Please join all of us at Detroit Opera as we celebrate Wayne S. Brown, President and CEO of Detroit Opera. Wayne will step down after a decade of service marked by steadfast leadership and a progressive approach that has made Detroit Opera one of the leading voices for the cultural arts in Detroit.

Wayne speaks to the audience before Arias and Overtures. Credit: Austin Richey/Detroit Opera

“My time at Detroit Opera has been particularly meaningful; since its founding, this company has always been defined by creativity and innovation, generated by the city that embraces it,” he told DBusiness reporter R.J. King. “The forward-thinking, inclusive, risk-taking approach of Detroit Opera is becoming a model for other opera companies in the U.S. My time at Detroit Opera has been an opportunity to celebrate and embrace a more expanded view of what opera means today, and I cannot wait to see what the company has to offer in the years to come.”

Detroit Opera founder Dr. David DiChiera with Wayne Brown, who took the reins from Dr. D in 2014. Credit: Detroit Opera

Above all, Wayne has maintained a commitment to the community that fostered his own artistic growth. “I returned to the city, a place that I care a great deal about to see how we could make a difference through whatever gifts, experience and perspective that we may have achieved along the way,” he explained to Duante Beddingfield of the Detroit Free Press.

Wayne with Ethan Davidson, Detroit Opera Chairman of the Board and Trustees, and Yuval Sharon, Detroit Opera Gary L. Wasserman Artistic Director on opening night of Madame Butterfly. Credit: Austin Richey/Detroit Opera

Incoming President and CEO Patty Isacson Sabee with outgoing President and CEO Wayne S. Brown. Credit: Austin Richey/Detroit Opera

Wayne is a graduate of the University of Michigan, where he received his bachelor of music degree with a major in voice and a minor in business. In the 1970s, he began his role with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra as an administrative manager, and subsequently was named assistant manager in charge of sales, community outreach, and the orchestra’s first Upper Peninsula tour. In 1979, Brown was instrumental in bringing about the orchestra’s first Classical Roots concert in Detroit, an annual initiative that is now being celebrated, and replicated, by several communities throughout the nation.

Wayne addresses the audience before the opening of Handel’s Xerxes. Credit: Austin Richey/Detroit Opera

On January 1, 2014, Wayne was named President and CEO of Michigan Opera Theatre, now Detroit Opera. Wayne came to Detroit from the National Endowment for the Arts, where since 1997 he had been director of Music and Opera, managing NEA grants for music and opera projects and directing the NEA Jazz Masters Fellowships, the nation’s highest honor in jazz. Earlier in his career, Wayne served as producer of music programs for the Cultural Olympiad in Atlanta, where he managed music events associated with the 1996 Olympic Games.

We applaud Wayne on his tireless commitment to the performing arts in Detroit, and congratulate him on a well-deserved retirement!

Wayne S. Brown with Ethan Davidson, Detroit Opera Chairman of the Board and Trustees in the Frenkel Lounge with a portrait of founder Dr. David DiChiera. Credit: Austin Richey/Detroit Opera