Meet our experts! MOT Director of External Affairs Arthur White has been sharing his knowledge and opera expertise with MOT patrons for years, including providing regular preview talks ahead of the Metropolitan Opera’s Nightly Opera Stream. Learn more about him below!
Arthur has worked in multiple aspects of opera as a singer, manager and community leader. In addition to having sung in several productions at MOT and with all the professional opera companies in Chicago, he spent the last 20 years in artist management, the marketing of operatic productions and as an impresario. He has produced and presented artists in concert at venues across the United States including the famed Carnegie Hall in New York City.
Arthur originally joined MOT in 2013, tasked with increasing community engagement. During this time he created MOT’s Opera Clubs, where opera singers give free community performances throughout Metro Detroit, followed by lectures of MOT’s upcoming operas. Arthur’s efforts were recognized by Opera America in 2015 as an example of successful grassroots engagement in the United States.
Previous roles include serving as Artist Manager at Chicago Concert Artists, the largest agency representing classical music performers in the city. He was primarily responsible for traveling to critique roster artists in performance, and to discover new up and coming artists to join the existing roster. He served as the personal manager of Grammy Award-winning singer William Warfield and legendary folk singer Odetta. He also produced baritone Robert Sims’ recital in the new and recently opened Zankel Hall in Carnegie Hall and managed his second appearance for Carnegie Hall in Jessye Norman’s “Honor” in 2009.
Arthur’s first experience with MOT was seeing the 2010 production of Don Giovanni. “I was impressed with not only the beauty of the Opera House, but the racial diversity of the singers on the stage,” he said. “I have always believed that opera belongs to all of us. I knew then and there I would one day work for this outstanding company.”
