(Sponsored by Barbara & Michael Kratchman) Donnie Ray Albert is a regular guest of opera companies and symphony orchestras around the world. In recent seasons, he has appeared with the Metropolitan Opera, Los Angeles Opera, Opera Pacific, Houston Grand Opera, Florentine Opera, Cincinnati Opera, Dallas Opera, Arizona, Austin Lyric, Pittsburgh Opera and Atlanta Opera. Overseas he has performed in Germany at the Cologne Opera; in Great Britain at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden; in Belgium at the Royal Opera; in the Czech Republic at the National Theater and in Japan with the New National Theater in Tokyo. He has also performed in Sao Paolo, Brazil and Vienna, Austria. As a concert artist, Mr. Albert has sung with the orchestras of Washington DC (National), Köln, Southwest Florida, Chicago, Houston, Dallas, Jerusalem, Seattle, Minnesota, St. Paul, Los Angeles, Palm Beach, Greensboro, Grant Park Music Festival and Madison, Vienna and Linz, Austria. He is also a resident artist with the Center for Black Music Research at Chicago’s Columbia College.

Pianist William Billingham has served as an Assistant Conductor for Lyric Opera of Chicago since 1995. Active as a recital accompanist and chamber musician, Dr. Billingham holds degrees from the Oberlin Conservatory, Peabody Conservatory and University of Southern California, where he studied accompanying with Gwendolyn Koldofsky and Brooks Smith. He started his opera career in Germany, spending five years as a repetiteur in the opera houses of Heidelberg and Düsseldorf. He has also been a pianist/coach for the Aspen Music Festival and School, Cleveland Orchestra, Florentine Op-era (Milwaukee, WI), Los Angeles Opera, Midsummer’s Music Festival (Door County, WI) and Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Ryan Opera Center.

Avery Boettcher is the resident soprano of the Michigan Opera Theatre Studio. She has performed a wide array of roles both in the United States and abroad, ranging from Susanna in The Marriage of Figaro with La Musica Lirica in Italy, to the lighter operetta and musical theater roles of YumYum in The Mikado with Viterbo University. She recently performed Lauretta in MOT’s production of Gianni Schicchi/Buoso’s Ghost in March as well Zerlina in MOT’s Don Giovanni last fall. Previous roles also include the Countess in The Marriage of Figaro at the Aspen Music Festival, Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni at Indiana University Opera Theater and Zweite Dame in The Magic Flute with the Indianapolis City Orchestra. Prior to MOT, Boettcher was an opera fellow in the Aspen Music Festival where she performed John Harbison’s “Mirabai Songs” with the Aspen Contemporary Ensemble, as well as Mahler’s “Symphony No. 4” with the Aspen Conductors Orchestra.

Soprano Christine Goerke has appeared in many of the most prestigious opera houses of the world including the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, San Francisco Opera, Canadian Opera Company, Royal Opera House, Paris Opera, Teatro alla Scala, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Teatro Real in Madrid, and the Saito Kinen Festival. She has sung much of the great soprano repertoire, beginning with the Mozart and Handel heroines and now moving into dramatic R. Strauss and Wagner roles. She has also appeared with many leading orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Radio Vara, the BBC Symphony Orchestra at the BBC Proms, and both the Hallè Orchestra and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra at the Edinburgh International Festival. Christine's recording of Vaughan Williams’s A Sea Symphony with Robert Spano and the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra won the 2003 GRAMMY Award for Best Classical Recording and Best Choral Performance. Her close association with Robert Shaw yielded several recordings, which include of Brahms’s Liebeslieder Waltzes, Poulenc’s Stabat Mater, Szymanowski’s Stabat Mater, and the GRAMMY-nominated recording of Dvořák's Stabat Mater. Other recordings include the title role in Iphigenie en Tauride for Telarc and Britten’s War Requiem, which won the 1999 GRAMMY Award for Best Choral Performance. Christine is the Associate Artistic Director of Detroit Opera (formerly Michigan Opera Theatre). She was the recipient of the 2001 Richard Tucker Award, the 2015 Musical America Vocalist of the Year Award, and the 2017 Opera News Award.

The music of American composer Mark Grey has been commissioned or premiered by such organizations as the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, National Opera of Belgium La Monnaie | de Munt Opera, Carnegie Hall, Cal Performances, Los Angeles Master Chorale, Kronos Quartet, Berkeley Symphony, Phoenix Symphony, Green Bay Symphony, California Symphony, Los Angeles Children’s Chorus, Meet The Composer and others, along with festivals at Ravinia, Cabrillo, Other Minds, Perth International, and Spoleto.

(Sponsored by Drs. Ali Moiin & William Kupsky) Olivia Johnson, born in Jacksonville, NC, is a graduate of the University of Michigan, where she earned her master’s degree while studying under Professor George Shirley. This year she is the resident mezzo-soprano at Toledo Opera in Toledo, Ohio for the 20/21 season. After performing the comprimario role of the Girlfriend in Daniel Sonenberg’s The Summer King at Michigan Opera Theatre in 2018, Ms. Johnson made her second appearance with MOT in the role of La Ciesca in Gianni Schicchi followed by its sequel, Buoso’s Ghost in 2020. She performed Mathilde in Opera MODO’s innovative re-telling of Poulenc’s Dialogue of Carmelites. A former member of Michigan Opera Theatre’s touring ensemble, Ms. Johnson has performed throughout the Metro Detroit area premiering new and creative works. Ms. Johnson made her soloist appearance with the Rackham Choir in Richard Einhorn’s “Voices of Light” at the Detroit Institute of the Arts and her solo debut with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra in their annual Classical Roots Gala.

Mezzo-soprano, Kaswanna Kanyinda, has been praised for her dramatic presence, vocal warmth and as a “talent to keep a sharp lookout for.” Prior to the pandemic, Ms. Kanyinda finished an active season with Opera MODO with lead roles in their productions of La Gioconda and Dialogue of the Carmelites. Last season, she won a Wilde Award for her performance as the Mother in Opera MODO’s 2019 production of The Consul. Prior to that, Ms. Kanyinda joined Pittsburgh Festival Opera as a member of their 2018 Mastersingers Program, won the Opera Guild of Charlotte competition in 2017 and earned her masters’ degree in 2016 from the University of Michigan, under the tutelage of George Shirley. There she was featured in the workshop premiere of Bright Sheng’s The Dream of the Red Chamber, and was honored to represent Michigan in performance at the Kennedy Center. As an undergraduate at UNC Chapel Hill, she was cast in La Clemenza di Tito, Highway #1 USA and Gianni Schicchi.

Praised by The Washington Post for her “gorgeous, warm voice that you want to keep listening to,” American mezzo-soprano Catherine Martin continues to make an impact in repertoire ranging from Verdi and Wagner to Strauss and Bellini. She recently performed as Wellgunde in Götterdämmerung with the National Taichung Theatre in Taiwan. Her 2018-2019 season included Wowkle in La fanciulla del West with Maryland Lyric Opera, Tamara in Enemies, A Love Story with Kentucky Opera, Eva Crowley in An American Dream with Lyric Opera of Chicago, Verdi's Requiem with the El Paso Choral Society, Maddalena in Rigoletto with New Orleans Opera, and Herodias in Salome with Dayton Opera. Recent seasons have included performances with Lyric Opera of Chicago as Waltraute in Die Walküre, her Minnesota Opera debut as Sister Helen in Dead Man Walking and joining the National Chorale for the world premiere of Angela Rice’s Thy Will Be Done performed at Lincoln Center.

(Sponsored by Gretchen & Ethan Davidson) Marsha Music, daughter of pre-Motown record producer Joe Von Battle, and West Side beauty Shirley Battle, grew up in Highland Park, and spent much time in her father's Detroit record shops. She has lived in these two cities all of her life. She is a self-described "primordial Detroiter" and "Detroitist," and writes about the city’s music, and its past, present and future. She is a former activist/labor leader and a noted speaker and storyteller. Her writings on Detroit are published in important anthologies and periodicals, and she was the recipient of the prestigious Kresge Literary Arts Fellowship in 2012. Ms. Music has contributed to significant Detroit narratives, including documentary films on HBO, PBS, and The History Channel. She was a Knight Arts Challenge awardee in 2015. Ms. Music has read her poetry with the Detroit Symphony, in “Symphony In D,” and has performed her one-woman shows on premier Detroit stages. She is the author of the recent book, The Detroitist.

(Sponsored by Joanne Danto and Arnold Weingarden) Sean Panikkar continues “to position himself as one of the stars of his generation… His voice is unassailable—firm, sturdy and clear, and he employs it with maximum dramatic versatility” [Opera News].  Highly prized as an interpreter of contemporary music on leading international stages, Mr. Panikkar created the roles of Adam in CO2 for a debut at Teatro alla Scala, Wendell Smith in The Summer King in a co-production of Pittsburgh Opera and Michigan Opera Theatre, Agent Henry Rathbone in a co-production of  JFK at the Fort Worth Opera and Opéra de Montréal, and he garnered passionate acclaim in the title role of Jack Perla’s Shalimar the Clown for Opera Theatre of Saint Louis. Numerous engagements with the Metropolitan Opera include the company premiere of The Death of Klinghoffer, a new production of Guillaume Tell, Roméo et Juliette, Manon Lescaut , Lucia di Lammermoor and Ariadne auf Naxos. An alumnus of San Francisco Opera’s Adler Fellowship, Sean Panikkar holds Master’s and Bachelor degrees in Voice Performance from the University of Michigan.  

Kaitlyn Pietras and Jason H. Thompson are husband and wife Projection Designers living in Los Angeles. Together they share over 20 years of industry experience covering a wide variety of industries with their craft including: theatre, opera, dance, museums, theme parks, corporate, and interactive environments. They’ve designed for major companies and theaters all over the US including: The Industry, Walt Disney Creative Entertainment, Center Theatre Group, LA Philharmonic, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, The Cleveland Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, New World Orchestra, Carnegie Hall, The Public Theatre, Broadway, The Guthrie Theatre, Kansas City Rep, South Coast Rep, The Geffen Playhouse, Pasadena Playhouse, Artists Repertory Theatre, Rattlestick Playwrights Theatre, and Ars Nova. Collectively they have won two Los Angeles Ovation Awards, three LADCC awards, as well as having work showcased at the Prague Quadrennial in 2019, 2015, and 2011.

Morris Robinson is considered one the most interesting and sought-after basses performing today. He regularly appears at the Metropolitan Opera where he debuted in a production of Fidelio and has since appeared as Sarastro in Die Zauberflöte (both in the original production and in the children’s English version), Ferrando in Il trovatore, the King in Aida, and in roles in Nabucco, Tannhäuser, and the new productions of Les Troyens and Salome. He has also appeared at the San Francisco Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Dallas Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Pittsburgh Opera, Opera Philadelphia, Seattle Opera, Los Angeles Opera, Cincinnati Opera, Teatro alla Scala, Volksoper Wien, Opera Australia, and the Aix-en-Provence Festival. His many roles include the title role in Porgy and Bess, Sarastro in Die Zauberflöte, Osmin in Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Ramfis in Aida, Zaccaria in Nabucco, Sparafucile in Rigoletto, Commendatore in Don Giovanni, Grand Inquisitor in Don Carlos, Timur in Turandot, the Bonze in Madama Butterfly, Padre Guardiano in La forza del destino, Ferrando in Il trovatore, Fasolt in Das Rheingold, and Landgraf in Tannhäuser. He is also a prolific concert singer. This season, Morris debuts two important roles: King Marke in Tristan und Isolde at the Seattle Opera and Daland in Der fliegende Holländer at the Santa Fe Opera. He also returns to LA Opera for Otello and appears in concert with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Tulsa Opera, and the Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional in the Dominican Republic, in addition to this performance with Detroit Opera. Morris’s solo album Going Home was released on the Decca label. He also appears as Joe in the DVD of the San Francisco Opera production of Show Boat, and in the DVDs of the Metropolitan Opera’s production of Salome and the Aix-en-Provence Festival’s production of Mozart’s Zaide.

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.

From a very early age I've had a wide ranging interest in the performing arts - puppetry, ballet, theater, animation, all of these fascinated. I suspect this is where I get my catholic appetite for all kinds of music, from Abba to Xenakis. I didn’t come to composition till the relatively late period of my mid-teens. My compositions seek to synthesize my admiration for the extended techniques and abstract tropes of contemporary new music, the long form narrative journeys of pre-20th century classical music, the kinesis of the dance music of my youth and the readily apprehensible structures of music theater. A long-time advocate of respect for artists not supporting themselves solely through their art, I devote my creative energies to both my own concert music compositions and a burgeoning demand as a theatrical orchestrator. I graduated from the Mannes College of Music in 1990 with a master’s degree in composition and theory. I’ve been the recipient of a fellowship at the Aspen Summer Music Festival, as well as a Meet The Composer grant, and a showcase concert devoted to my works in February, 2010 by NewMusicNewYork.