Palm Beach Opera Hires Singers For Administrative Roles

David Walker

"Now that Palm Beach Opera has stabilized its finances, the company has turned its attention to surmounting the challenges facing most arts groups these days — expanding its audience and raising more money to support its programs. Two recent hires play into those goals. Jourdan Laine Howell signed on in September as education and community engagement manager. David Walker will begin work Aug. 3 as director of institutional advancement. The two were hired because of their 'experience, personality and drive,' General Director Daniel Biaggi said. There’s no doubt about the drive. Howell resolved to pursue a doctoral degree in music when she was a freshman in high school. She achieved her goal in December, after earning undergraduate and master degrees in vocal performance. (Stage fright steered her into a career as an educator. Walker pursued two master’s degrees in arts administration while holding down intern and consulting

Jourdan Laine Howell

jobs — and successfully battling prostate cancer. He had an 18-year international career as a countertenor before transitioning to arts management in 2010. He left performing to become an administrator because the art form needed him, he said. While he was singing, 'I discovered that many in top leadership had business or artistic acumen,' he said. 'Rarely did they have both.'He’s held a number of development jobs, most recently at North Carolina Opera in Raleigh. During his two-year tenure, the fledgling company’s contributed income increased by 58 percent. 'I see no weaknesses in David,' said Dr. Stephen Prystowsky, the company’s former board president. [Source]

Palm Beach Opera Hit With Lawsuit Regarding Raimondi Sculpture

Spirit Ascending by John Raimondi

"The sculpture Spirit Ascending once stood 39-feet-tall, a focal point for a South Florida philanthropist's home and later a piece for the Palm Beach Opera's now-defunct opera house building plans. And it was reduced to a pile of scrap metal, which the artist said was sold for cash. Sculptor John Raimondi filed a federal lawsuit Monday, claiming the opera dismantled the 2-1/2-ton, bronze sculpture in September 2013 without asking his permission to do so, in violation of the federal Visual Artists Rights Act. After destroying his piece, Raimondi claims opera officials sold off the pieces of bronze to a scrapyard for profit. 'It's just inconceivable,' he said. 'I could understand if they were a concrete company or something, but they're in the business of observing and preserving an art form — opera. It's incomprehensible.' Ceci Dadisman, the opera's director of communications, said the organization has not yet been served with the lawsuit and declined to comment when reached by phone Tuesday....The Visual Artists Rights Act, which was adopted in 1990, is a federal law that grants certain rights to artists who produce printed photographs, sculptures, paintings and other pieces of art. One of those rights is that an artist's work cannot be destroyed, distorted or modified without the artist's consent. Raimondi's lawyer, L. Louis Mrachek, said sometimes when a piece of art is sold, a Visual Artist Rights Act clause can be included in the contract, which would void the rights of the artist. In the case of Spirit Ascending, no such contract was signed with either Pope or the opera. [Source]

MET Cover Tenor Taylor Stayton Takes Center Stage At PBO

Tenor of the High Seas: Taylor Stayton
shows off his top C's in Florida

"Life is good for tenor Taylor Stayton. Wearing baggy shorts, t-shirt and a boyish smile, he was celebrating his 30th birthday last Friday when he arrived for an interview at Palm Beach Opera’s production center in West Palm Beach. On Friday and Sunday, he will make his role debut as Tonio in the company’s production of Gaetano Donizetti’s comic opera The Daughter of the Regiment....Not many tenors are up to portraying Tonio. That’s because of the nine high Cs in his first act aria 'Ah, mes amis…Pour mon ame.' It’s the aria that rocketed Luciano Pavarotti to stardom when he sang it in 1972 at the Metropolitan Opera. 'The thing is, it’s like a secret among us tenors,' he said. 'If you have a high C, it’s not that difficult'....But it wasn’t just his facility with high Cs that persuaded Palm Beach Opera to cast him. Beauty of voice, tone and line are paramount in bel canto opera. 'His voice has such a lyric quality that the parts that aren’t high Cs are also beautifully sung,' said Scott Guzielek, director of artistic operations. As a teenager, Stayton sang, played guitar and performed in school musicals and choirs. He grew up listening to bands such as Aerosmith, The Beatles, Steely Dan and The Band and still loves classic rock. He was steered into opera at Ohio State University. In addition to performing with smaller companies, he’s covered several roles at the Met. One memorable night in 2011 he wound up on stage as Percy in Anna Bolena alongside soprano Anna Netrebko, when Stephen Costello fell ill in the middle of the show. 'Within five minutes, they threw me into costumes and makeup,' he said. 'It was better that way. If he’d canceled two days before I would have had to sit for two days and gotten my nerve up.' In April, he will return to the Met to cover Costello in The Merry Widow. At this stage of his career he prefers comic roles. 'That’s my personality,' he said." [Source] Click here for more information about the Palm Beach Opera production of Donizetti's The Daughter of the Regiment by clicking here.

Palm Beach Opera Rewarded For Vital Contributions To Arts

Hot Ticket: Next up for Palm Beach Opera is a recital by Ildar Abdrazakov, titled "Seduction of the Senses," on February 5, 2015. More details and tickets can be found here. (Photo: Julia Borodina)

"Palm Beach Opera, under the general direction of Daniel Biaggi, will receive the Classical South Florida Ziff Award at a luncheon Jan. 30 at the Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables. CSF honors organizations that make vital contributions to the arts. The award is sponsored by Dr. Sanford L. Ziff, founder of Sunglass Hut of America, and his wife Beatrice, who donated $1 million in 2007 to help found Classical South Florida 90.7. The nonprofit public radio organization is headquartered in Fort Lauderdale." [Source ] Read a review of the company's most recent performance of La Bohème by clicking here.

Maestro Ramón Tebar Named Music Director At Opera Naples

"Opera Naples announces the appointment of Maestro Ramón Tebar as music director, effective immediately. He also serves as music director of the Florida Grand Opera, artistic director of the Palm Beach Symphony and music director of the Dominican Republic’s biannual Santo Domingo Festival. When he was named to his position with the Florida Grand Opera in 2011, he became the first Spanish conductor appointed to an American opera company. Mr. Tebar began working as a pianist and assistant conductor in his hometown of Valencia in Spain when he was 15 years old. He went on to become assistant conductor with the Joven Orquesta Nacional de España, while at the same time graduating with honors in piano and chamber music. Since his arrival in the U.S. in 2005, he has been part of the musical staff of Palm Beach Opera and Cincinnati Opera, producing more than 40 different operas, while maintaining a full schedule in Europe, the Caribbean and South America. He has served as a guest conductor for organizations including Italy’s Orchestra Teatro Regio di Torino and the Spoleto Festival Orchestra, Spain’s Festival de Opera de a Coruna, Germany’s Kolner Philharmonie, the Netherlands’ Het Concertgebouw, Russia’s St. Petersburg Symphony and Orchestra de Rouen Haute- Normandie, to name a few. He has conducted many internationally renowned artists, including tenor Ben Heppner, violinist Joshua Bell, soprano Maria Guleghina and cellist Gautier Capuçon. In addition, he remains in collaboration with many of the world’s most famous vocal artists — among them Montserrat Caballé, Angela Gheorghiu, Roberto Alagna and Joseph Calleja, performing with them from Buenos Aires to Amsterdam, San Juan to Moscow. Orchestral conducting occupies a good part of his annual activities in his native Spain as well as the Netherlands. He will make his Vienna State Opera debut in Rossini’s Il Barbiere di Siviglia in winter 2016. Mr. Tebar currently lives with his family in Miami." [Source] For more information about the conductor, click here.

Palm Beach Opera Receives OPERA America Grant For Technology

The Raymond F. Kravis Center for the Performing Arts in Palm Beach

"Statistically speaking, the free concert on the West Palm Beach waterfront that Palm Beach Opera staged in December was a rousing success. About 2,500 people turned up to hear soloists and a full chorus and orchestra perform opera favorites and Broadway show-tunes. Around 52 percent had never been to an opera event before. The debut concert was the flagship of the company’s drive to attract new audiences. One of its most innovative features was a mobile-device app that enabled users to access scene-setting information, lyrics and fun facts about the pieces being performed. For the next edition, scheduled Dec. 13 at the Meyer Amphitheatre, the company intends to open a two-way conversation by developing a new app financed by a $30,000 grant from Opera America, a service organization for the opera community. With the new app, audience members can shoot off comments about the show, ask questions and respond to surveys, said Daniel Biaggi, Palm Beach Opera’s general director. Plans call for users to be able to tweet and post to Facebook directly using a hashtag. The company also is 'investigating the cost and feasibility of live feeds from social media within the app so that people would see all their comments go by,' he said. Palm Beach Opera is one of seven companies chosen from 53 applicants to receive a total of $300,000 in grants under the Building Opera Audiences program. The program, now in its second year, is supported by the Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation." [Source]

Palm Beach Opera to Make Major Seasonal Changes in 2013

Nicole Cabell as Juliette and Arturo Chacón-Cruz as Roméo star in Palm Beach Opera’s remarkable production of Charles Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette. Read the review of the performance by clicking here.
(Photo: Chris Salata/Daily News)

"Palm Beach Opera announced a planned 2013 season Friday night contingent upon closing a deficit and fund-raising that has yet to materialize. The company continues to struggle with an ongoing deficit and reduced contributions from patrons. Next season Palm Beach Opera will move to a festival business model, with a more concentrated season running three months from January through March at the Kravis Center, which they hope will reduce expenses. Further, the company will inaugurate an association with Lynn University and also offer a variety of opera performances throughout Palm Beach County. The season will open in January with Verdi’s La Traviata. Rossini’s La Cenerentola will follow in February with Richard Strauss’s Salome closing the season in March. Casting details are yet to be announced. The company will also mount a fully staged production of Britten’s The Turn of the Screw featuring the company’s young artists at Lynn University’s Wold Performing Arts Center in Boca Raton. Other off-site festival events include a free outdoor concert performance of Bizet’s Carmen at the Meyer Amphitheater in West Palm Beach and a gala concert in Palm Beach. Details of the season were announced by company general director Daniel Biaggi at Friday’s opening-night performance of Gounod’s Romeo et Juliette at the Kravis Center." [Source]

Palm Beach Opera Displays Financial and Artistic Success

Founded in 1961 as the "Civic Opera of the Palm Beaches," the Palm Beach Opera is a professional opera company performing at the Kravits Center for the Performing Arts in West Palm Beach, Florida. For years the jet-set have been traveling from large cities across the country to reach this haven for the rich in an area known

Daniel Biaggi: Captain of the high C's

mostly for its golfing and yachting during the winter months. West Palm Beach is technically a municipality (the oldest in South Florida) with a population that inches toward 100,000 residents and its slightly more exclusive neighbor, Palm Beach, has only 30,000 residents during peak vacation season. Opera can be a tough sell in these parts, especially since Florida Grand Opera is operating a mere 67 miles south in Miami and the Metropolitan Opera broadcasts to movie theater as part of their "Live in HD" series. In the beginning, the company performed one production annually and by the mid-1990s four fully staged operas were taking place each season. Artistically, Palm Beach Opera hit its stride during the directorship of its Principal Conductor Anton Guadagno from 1984 to 2002. The new millennium brought corporate scandals and plummeting stock portfolios for many supporters of the opera. The company had no choice but to

James Valenti: Star tenor and
West Palm Beach resident.

make bold choices for leadership in order to succeed and flourish in the coming decade. After Maestro Guadagno passed away in August 2002, the company brought Bruno Aprea in as the Artistic Director & Principal Conductor beginning in 2005 and appointed Daniel Biaggi as the new General Director in 2008. As Palm Beach Opera celebrates its 50th Anniversary this season by opening with Madama Butterfly on December 16, 2011, it is clear the artistic and financial vision of the company is beginning to pay off. Although they reduced the budget from $6.5 million to $4.7 million, trimmed full-time staff to ten positions and now present three fully staged operas with one concert performance a season (Beethoven's Symphony #9 and Verdi's Requiem were recent choices), the quality of singing has skyrocketed. In addition to meeting the expectations of audiences aurally skilled in houses like the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago and San Francisco Opera, the company has to provide A-list singers alongside budding young talent that fits the budget. Recent seasons have seen veterans Ruth Ann Swenson and Dolora Zajick, as well as newcomers Angela Meade, Anthony Roth Costanzo, Nadine Sierra, James Valenti and Nicole Cabell.

Metropolitan Opera soprano Ruth Ann Swenson
at a post-performance dinner 

Now that the company has found its footing, they hope to expand beyond the typical Italian and French repertoire into 20th-century works (especially American pieces) and Baroque. For more about the cast and performance dates of Madama Butterfly at the Palm Beach Opera, click here. And if you are in the neighborhood on January 20 and 22, the company will present two Golden Jubilee concerts featuring scenes from La Traviata, Die Fledermaus, La Bohème, Carmen, Aïda, among others and will be hosted by the baritone Sherrill Milnes. The concerts will be lead by conductors Julius Rudel and Bruno Aprea with singers Angela Brown, Ruth Ann Swenson, Denyce Graves-Montgomery, Brandon Jovanovich and many more.[Source, Source, Source]

Soprano Betsy Diaz, 22, at the Palm Beach Opera Competition

The young Cuban-American singer talks about how she prepares to sing in the competition, including listening to Rihanna's "Umbrella" on her ipod before singing Puccini's "Sì, mi chiamano Mimì" on stage. She also discusses what it is she loves about the art form of opera and how she tries to communicate that to the audience. Read more about the up-and-coming soprano's career on her website: http://www.betsydiaz.com/bio.html.

Italian Soprano Conquers Palm Beach Opera as Tosca

Tosca and Cavaradossi (sung by Riccardo Massi)

"The hefty voice of soprano Chiara Taigi brought an unaccustomed depth and worldliness to the role of the renowned singer Floria Tosca...Fittingly, the role of Tosca was taken by a native of the city of Rome. Chiara Taigi’s rich soprano and subtle acting gave Tosca unusual depth and maturity. Rather than engaging in a succession of over-the-top, jealous diva poses, she gave a realistic – within the bounds of the art form – portrait of a woman of warmth, emotional turmoil and frantic courage. Her singing wasn’t always even or accurate, particularly in the first act, as she berates Cavaradossi about the beautiful blonde woman in his church painting. But her 'Vissi d’arte' was a moving, breathing and emotionally committed performance. Her murder of Scarpia, rather than being a moment for shrieking dramatics, was creepily intimate as she murmured to him to die." [Source]