky, who was seeking a native speaker without teaching experience to work with singers according to his own pedagogical principles. Siena went on to teach in a number of operatic settings (among them, the Curtis Institute of Music, Metropolitan Opera, New York City Opera, and Seattle Opera). Over the years, she worked with a number of well-known singers, including Samuel Ramey, Justino Díaz, Carol Vaness, Wolfgang Brendel, June Anderson, Gianna Rolandi, and Jerry Hadley. The conductors, coaches, and stage directors with whom she has worked include Otto Guth, Max Rudolf, Edoardo Müller, David Effron, Arthur Fagen, Anthony Pappano, Anthony Manoli, Terry Lusk, Dino Yannopoulos, Tito Capobianco, Andrei Șerban, John Cox, and John Copley. At New York City Opera, Siena worked closely with Beverly Sills—as her executive assistant, as a diction coach, and as the creator of English supertitles for a dozen operas. More recently, she worked for two years as a coach for the Young Artists Program of the Los Angeles Opera and, for the past six years, she has taught in Dolora Zajick’s summer Institute for Young Dramatic Voices. Born in Florence, Italy, to an Italian mother and a Russian émigré father, Siena arrived in the United States at age seven. She received a B.A. from Sarah Lawrence College and, in her twenties, worked for two years in Italy as secretary to the president of the Olivetti Company. Many years later, she continued her education, earned a master’s degree, and became licensed as a psychotherapist by the state of California, where she practiced for 15 years. The mother of two grown children, she moved to Bloomington to be near her son, who lives here with his wife and two young daughters.

Praised for his “stentorian” and “robust bass” by The New York Times, venerable American bass Peter Volpe continually receives critical and popular acclaim across four continents for his powerful command and the rich texture of his timbre. Possessing a vast and ever-expanding repertoire of over 90 roles in six languages in a career encompassing more than 35 years, his captivating style and interpretive skill embrace the depth of every historical and fictional character he embodies. Of his recent portrayal of Prince Gremin in Eugene Onegin, Opera News applauded his ability “to create in his single aria and scene an impressive dignity. His full-bodied bass and great candor of tone, together with his intelligent interpretation, won him a well-deserved ovation.”

In wide-ranging repertoire that spans from Mozart to Verdi and Rossini to Britten, he has graced the stages of many of the great opera houses throughout the United Stated and abroad, including the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, San Francisco Opera, Washington National Opera, Santa Fe Opera, Oper Stuttgart, Vancouver Opera, Glimmerglass Festival, Opera Philadelphia, New York City Opera, Florida Grand Opera, Central City Opera, Florentine Opera, Austin Lyric Opera, Arizona Opera, Atlanta Opera, Pittsburgh Opera, Sarasota Opera, Nashville Opera, Kentucky Opera, Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Hawaii Opera Theatre, Spoleto Festival USA, Palm Beach Opera, Portland Opera, Michigan Opera Theatre, Opera Saratoga, Mobile Opera, Opera Omaha, Virginia Opera, New Orleans Opera, Wolf Trap Opera, New Jersey State Opera, and Bard Music Festival, as well as the opera houses of Manitoba, Montreal, Ottawa, Edmonton, Tokyo, Kyoto, Shanghai, Beijing, Prague, Colmar, Mulhouse, Imola, Riccione, Strasbourg, Karlsruhe, Bremen, Dusseldorf, and Saarbrucken.

Volpe has performed with some of the most celebrated conductors of his time, including James Levine, Seiji Ozawa, Valery Gergiev, Sir John Pritchard, Maurizio Arena, Marco Armilliato, Marcello Viotti, Jacques Lacombe, Jonathan Darlington, Semyon Bychkov, Joseph Rescigno, Vincent La Selva, Richard Buckley, Leon Botstein, and Richard Hickox, among others.

He made his memorable Metropolitan Opera debut in the company’s new production of Prokofiev’s War and Peace, and subsequently returned for 13 seasons with the company for new productions of Berlioz’s Les Troyens, Strauss’s Salome, and Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov, as well as for Falstaff, Gianni Schicchi, Roméo et Juliette, Aïda, I vespri siciliani, Cyrano de Bergerac, Andrea Chenier, Carmen, and, most recently, as Idraote in Armida, Angelotti in Tosca, and Dr. Grenvil in La Traviata.

Recent highlights of Volpe’s career include three broadcasts for the Metropolitan Opera’s Live in HD series: Puccini’s Il trittico, Rossini’s Armida, and Verdi’s La Traviata, as well as Verdi’s Requiem at the Chichester Festival in Chichester, England, and Marcel in Meyerbeer’s Les Huguenots with Leon Botstein at Bard SummerScape, for which Opera News hailed “Peter Volpe gave a terrific performance as the querulous old soldier Marcel, incisive and endearing; the decibels he produced were impressive.” The New York Timesdeclared “the bass Peter Volpe brought a robust voice and charismatic presence to Marcel, the count’s stalwart protector.” In 2007, Volpe created the role of Antoine Deguiche in the world premiere of David DiChiera and Bernard Uzan’s Cyrano for Michigan Opera Theatre. Recordings of the Bard SummerScape Les Huguenots and Michigan Opera Theatre’s Cyrano, as well as a DVD of the Met’s Armida, were subsequently released and well received.

Volpe made a recent foray into the Wagnerian repertoire, having performed Hunding in Die Walküre with the American Symphony Orchestra at Bard College under Leon Botstein, an All-Wagner concert with North Carolina Opera, and Daland in Der Fliegende Holländer at the Glimmerglass Festival in a new production by Francesca Zambello, for which Opera News extolled “Peter Volpe, in firm, resonant voice, played Daland not as an old buffoon but as a virile commander in early middle-age.” In addition, he has performed Daland to great acclaim with Virginia Opera, Florentine Opera, and Washington National Opera.

Engagements for this season and beyond include Judge Turpin in a new Christopher Alden production of Sweeney Todd at the Glimmerglass Festival, King Philip II in a new production of Verdi’s Don Carlo at Washington National Opera, a repeat of Judge Turpin with New Orleans Opera, Il Commendatore in Don Giovanni with Nashville Opera, Daland in Der Fliegende Holländer with Austin Opera, Basilio in The Barber of Seville with Florentine Opera, and Gremin in Eugene Onegin with Spoleto Festival USA.

Notable performances for Volpe include the title role in Don Giovanni with New York City Opera and Florentine Opera, for which Opera News praised “Peter Volpe’s handsome figure and aristocratic bearing made for good casting as Giovanni. His virile bass caressed ‘Deh vieni alla finestra’ sensuously . . . “; King Philip II in Don Carlo with Vancouver Opera and Austin Lyric Opera, to which the Austin Post hailed “The standout performer of the evening was Peter Volpe as King Philip. His stage presence and deep bass were captivating”; Méphistophélès in Faust with Vancouver Opera and Palm Beach Opera, to which Opera Canada stated “Peter Volpe’s Méphistophélès was debonair, comic, and sinister in the right proportions, while his rich voice poured forth like molten brimstone,” and The Globe and Mail said “bass Peter Volpe, proved to be an excellent Méphistophélès, both vocally and dramatically, shining from his first big moment—’Le veau d’or est toujours debout’—onward. Volpe balanced the demonic and comic elements of his character, and the audience responded to his sardonic wit with outbursts of laughter”; and Raimondo in Lucia di Lammermoor with Atlanta Opera, Austin Opera, and Portland Opera, about which Opera News noted “The best solo singing, strong and beautiful, came from bass Peter Volpe as a compassionate Raimondo.” Additionally, Volpe has received much acclaim for his interpretation of the evil assassin Sparafucile in Rigoletto, which he has performed prolifically in houses such as New York City Opera, Opera Manitoba, Edmonton Opera, Opera Lyra Ottawa, Arizona Opera, Austin Opera, and Kentucky Opera, and for which he garnered handsome reviews from the Tucson Citizen: “Making his AOC debut, the production’s Sparafucile, Peter Volpe, was likewise the real thing. Now this is a bass! Big, solid, and earth-shaking, the handsome assassin’s voice had the ominous aura one always wishes for but too seldom finds”; The Financial Times: The best performances came from . . . Peter Volpe as a dark-toned Sparafucile . . .”; and The Oregonian: “As the assassin Sparafucile, Peter Volpe commanded the stage with his splendid bad-guy bass, all darkness and low notes.”

Other notable roles in his expansive repertoire include Ramfis in Aïda (Palm Beach Opera, Austin Opera, Michigan Opera Theatre, Arizona Opera), Il Commendatore in Don Giovanni (Arizona Opera), Frère Laurent in Roméo et Juliette (Vancouver Opera, Austin Opera, Michigan Opera Theatre), Gremin in Eugene Onegin (Vancouver Opera, Opera Lyra Ottawa, Lyric Opera of Kansas City), König Ludwig in Euryanthe (Bard SummerScape), Marquis of Calatrava and the cover of Guardiano in La Forza del Destino (Washington National Opera), Basilio in The Barber of Seville (Opera Omaha, Edmonton Opera, Vancouver Opera), Zuniga in Carmen (Seiji Ozawa Opera Project in Japan, Arizona Opera), Banquo in Macbeth (Portland Opera, Arizona Opera), Timur in Turandot (Opera Lyra Ottawa, Portland Opera, Manitoba Opera, Florentine Opera, New Orleans), and Ferrando in Il Trovatore (Arizona Opera, New Jersey State Opera, Augusta Opera), as well as productions of Britten’s Billy Budd and Tchaikovsky’s Maid of Orleans (Washington National Opera), Salome, Nabucco, and Roméo et Juliette (San Francisco Opera), and covers of Pistola in Falstaff, Silva in Ernani, Méphistophélès in Faust (Lyric Opera of Chicago), and Pimen in Boris Godunov with Jerome Hines as Boris (New Jersey State Opera).

A consummate concert artist, Volpe has performed Verdi’s Requiem with the Philharmonia Orchestra of London at The Chichester Festival, Manhattan Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall, Chattanooga Symphony, L’Orchestra di Imola in Italy, Oberlin Conservatory, Arizona State University, Indianapolis Symphony, Queens Symphony, Augusta Choral Society, and New Jersey Symphony, which was recorded and subsequently released on CD. In addition, he has performed Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with the Chattanooga Symphony, Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis with the New York Metropolitan Orchestra, Edmonton Symphony, and Augusta Choral Society, Händel’s Messiah with the Edmonton and Louisville Symphonies, Mozart’s Requiem with the Choral Society of Philadelphia, and an all-Verdi concert with The Washington Chorus at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.

While consistently in demand, he remains a focused performer, concert soloist, and talented educator who feels an affinity for mentoring developing singers. In this vein, he frequently gives master classes and voice lessons in conjunction with his engagements. A few such venues include Arizona State University, Opera Omaha, Arizona Opera, Portland Opera, Glimmerglass Festival, Austin Opera, and Florida Grand Opera. Additionally, he maintains a voice studio in New York City and has frequently been called upon to judge competitions and serve in an advisory capacity for opera companies and opera agencies.

Volpe was born and raised in Long Island, New York. A second-generation Italian-American, he was exposed to opera early in life and quickly developed a passion for the art form. He completed his studies at Indiana University under the tutelage of Nicola Rossi-Lemeni, who took Volpe on as his protégé and to whom Volpe attributes his technique and knowledge of the bass repertoire. Shortly after the completion of his studies, he was accepted into the prestigious Merola Program at San Francisco Opera and subsequently made his San Francisco Opera main stage debut at 26 years of age. He has received awards and mentions from the MacAllister Vocal Awards Competition, Palm Beach Opera Vocal Competition, and Sylvia Getzky Competition.

Jonathan Bryan is a baritone from Dallas, Texas, currently pursuing a master’s degree in vocal performance. During his time at IU, he has performed several leading and supporting roles, including Sharpless (Madama Butterfly, 2016), Guglielmo (Così fan tutte, 2016), and Owen Hart (Dead Man Walking, 2015). He has made appearances as a concert soloist in the University Singers’ 2015 performance of Rossini’s Petite messe solennelle and the Joshi Handel Project’s 2016 performance of Handel’s Messiah. Bryan has spent the last two summers as a studio artist with Wolf Trap Opera, appeared as bass soloist for the St. Paul Episcopal choir’s performance of Haydn’s Missa in Angustiis, and appeared as baritone soloist for the National Symphony Orchestra’s July 2016 concert Stars and Stripes Forever! He is a student of Wolfgang Brendel.

Brazilian baritone Bruno Sandes earned his bachelor’s degree from the Jacobs School of Music and is currently in the second year of his Master of Music in Voice Performance degree, studying under the tutelage of Carol Vaness. Sandes earned a degree in Interior Design at the Federal Institute of Alagoas, Brazil, before relocating to Bloomington, Indiana. His roles with IU Opera Theater include Sergeant Sulpice in Donizetti’s The Daughter of the Regiment, Ali Hakim in Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Oklahoma!, Doctor Falke in Strauss’s Die Fledermaus, Emile de Becque in Rodgers and Hammerstein’s South Pacific, Police Sergeant in Rossini’s The Barber of Seville, Taddeo in Rossini’s The Italian Girl in Algiers, Le Surintendant des Plaisirs in Massenet’s Cendrillon, and Sùng Ông in the world premiere of P. Q. Phan’s The Tale of Lady Thi Kính. He won first place in the XI Maracanto International Voice Competition and was one of the winners of the 2013 Indianapolis Matinee Musicale Competition. Sandes was a semifinalist in the IX Maria Callas International Voice Competition and selected as one of six singers from around the world in the 42nd International Winter Festival of Campos do Jordão. He was chosen as the grand winner of the 2014 IU Latin American Music Center Recording Competition. He recently returned from a concert tour in Portugal and Austria with pianist Marta Menezes, sponsored by the Georgina Joshi Foundation. In October, Sandes will be representing IU with pianist Shelley Hanmo at the semifinal of the Liszt International Competition.

Bass-baritone Glen Hall, a native of Mooresville, Indiana, is pursuing a Performance Diploma in Voice Performance at the Jacobs School of Music under the tutelage of Peter Volpe. Hall is also finishing his Master of Music in Voice Performance from Jacobs, where he was previously studying with Wolfgang Brendel, and earned his Bachelor of Music in Voice Performance from the University of Indianapolis (UIndy). He was most recently seen on the Indiana University Opera Theater stage as Mayor Shinn in The Music Man. Other roles include Judge Turpin in Sweeney Todd, Swann in Maxwell Ramage’s Swann’s Love (premiere) with New Voices Opera, and Guard 2 in William David Cooper’s Hagar (premiere) with the National Opera Association. At IU Opera, he has been a chorus member in Heggie’s Dead Man Walking, Bizet’s Carmen, and Catán’s Florencia en el Amazonas. At UIndy, he performed as Wazir in Kismet and gave many recitals, concerts, and performances of operatic scenes. Hall worked under the baton of Raymond Leppard as a soloist on many occasions at UIndy. Hall was handpicked by William Bolcom to perform in a concert dedicated to Bolcom’s life and music.

Bass Rivers Hawkins, a South Carolina native, is a Performer Diploma student and an associate instructor at the Jacobs School of Music, studying with Brian Gill. IU credits include the role of Capitán in Florencia en el Amazonas, and the ensembles of Dead Man Walking and Peter Grimes. At Jacobs, he has also participated in opera workshops conducted by Carol Vaness and Heidi Grant Murphy, where he performed scenes from Les Contes d’Hoffmann (Dr. Miracle), Hamlet (Claudius), Adriana Lecouvreur (Quinault), and Faust (Méphistophélès). Rivers earned his undergraduate degree from the Steinhardt School at New York University and took part in numerous productions there. Favorites include the role of Don Alhambra in The Gondoliers as well as featured roles in Italian Songbook and Liebeslieder—fully staged, devised opera pieces featuring the music of Wolf and Brahms. This past summer, he joined Central City Opera as a Bonfils-Stanton Foundation Young Artist, where he performed in productions of Carmen, Così fan tutte, The Burning Fiery Furnace, and Gallantry.

Soprano Kaitlyn Johnson is a first-year doctoral student in voice performance and an associate instructor of voice at the Jacobs School of Music. She graduated with her Master of Music in Vocal Performance from IU in May 2017 and continues her studies under the guidance of soprano Heidi Grant Murphy. Johnson recently performed the title role in IU Opera Theater’s production of Catán’s Florencia en el Amazonas to great acclaim. The Bloomington Herald-Times said, “Johnson carried herself like a diva and produced a voice of range and strength.” She spent summer 2016 as a young artist with the Prague Summer Nights Festival, where she performed Donna Anna in Mozart’s Don Giovanni on the stage of the Estates Theatre in Prague. During her master’s degree studies at Jacobs, she was seen as Mrs. Charlton inDead Man Walking and in the choruses of Peter Grimes and Carmen. She is a 2015 cum laude graduate of Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, where she studied with Stephen King. She is a proud alumna of Houston Grand Opera’s Young Artist Vocal Academy and the Aspen Opera Center. Johnson is the recipient of a 2017 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions Encouragement Award, the 2017 Cox and Koch voice award from the National Society of Arts and Letters Bloomington chapter, a 2016 Georgina Joshi International Fellowship, and the 2015 Farb Family Outstanding Graduate Award (Rice University). She is originally from Atlanta, Georgia.

Hayley Lipke, soprano, is a native of Racine, Wisconsin, and a second-year master’s student under the tutelage of Jane Dutton and Gary Arvin at the Jacobs School of Music. She performed as Rosalba Montealban (Florencia en el Amazonas) and Alma Hix (The Music Man) last year with IU Opera Theater. While earning her Bachelor of Music degree from Jacobs, Lipke performed as Gertie Cummins (Oklahoma!) and in the choruses of Falstaff, Le Nozze di Figaro, Werther, La Traviata, South Pacific, Dead Man Walking, and Così fan tutte. She sang as a concert soloist at the Orfeo Music Festival in Vipiteno, Italy, in 2012. She was awarded the Bella Voce award in the 2015 Bel Canto Foundation competition, was a finalist in the 2017 Georgina Joshi Scholarship Competition, and won second place in the 2017 Matinee Musicale Foundation Competition at the graduate level.

Tenor Ting Li, from Zhejiang Province, China, earned a Bachelor of Music degree from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music, where he studied with Bo Song. In 2016, Li earned a Master of Music degree from the Yale School of Music, where he studied with Richard Cross. Li is currently a first-year Performer Diploma student studying with Carol Vaness at the Jacobs School of Music. His roles include Tamino in Die Zauberflöte, Lysander in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Rinuccio/Gherardo in Gianni Schicchi, Young Gypsy in Aleko, Guillot in Manon, Alfredo/Gastone/Guiseppe in La Traviata, and Don Curzio in Le Nozze di Figaro. He has performed leading roles in opera workshop scenes including Rigoletto, Il Trovatore, Adriana Lecouvreur, Roméo et Juliet, Les Contes d’Hoffmann, L’Elisir d’Amore, Così fan tutte, The Barber of Seville, Die Fledermaus, Hamlet, and West Side Story. In 2015, he was invited by Distinguished Concerts International New York as one of the soloists to perform at Carnegie Hall. In 2014, Li sang Handel’s Messiah for his debut with the Hartford Symphony Orchestra. The same year, he was accepted as a young artist at the Aspen Music Festival. He has performed in major concert halls throughout the United States, Europe, and Asia, collaborating with renowned directors such as Linda Brovsky, Claudia Solti, and Ted Huffman, among others.

Leo Williams is a second-year voice performance student of Alice Hopper at the Jacobs School of Music. He is a recent recipient of the Jacobs Premier Young Artist Award, Schmidt Foundation Young Artist Scholarship, and Georgina Joshi International Fellowship. Previous stage credits at IU include The Daughter of the Regiment, Peter Grimes, Giles Corey (The Crucible), and The Magician (The Consul). This is his debut as Don Ottavio, and he debuted the role of Tamino (Die Zauberflöte) this past summer while touring in Germany. He is a member of the Florida Grand Opera chorus as well as the Palm Beach Opera chorus. Roles, scenes, operas, ballets, and choreography performed outside of IU include Rudolf Hoess (Yours Truly), Fredrick Douglass (The Line That Divides), Kaspar (Amahl and the Night Visitors), Tamino/Monastatos/First Priest (Die Zauberflöte), Don Ottavio (Don Giovanni), Belmonte (Die Entführung aus dem Serail), La Bohème, La Sonnambula, Norma, The Passenger, Don Pasquale, MacBeth, The Barber of Seville, The Daughter of the Regiment, Our Town, Les Contes d’Hoffmann, The Bartered Bride, The Tender Land, The Nutcracker, Swan Lake, Giselle, Le Corsaire, La Bayadère, Rent, Wicked, and The Secret Garden. In conjunction with his studies of the Holocaust this past summer, via the Joshi fellowship, he is looking forward to presenting and singing in two self-directed and self-produced orchestrated scenes of new opera detailing the journey over lands into concentration camps.

Baritone Andrew Stack is a second-year Master of Voice student studying under Patricia Havranek. Originally from Manhasset, New York, he earned his undergraduate degree in voice performance from Westminster Choir College, where he studied with Lindsey Christiansen and was a member of the Westminster Choir. Since graduating from Westminster, Stack has made his professional debut at the Spoleto USA Festival in Charleston, S.C., as Zaretsky (Eugene Onegin), sung in master classes for Dalton Baldwin at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria, and taken part in SongFest at the Colburn School in Los Angeles, California. He has also collaborated with some of the foremost living composers in the industry, including Libby Larsen and Jake Heggie. Recently, Stack performed the role of the Bishop in IU’s summer production of The Three Hermits by Stephen Paulus, Starveling in the Carol Vaness Opera Workshop’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream this past winter, and in the American premiere of Sven-David’s Sandström’s symphonic work Uppbrott.

Soprano Avery Boettcher, a native of Appleton, Wisconsin, is a graduate of Viterbo University. She has performed several roles in the United States and abroad, including Yum-Yum in The Mikado, Clorinda in La Cenerentola, Sieglinde Lessing in Jerome Kern’s Music in the Air with the Music by the Lake Music Festival, and Susanna in Le Nozze di Figaro with La Musica Lirica in Novafeltria, Italy. She is currently studying with Carol Vaness while pursuing a Master of Music in Voice Performance from the Jacobs School of Music, where she was awarded the Mavis McRae Crow Scholarship and an Artistic Excellence Fellowship. Upcoming engagements include Tarik O’Regan’s Triptych and Fredrik Sixten’s Requiem, both with the Bel Canto Chorus of Milwaukee. Most recently, Boettcher was named a winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions Wisconsin District, an Upper Midwest Regional Finalist, a three-time first-place winner in the Wisconsin National Association of Teachers of Singing competition, and a finalist in the 2013 Schubert Club competition.

Shayna Jones, soprano, was recently praised by The Baltimore Sun for her “rich voice.” Recent roles include Micaëla (Carmen), Anna Maurrant (Street Scene), First Lady (Die Zauberflöte), and Nella (Gianni Schicchi). Other notable appearances include the role of Ortlinde from Die Walküre at the Oslo Opera House in Norway and Aunt Norris in the American premiere of Jonathan Dove’s Mansfield Park at the Baltimore Theatre Project. She was recently seen in Indiana as part of New Voices Opera, premiering the role of Eve from In Memoriam. She is a second-year graduate student with Heidi Grant Murphy.

Soprano Alyssa Dessoye, from Tampa, Florida, is currently pursuing a Master in Music degree as well as a Performance Diploma in Voice under the tutelage of Carol Vaness. Dessoye earned her Bachelor of Music degree from Florida State University, where she performed the roles of Zerlina in Don Giovanni and Suor Genovieffa in Suor Angelica. Dessoye is the 2017-18 recipient of the Wilfred C. Bain Scholarship at the Jacobs School of Music. She was most recently seen as Kate Pinkerton in IU Opera Theater’s production of Madama Butterfly.

Soprano Juyeon Yoo, a native of South Korea, is pursuing a Master of Music degree at the Jacobs School of Music, studying with Jane Dutton. Yoo earned her bachelor’s degree from Seoul National University. This past summer, she performed as a professional artist with Songfest. At the Jacobs School, Yoo has performed as a member of the chorus in Madama Butterfly (2016) and Peter Grimes (2017). The role of Zerlina marks her solo debut with IU Opera Theater.

This production marks Joey LaPlant’s IU Opera debut. An Indianapolis native and student of Brian Horne, LaPlant is a sophomore pursuing a degree in voice performance with an outside field in musical theatre at IU. Last year, he performed as a chorus member and featured soloist in IU Opera’s production of Florencia en el Amazonas, a chorus member and featured dancer in IU Opera’s The Music Man, and Caiaphas in IU Theatre’s Jesus Christ Superstar. He can be heard also as a chorus member in IU Opera’s premiere of Jake Heggie’s It’s a Wonderful Life in November.

Baritone Stephen Walley is in his third year of undergraduate studies under the tutelage of Wolfgang Brendel. This past year, Walley played Sir Despard in Ruddigore with the University Gilbert and Sullivan Society, Falke in Boston University Tanglewood Young Artist Opera’s production ofDie Fledermaus, and The Imperial Commissioner in Madama Butterfly with IU Opera Theater. He spent last summer with Ohio Light Opera, where he covered Dr. Engel in The Student Prince and participated in the ensemble for the season. He has also participated as a chorus member in IU Opera’s productions of The Barber of Seville, Die Fledermaus, Carmen, The Daughter of the Regiment, and Peter Grimes. In 2017, Walley was a finalist in the Tri State Vocal Competition with the Opera Guild of Dayton and received the Bella Voce award from the Bel Canto Foundation. A resident of Gladstone, New Jersey, he received the New Jersey Governor’s Award for Vocal Music in 2015. Past opera scene credits include Edwin in Die Csárdásfürstin, Malatesta in Don Pasquale, Papageno in Die Zauberflöte, Candide in Candide, and Strephon in Iolanthe.