Yuval Sharon has amassed an unconventional body of work that expands the operatic form. He is founder and Artistic Director of The Industry in Los Angeles and the newly appointed Gary L. Wasserman Artistic Director of Michigan Opera Theatre. With The Industry, Mr. Sharon has directed and produced new operas in moving vehicles, operating train stations, Hollywood sound stages, and various “non-spaces” such as warehouses, parking lots, and escalator corridors. From 2016-2019, Mr. Sharon was the first Artist-in-Residence at the Los Angeles Philharmonic, creating nine projects that included newly commissioned works, site-specific installations, and performances outside the hall. His residency culminated in a major revival of Meredith Monk’s opera ATLAS, making him the first director Monk entrusted with a new production of her work. The first American ever invited to direct at Bayreuth, Mr. Sharon distinguished himself with a boldly progressive Lohengrin in 2018, using subtle dramatic direction to completely overhaul the opera into a critique of entrenched power structures. He is the recipient of the 2014 Götz Friedrich Prize in Germany for his production of John Adams’s Doctor Atomic. He also directed a landmark production of Song Books at the San Francisco Symphony and Carnegie Hall. In 2017, Sharon was honored with a MacArthur Fellowship and a Foundation for Contemporary Art grant for theater. Photo credit: Casey Kringlen

Mexican-born conductor Roberto Kalb has served as Music Director of Detroit Opera since 2022. He conducted Detroit Opera’s performances of The Cunning Little Vixen in May 2024 and two concerts featuring the Detroit Opera Orchestra and Resident Artists in the fall of 2023. He conducted Yuval Sharon’s new production of La bohème at Detroit Opera in 2022. Additional 2023–24 season performances for Roberto included house debuts at Santa Fe Opera (L’elisir d’amore) and Atlanta Opera (Rigoletto), concerts with the Kansas City Symphony and the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, and Cavalleria rusticana/Pagliacci at Lyric Opera of Kansas City. Season highlights in 2022–23 included performances at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, Lyric Opera of Kansas City, San Diego Opera, and San Francisco Opera.   In 2019, Roberto concluded a five-year tenure as resident conductor and head of music at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis (OTSL), where he led the world premiere of Tobias Picker’s Awakenings (2022); he also conducted OTSL’s critically acclaimed run of Rigoletto (2019) in collaboration with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra. Roberto has also conducted at companies including Opéra Orchestra National Montpellier, Florida Grand Opera, Kentucky Opera, Wolf Trap Opera, Opera Maine, and Tulsa Opera.   He has conducted performances with the Orquesta Sinfónica del Estado de México, Orquesta Carlos Chavez in Mexico City, the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, Palm Beach Symphony, and the Orquestra Sinfonica da USP in São Paulo, Brazil.    Roberto holds degrees from the University of Michigan and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and in 2021 was awarded the prestigious Solti Foundation U.S. Career Assistance Award. He is married to soprano Mané Galoyan.   Photo credit: Simon Pauly

Mexican-Lebanese soprano Marlen Nahhas recently completed the Cafritz Young Artists program with Washington National Opera. Highlights of her time at WNO include The Magic Flute (Pamina), La traviata (Violetta) directed by Francesca Zambello, Tesori’s The Lion, The Unicorn and Me (Flamingo), The Consul (Foreign Woman), the world premiere of Sankaram’s Taking Up Serpents (Queer Kid), and a Concert of Comedic Masterpieces under the baton of Maestro Joseph Coloneri. Next season she will debut with Virginia Opera in La bohème (Musetta), a role she performed with Opera Naples and Finger Lakes Opera. Recent orchestral debuts include the National Symphony Orchestra in excerpts from La bohème (Mimì) conducted by NSO music director Maestro Gianandrea Noseda and Kansas City Symphony for excerpts from Le nozze di Figaro (Susanna). She was a member of the Merola Opera program at the San Francisco Opera Center where she performed scenes from Il tabarro, Don Giovanni, Don Carlo, and La rondine in the Schwabacher and Grand Finale concerts. She was also an Apprentice Artist with Central City Opera where she covered roles in Tosca (title role) and Così fan tutte (Fiordiligi). Additional performing experience includes Madama Butterfly (title role) and Die Fledermaus (Rosalinde). Ms. Nahhas was a National Semi-Finalist in The Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and a graduate of Oklahoma City University and Indiana University.

American tenor Matthew White, whom the New York Classical Review said had a “distinctive tenor [with a] dark and powerful lyric sound,” recently made critically acclaimed debuts as Roméo in Gounod’s Roméo et Juiliette with Cincinnati Opera, the Duca in Rigoletto with Edmonton Opera, and Pinkerton in Puccini’s Madama Butterfly with the Princeton Festival. In the 2021-2022 season, Mr. White will join Michigan Opera Theatre as Rodolfo in Yuval Sharon’s new production of La bohème, told in reverse; the production will later play at the Spoleto Festival USA. He will also sing Don José in Carmen with Arizona Opera, Lancelot in Chausson’s Le roi Arthus with Bard SummerScape, and Frederic in The Pirates of Penzance with Cincinnati Opera. Cancelations due to the Covid-19 pandemic included Stravinsky’s Pulcinella with Dallas Opera, Roméo with Michigan Opera Theatre, Pinkerton with Cincinnati Opera, and Alfredo in La traviata with Lyric Opera of Kansas City. In the 2020-2021 season, Mr. White performed Pinkerton with Tulsa Opera. He also enjoyed touring with “The Bad Boys of Opera” at various venues. Highlights of the 2019-2020 season included his role and house debuts as Rodolfo with Opera Naples, while in concert, he performed with the Florida Orchestra as the tenor soloist in Handel’s Messiah. A recent graduate of Philadelphia’s prestigious Academy of Vocal Arts, Mr. White performed Roméo, the title role in Werther, Roberto in Puccini’s Le Villi, Edgardo in Lucia di Lammermoor, Avito in Montemezzi’s L’amore dei tre re, and Faust in Lili Boulanger’s Faust et Hélène. He made his debut with Opera Maine as Rinuccio in Gianni Schicchi, and has appeared with Palm Beach Opera and Vero Beach Opera. Concert credits include performances with the New Jersey Festival Orchestra, Ocean City Pops, and the Longfellow Chorus Festival. A favorite of competitions, Mr. White was selected to compete in the 2019 Operalia Competion in Prague. He was awarded the Grand Prize of the Gerda Lissner International Vocal Competition, 1st place in the Deborah Voigt International Vocal Competition, 2nd place in the Metropolitan Opera Mid-Atlantic region, the Grand Prize in the Mario Lanza Vocal Competition, an Encouragement Award from the George London Foundation, and is the recipient of the Alfonso Cavaliere Award. He has participated in the training programs of Bel Canto at Caramoor, PORTopera, and Seagle Music Colony. A trained violinist, Mr. White is also an avid surfer and runs his own surfboard business, which currently has clients around the world.

Coming soon  

In the autumn of 2020, Brandie Sutton made a very successful debut in Vienna, as Clara in Porgy and Bess, at Theater an der Wien. This was also the role of her Metropolitan Opera debut in February 2020. She will return to the Met next season, as La Fee in Cendrillon. She has also sung with New York City Opera and at the operas houses of Seattle, Geneva, Hamburg, Dresden, Frankfurt, Bari and Mexico (Palacio de las Bellas Artes.). A versatile concert artist, Sutton has sung with the Mostly Mozart Festival, National Symphony Orchestra, Jazz at Lincoln Center, South Florida Symphony, Royal Danish Symphony, Oregon Symphony and many others. During the current pandemic, she has been appearing in a wide range of online, virtual events.

One of America's most versatile tenors and enlightened musicians, George Shirley remains in demand nationally and internationally as performer, teacher, and lecturer.    He has won international acclaim for his performances with the Metropolitan Opera, and with major opera houses and festivals in England, Germany, Austria,, Argentina, the Netherlands, Monte Carlo, Scotland, Italy, Japan, Chicago, San Francisco, Washington D.C., Santa Fe, and Detroit, among others.     Mr. Shirley has recorded for the RCA, COLUMBIA, DECCA, ANGEL, VANGUARD, C.R.I, CAPRICCIO, PHILIPS, and ALBANY lables; he received a GRAMMY AWARD in 1968 for his role (FERRANDO) in the prize-winning RCA recording of Mozart's COSI FAN TUTTE. He has performed more than 80 operatic roles over the span of his 57-year career, as well as oratorio and concert literature with some of the world’s most renowned orchestras (e.g., London Philharmonic, BBC Symphony, London Symphony, and the major orchestras of New York City, Washington, D.C., Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Detroit, Chicago, San Francisco, Cleveland, Los Angeles, and Boston) and conductors (Solti, Stravinsky, Leinsdorf, Ormandy, Klemperer, Bernstein, Maazel, Colin Davis, von Karajan, Schippers, Steinberg, Ozawa, et al.). As recitalist he has collaborated with William Bolcom, Charles Wadsworth, Philip Eisenberg, Martin Isepp, Jonathan Brice, John Wustman, Kelly Wyatt, George Posell, and Martin Katz to name but a few.    He was the first black tenor and second African American male to sing leading roles with the Metropolitan Opera, where he remained for eleven years as leading artist. He was the first black high school vocal music teacher in the Detroit Public Schools and the first black member of the United States Army Chorus in Washington, D.C. The Opera News January, 2004 issue featured a retrospective of Mr. Shirley’s career, Reunion: George Shirley, by Eric Myers. The February, 2022 issue of Opera News again focuses on the tenor’s accomplishments in an article written by Kenneth Overton, Talking With A Legend. In 2015, he received the National Medal of Arts from President Barack Obama.    George Shirley is The Joseph Edgar Maddy Distinguished University Emeritus Professor of Music at the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre & Dance. 

Last season, Ben Taylor made his Boston Lyric Opera debut in La bohème (Schaunard), followed by debuts with Bayerische Staatsoper for La fanciulla del West (Bello), OperaDelaware/Opera Baltimore for La traviata (Germont), and Opera Philadelphia for La bohème (Schaunard). He returned to The Metropolitan Opera for The Magic Flute (Papageno) and Dialogues des Carmélites and Berkshire Opera Festival for La bohème (Marcello). On the concert stage he will make his debut with the Cleveland Orchestra in La fanciulla del West (Bello). He recently made his Metropolitan Opera debut in 2021 in Fire Shut Up in My Bones (Chester), followed by debuts with Detroit Opera and Spoleto Festival USA in La bohème (Schaunard), Cincinnati Opera for the world premiere of Castor and Patience (West), North Carolina Opera for Sanctuary Road (William Grant Still), Baltimore Concert Opera for Adriana Lecouvreur (Michonnet), and a return to Pittsburgh Opera for The Magic Flute (Papageno).

Hailing from Stafford, Virginia, bass Cory McGee opens his 2021-2022 season performing the role of Theseus in Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream with the Santa Fe Opera. This fall, he will be seen as Basilio in Rossini’s Il barbiere di Siviglia with Opera on the James.  Further engagements this season include Billy in the world premiere of Thompson’s The Snowy Day, and Virgil in the world premiere of Cohen’s Turn and Burn, both with Houston Grand Opera. Mr. McGee will also be featured at The Houston Grand Opera’s Studio Showcase and Rienzi Recital Series. In Spring of 2022, he will make his debut with both Michigan Opera Theatre and The Florentine Opera, singing the role of Colline in Puccini’s La bohème.

This past season, Mr. McGee performed in The Houston Grand Opera’s Studio Showcase and Rienzi Recital Series, producing a full recording of Schubert’s Schwanengesang. He was also seen in Lawrence Brownlee’s Giving Voice concert and The Snowy Day documentary, both with Houston Grand Opera. Recent operatic roles include the Sodbuster in Mazzoli’s Proving Up, and Publio in Mozart’s La clemenza di Tito, both with Rice Opera Theatre. Most recently, McGee was a finalist in both the Pasadena Vocal Competition and the Houston Grand Opera’s 32nd annual Eleanor McCollum Competition. Concerts last season included Handel’s Messiah with West University Baptist Church, Houston TX, and a return as a soloist to Unity Church of Houston for their Black History Month Celebration in February 2020.

Mr. McGee joined Santa Fe Opera as an Apprentice Artist for the 2019 season, portraying the role of the Gardener in Ruder’s The Thirteenth Child. In 2018, he was seen with Wolf Trap Opera as a Studio Artist, performing the role of La Voce in Mozart's Idomeneo, and Ranger Nat in Wolf Trap's commissioned children's opera, Hanlon's Listen, Wilhelmina!. Cory was also seen as a soloist in Bernstein at 100 - A Celebration, at Wolf Trap's Filene Center.