Mary Birnbaum, whose stage direction of opera and theatre New York Times critic Anthony Tommasini called “viscerally overwhelming” (Rape of Lucretia at Juilliard) and “genuinely insightful…vibrant” (The Classical Style at Carnegie Hall), works both internationally, from Taiwan (Otello) to Central America (L’elisir d’amore and La bohème at the National Theatre of Costa Rica and Querido Arte in Guatemala), Australia and Israel, and across the U.S. (Opera Philadelphia, Seattle Opera, Opera Columbus, Virginia Arts Festival (Kept), Ojai Festival, Boston Baroque).

Birnbaum’s 2020-21 season included productions of Das Rheingold at Virginia Opera, L’Orfeo (Rossi) at The Juilliard School, In a Grove (Cerrone/Fleischmann) at Pittsburgh Opera, and The Sound of Music at the Virginia Arts Festival. Her production of La bohème opened the season at the Santa Fe Opera in 2019, the first new female-led production at the company since 1997.

Birnbaum’s production of Dido and Aeneas played Opera Holland Park in London and Opera de Versailles. In Opera Magazine, George Loomis wrote that Mary Birnbaum’s “thoughtful direction [of Eugene Onegin at Juilliard] was rich with imaginative touches” and the Houston Press termed her Hansel and Gretel a “stunner, perhaps the company’s most perfect realization. [The Company] has found a director of real quality in Mary Birnbaum.”

Currently Associate Director of the post-graduate Artist Diploma in Opera Studies program at Juilliard, Mary has taught acting for singers at Bard College and in the Lindemann Young Artists Program at the Metropolitan Opera. A graduate of Harvard College, Mary also trained professionally in physical theater at L’Ecole Jacques Lecoq in Paris.

Equally devoted to instrumental chamber music as he is to art song and operatic repertoire, César Cañón alternates his activity as a pianist with vocal coaching, teaching and conducting. He has performed in his native Colombia, Brazil, Mexico, Canada, Italy, Norway and across the United States. His concert appearances include the Kennedy Center, the Norwegian National Opera, Detroit Symphony, and San Francisco Opera’s Taube Atrium Theatre at the Diane B. Wilsey Center for Opera. He has been a guest performer and lecturer at Michigan State University, University of Michigan, Emory University, San Francisco Conservatory of Music, University of Texas at Austin, Universidad Central de Colombia, Universidad Sergio Arboleda, and Universidad Nacional de Colombia.

Cañón is an alum of the Aspen Opera Theatre Center and the Merola Opera Program. He has also been a vocal coach and repetiteur for the Ad Astra Music Festival; assistant conductor and pianist for Opera de Colombia, the Bogota philharmonic, Teatro Colón de Bogotá and Festival Amazonas de Opera in Manaus, Brazil. Cañón was an Adler Fellow with the San Francisco Opera in 2018 and 2019. As a fellow, he was featured in the Schwabacher recital series, in which he performed Johannes Brahms’ Die Schöne Magelone alongside baritone Christian Pursell and soprano Felicia Moore. In the summer of 2019, he conducted Mozart’s La Finta Giardiniera with Accademia Europea dell’Opera in Lucca, Italy. While in San Francisco, Cañón worked with several Bay Area cultural institutions. He was music director for productions of Pocket Opera in their 2019 and 2020 seasons, pianist for the 2019 and 2022 James Toland Vocal Competition, and rehearsal pianist in selected projects with the San Francisco Symphony and Opera Parallèle. In 2021 he was awarded a Bayreuther Festspiele Stipendiat by the Wagner Society of Northern California, allowing him to attend the prestigious festival in Bayreuth. As a staff pianist, Coach and conductor for the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, he closely collaborated with mezzo soprano Frederica von Stade.

Cañón holds a Bachelor of Music degree from Universidad Nacional de Colombia, and a Master of Music and Doctorate in Collaborative Piano from the University of Michigan, where he studied with Martin Katz. He is currently part of the music staff of the San Francisco Opera and the Norwegian National Opera, where he works as staff conductor, repetiteur and assistant chorus master.

Gerardo Felisatti graduated in Piano, Vocal Chamber Music (Rovigo) and Conducting (Vicenza); received his Diploma in Répétituership (Rome) and his Degree in Musicology (Venice). He studied with Franco Scala, Leslie Howard, Irwin Gage, Erik Battaglia, and Ulrich Eisenlohr. He worked as Vocal Coach at Teatro La Fenice di Venezia, Arena di Verona, Teatro Sociale di Rovigo, Teatro Comunale di Treviso, Teatro Verdi di Padova, and Houston Grand Opera. 

Mr. Felisatti has taught at Conservatorium van Amsterdam in the Classic Voice and Conducting department. He has been working at the Milan, Trento, and Parma Conservatories and teaches in Trapani as vocal coach. As an accompanist, he recently gave a concert tour in Japan and South Korea as an official accompanist for Arena di Verona, and he has worked with acclaimed singers June Anderson, Cecilia Gasdia, Daniela Mazzucato, Mariella Devia, Fabio Armiliato, Fabio Sartori, Giovanna Casolla, Alessandro Corbelli, Luciana D’Intino, Jessica Pratt, Luca Pisaroni, Maurizio Muraro, Franco Vassallo, Mara Zampieri, Riccardo Zanellato, and Paolo Gavanelli. 

As conductor, he has worked with the Orchestra Regionale Filarmonia Veneta, Orchestra del Teatro Olimpico di Vicenza, Orchestra Città di Ferrara, Orchestra di Padova e del Veneto, and Orchestra Verdi di Milano.

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, 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 Strauss and Wagner roles.

Ms. Goerke has also appeared with 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 Symphony at the Edinburgh International Festival. She has worked with some of the world's foremost conductors including James Conlon, Sir Andrew Davies, Sir Mark Elder, Christoph Eschenbach, Claus Peter Flor, James Levine, Sir Charles Mackerras, Kurt Masur, Zubin Mehta, Andris Nelsons, Seiji Ozawa, David Robertson, Donald Runnicles, Esa-Pekka Salonen, the late Robert Shaw, Patrick Summers, Jeffery Tate, Christian Thielemann, Michael Tilson Thomas, and Edo de Waart.

Ms. Goerke's recording of Vaughan Williams’ 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 included the Brahms' Liebeslieder Waltzes, Poulenc's Stabat Mater, Szymanowski's Stabat Mater, and the Grammy-nominated recording of Dvorak'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.

Ms. Goerke was the recipient of the 2001 Richard Tucker Award, the 2015 Musical American Vocalist of the Year Award, and the 2017 Opera News Award. Opera.

"Martin Katz must surely be considered the dean of collaborative pianists," said the Los Angeles Times, and Musical America magazine created an award expressly for him: Accompanist of the Year. One of the world's busiest collaborators, he has been in constant demand by the world's most celebrated vocal soloists  for more than five decades. He was fortunate to accompany Marilyn Horne for almost all of that time. He has also appeared and recorded regularly with Frederica von Stade, David Daniels, Jose Carreras, Karita Mattila, Cecilia Bartoli, Kiri Te Kanawa, Kathleen Battle, Piotr Beczala, Joseph Calleja to name just a few. Season after season, the world's musical capitals figure prominently in his schedule. 

Mr. Katz is a native of Los Angeles, where he began piano studies at the age of five. He attended the University of Southern California and studied the specialized field of accompanying with its pioneer teacher, Gwendolyn Koldofsky. While yet a student, he was given the unique opportunity of accompanying the classes and lessons of such luminaries as Lotte Lehmann, Jascha Heifetz, Pierre Bernac, and Gregor Piatigorsky. Following his formal education, he held the position of pianist for the US Army Chorus in Washington, D.C. for three years, before moving to New York where his international career began in earnest in 1969.     

In more recent years, invitations to conduct orchestral evenings and operas have come with increasing frequency. Mr. Katz has partnered several of his soloists on the podium for orchestras of the B.B.C., Houston, Washington, D.C., Tokyo, New Haven and Miami. He has also been pleased to conduct several staged productions for the University of Michigan's Opera Theatre, the Music Academy, and San Francisco Opera’s prestigious Merola program. 

Finally, the professional profile of Martin Katz is completed with his passionate commitment to teaching. For four decades, the University of Michigan has been his home, where he has been happy to chair the School of Music's program in collaborative piano, and also play an active part in operatic productions. He has been a pivotal figure in the training of countless young artists, both singers and pianists, who are now working  all over the world. The University of Michigan has recognized this important work, awarding him the first Artur Schnabel professorship, and more recently named him a Distinguished University Professor. He chose to name this award after his teacher, Gwendolyn Koldofsky, herself a cornerstone at the Music Academy for many decades. In addition to his work at his home school, he is a regular guest teacher at Helsinki's Sibelius Academy, Songfest, Chicago College of Performing Arts, Canadian Operatic Arts Academy, and the New National Theatre of Tokyo.  

Mr. Katz’s comprehensive guide for accompanists, “The Complete Collaborator,” published by Oxford Press, is widely seen as the seminal work on this subject.

Mr. Katz attended the Music Academy in 1964, and was named a recipient of the Academy’s Distinguished Alumni Award in 1999.

London-based conductor William Long continues to showcase his “masterful command of challenging, multi-stylistic works” (Opera News) with some of the world’s premier musical institutions. Recent highlights include his debut with the London Symphony Orchestra at The Barbican, conducting Washington National Opera’s production of Carmen and the world premiere of Terence Blanchard’s Fire Shut Up In My Bones with Opera Theater Saint Louis and the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra.

This upcoming season, Long returns to The Metropolitan Opera to cover Terence Blanchard’s Champion, San Francisco Opera for the world premiere of John Adams’ Antony and Cleopatra and concerts with the San Francisco Opera Orchestra & Chorus, and Washington National Opera for La bohème. Long will also continue his relationship with the London Symphony Orchestra as a Cover Conductor where he has assisted in a wide variety of programs since 2020, working with Sir Simon Rattle, Gianandrea Noseda, and John Wilson. He also continues his posts at the prestigious Music Academy in Santa Barbara, California.

Long’s previous work has included appearances as Cover Conductor at the Kennedy Center for productions of Eugene Onegin, Candide, and the world premieres of Missy Mazzoli’s Proving Up and Terence Blanchard’s Champion. A native of California, he has worked extensively with San Francisco Opera as Assistant Conductor on productions of Arabella, Hänsel und Gretel, Così fan tutte, Le nozze di Figaro, and with Los Angeles Opera as Cover Conductor for Gordon Getty’s Usher House and The Canterville Ghost.

From 2013-2018 Long served as Assistant Conductor at San Francisco’s Opera Parallèle, where he prepared productions of Jake Heggie’s Dead Man Walking and At the Statue of Venus, Leonard Bernstein’s Trouble in Tahiti, Jonathan Dove’s Flight, Tarik O’Regan’s Heart of Darkness, and Philip Glass’ Les enfants terribles, among other projects.

Long holds a B.A. in Piano Performance and an M.A. in Conducting from the University of California, Santa Cruz, where he studied with Maria Ezerova and Nicole Paiement. He also studied with Harold Farberman at the Conductor’s Institute at Bard College and Vance George at Westminster Choir College.

Sought after pianist, coach, and conductor, Mario Antonio Marra currently serves as the Head of Music at Minnesota Opera where he also stewards the development of the company's Resident Artists. He has served on the music staff at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, San Francisco Opera, and Oper Frankfurt among others. Recent conducting credits include Minnesota Opera’s production of Don Giovanni and Season Preview Gala. Passionate in his work nurturing and coaching the next generation of singers, Mario has served on the faculties of numerous summer training programs including the Merola Opera Program in San Francisco where he returns for his third summer in 2024.

An active recitalist, he has recently performed with many of today's most sought after singers including Željko Lučić, Eric Owens, Quinn Kelsey, Ramón Vargas, and Stephanie Blythe. He has been presented at prestigious venues internationally, including Carnegie Hall in New York, Auditorium Parco della Musica in Rome, The Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., Palazzo Davanzati in Florence, Oper Frankfurt, and the Civic Opera House in Chicago.

Lauded by the legendary Marilyn Horne for his "superb technique," Marra was a winner of the Marilyn Horne Song Competition at Music Academy where he was a fellow in 2023 and 2014, along with the critically acclaimed young baritone John Brancy. He is a graduate of the Patrick G. and Shirley W. Ryan Opera Center young artist program at the Lyric Opera of Chicago. His mentors and teachers include Norma Verrilli, Marilyn Nonken, and Warren Jones.

William McGraw, baritone, retired from CCM in May of 2021 after a 35-year tenure as Professor of Voice. McGraw studied voice with the renowned Wagnerian soprano Margaret Harshaw and began his professional singing career under the care of the inestimable Boris Goldovsky. McGraw’s operatic roles include Figaro in Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Marcello in La bohéme, Enrico in Lucia di Lammermoor, Germont in La Traviata, Konrad Nachtigall in Die Meistersinger, Marco in Gianni Schicchi, and John Proctor in The Crucible. McGraw has performed with opera companies including Boston Opera (with the late Sarah Caldwell), Goldovsky Opera on Tour, Greater Miami Opera (now Florida Grand Opera), Cincinnati Opera, Dayton Opera, Indianapolis Opera, Maracaibo, Venezuela Opera, Shreveport Opera, and Kentucky Opera.

Professor McGraw has had the good fortune of sharing the solo stage with internationally acclaimed artists soprano Deborah Voigt, tenor Ben Heppner, and mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe at Cincinnati’s May Festival, under the baton of maestro James Conlon. In the summers of 2010 and 2011, Professor McGraw taught at the CCM Spoleto Music Festival in Spoleto, Italy. In the summers of 2013 and 2014, Professor McGraw taught at Opera On The Avalon under the direction of Cheryl Hickman in St. John’s, Newfoundland. In the summers of 2016 and 2017, Professor McGraw teaches in the wonderfully unique art song festival, SongFest, which features influential living composers of song as well as high visibility coaches of art song and is the creation of Rosemary Hyler Ritter. In May of 2024, Mr. McGraw will join the faculty of Fellowship of the Song founded by Samuel Martin in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Professor McGraw was a CCM faculty member from 1986-2021, and many of his former students have gone on to successful careers in the performing arts. Additionally, his current and former students have performed in the major opera houses of Berlin, Bonn, Bremen, Paris, Mannheim, Freiburg, Salzburg, San Francisco, Houston, Indianapolis, Santa Fe, New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Cincinnati. Students have also performed in numerous young artist programs such as those of Cincinnati Opera, Opera Theater of St. Louis, Des Moines, Central City, Chautauqua, Wolf Trap, Glimmerglass, Houston Grand Opera, Merola, Music Academy with Marilyn Horne, Florida Grand, and Chicago Lyric Opera. Professor McGraw is proud to have students teaching in leading universities and colleges in the United States.

Professor McGraw has been named Omicron Delta Kappa Man of Merit by Baylor University in recognition of outstanding accomplishments.

Newly appointed Chief Conductor of the Gävle Symphony Orchestra, Christian Reif has established a reputation for his natural musicality, innovative programming and technical command. The 2023/24 season marks Reif’s inaugural season as Chief Conductor of the Gävle Symphony Orchestra. He leads 7 programs with the orchestra including their season-opening concerts and a Swedish tour in March 2024.

Since 2022, Reif has served as Music Director of the Lakes Area Music Festival in Minnesota, a month-long summer festival committed to commissioning new works and to giving free concerts for the community with programming that ranges from opera and chamber music to symphonic performances.

Highlights of Reif’s 2023/24 season highlights also include subscription appearances with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, St. Louis Symphony, Seattle Symphony, Milwaukee Symphony, Philharmonia Orchestra, Swedish Radio Symphony and Brno Philharmonic Orchestra plus summer festival appearances at the Grand Teton Music Festival and at Interlochen. Reif conducts his own arrangement of John Adams’ El Niño with the Cincinnati Symphony, and with the American Modern Opera Company on tour to Stanford University, Yale University, Harriman-Jewel in Kansas City, and at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York.

With an equal footing in North America and Europe, Reif has conducted the symphony orchestras of San Francisco, Baltimore, Cincinnati, Dallas, Houston, Colorado, Indianapolis, Kansas City and Louisville, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra and Orchestra of St. Luke’s. In Europe, he has performed repeatedly with Orchestre National de Lyon, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Münchner Rundfunkorchester, Gävle Symphony Orchestra, Hallé Orchestra and Stavanger Symphony.

Reif is featured on classical singer Julia Bullock’s debut solo Nonesuch Records album Walking in the Dark where he leads London’s Philharmonia Orchestra as well as accompanies Bullock on the piano. The album, praised by Gramophone Magazine as “illuminating”, won the 2024 GRAMMY® Award for Best Classical Solo Vocal Album. In 2020, Reif and Bullock recorded a series of at-home virtual “Songs of Comfort”. NPR Music featured the duo in a “Tiny Desk Concert” for their special quarantine edition of the series, and The New York Times highlighted them on their “Best Classical Music of 2020” list.

From 2016 to 2019, Christian was Resident Conductor of the San Francisco Symphony and Music Director of the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra, after being the Conducting Fellow at the New World Symphony from 2014 to 2016 and at Tanglewood Music Center in 2015 and 2016.

Georgian pianist Nino Sanikidze has held the position of a Head Coach for the Domingo-Colburn-Stein Young Artist Program at Los Angeles Opera since the program’s inception in 2006. In addition, she works closely with LA Opera’s Richard Seaver Music Director James Conlon as a pianist and a prompter for mainstage productions.

Outside of LA Opera, she has been engaged with such companies as Teatro Real in Madrid, Teatro di San Carlo in Naples, Royal Opera House Muscat, Teatro Municipal di Santiago, Washington National Opera, Bard Summerscape, Cleveland Opera, and Wichita Grand Opera. A frequent collaborator with the Broad Stage in Santa Monica, her notable concert appearances include a recital with tenor Marcelo Alvarez and a recital with mezzo-soprano Elina Garanca. In addition she has performed in a recital with world-renown guitarist Angel Romero at Palm Springs Life Festival.

Since 2008 she has been an official pianist for Placido Domingo’s World Opera Competition Operalia.  In this capacity she has performed on the illustrious stages of Teatro alla Scala in Milan, Royal Opera House in London, Teatro Nacional de Sao Carlos in Lisbon, National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing, Hungarian State Opera House in Budapest, Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles, Teatro Degollado in Guadalajara, Teatro Filarmonico in Verona, Grand Théâtre de Québec, among others.

Dr. Sanikidze serves on a judging panels of the Metropolitan Opera National Council auditions, Richard Tucker Music Foundations Study and Career Grant Auditions, Marcela Sembrich International Voice Competition, Classical Singer Convention, Music Center Spotlight Awards, and Center Stage Opera Competition. A sought-after clinician, she has been a principal guest coach for the USC Thornton School of Music and has conducted masterclasses at Chapman Conservatory, Opera Santa Barbara, University of Kansas, Songfest, Music Center Spotlight, and YoungArts Los Angeles.

Ms. Sanikidze is the recipient of numerous honors, including the Marilyn Horne Foundation Award for Excellence in Vocal Accompanying. She received her Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Maryland, College Park, and is an alumna of the Domingo-Cafritz Young Artist Program at Washington National Opera, as well as the Music Academy of the West, Aspen Opera Center, Cleveland Art Song Festival, and SongFest. She has served on the faculty of prestigious Vocal Institute at the Music Academy of the West since 2014.

“Technically nimble and supportive pianist” (New York Times), “Accompanist with wondrous tact and virtuosity” (San Francisco Chronicle), “Vigorous and versatile” (Washington Post) and “Extraordinarily sensitive collaborative synch throughout the evening” (VOICE Magazine) Tamara Sanikidze gave her first performance with the Georgian Symphony Orchestra at age eight and has since appeared as soloist and chamber musician throughout the Republic of Georgia, Russia, Europe, Asia and the Americas.

Since 2009, in capacity of an official pianist for Plácido Domingo’s annual World Opera Competition “Operalia” Dr. Sanikidze has performed in such renown opera houses as Hungarian State Opera house in Budapest, La Scala in Milano, Galina Vishnevskaya's Opera Centre in Moscow, Teatro Filarmonico in Verona, Royal Opera house in London, Dorothy Chandler Auditorium in Los Angeles, Teatro Degollado in Guadalajara, São Carlos in Lisbon, and National Theater in Prague.

As a winner of the Marilyn Horne Foundation Award for Excellence in Vocal Accompanying she has performed regularly in the Marilyn Horne Foundation’s “The Song Continues…” and “On the Wings of Song”. Active Song Recitalist she has partnered with such luminaries as Thomas Hampson, Nino Machaidze, Isabel Leonard, Quinn Kelsey, Marjorie Owens, Elizabeth Futral, Nicole Cabell, Leah Crocetto, Nadine Sierra and Amanda Majeski in New York City’s Carnegie Hall, Steinway Hall and other prestigious venues including the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC. By the special invitation, she has traveled to Beijing, China to perform with Mo. Plácido Domingo and also has performed at the White House for President George W. Bush and First Lady Laura Bush.
In May 2019 Sanikidze joined the much acclaimed Camerata Pacifica ensemble for a concert tour throughout South California.

Between 2007- 2012 Ms. Sanikidze was a Young Artist Coach at the Domingo-Cafritz Young Artist Program at Washington National Opera and an Adler Fellow at San Francisco Opera, where she served as an Assistant Conductor and Coach for productions of Don Giovanni (Mo. Plácido Domingo), Rigoletto (Mo. Giovanni Reggioli), Hansel and Gretel (Mo. Steven Gathman), La Traviata (Mo. Plácido Domingo and Mo. Dan Ettinger), Carmen (Mo. Julius Rudel), Turandot(Mo. Keri-Lynn Wilson), Falstaff (Mo. Sebastian Lang-Lessing), La fanciulla del West (Mo. Nicola Luisotti), Aida (Mo. Nicola Luisotti), The Makropulos case (Mo. Jiří Bělohlávek), Die Walküre (Mo. Donald Runnicles), Carmen (Mo. Nicola Luisotti), and Xerxes (Mo. Patrick Summers).

Upon finishing the prestigious Adler Fellowship Program, Sanikidze joined the Music Staff at both San Francisco Opera and Los Angeles Opera where she works closely with Mo. Plácido Domingo, Mo. James Conlon and Mo. Nicola Luisotti. In the capacity of a Pianist, Prompter, Coach and an Assistant Conductor she has prepared and performed a wide range of operatic repertoire, including Simon Boccanegra starring Plácido Domingo, Tosca, Der fliegende Holländer, La Cenerentola, Falstaff, Evgeny Onegin, Die Zauberflöte, Billy Budd, Lucia di Lammermoor, Madama Butterfly, Un ballo in maschera, Le nozze di Figaro, Il barbiere di Siviglia, Aida, Turandot, Wagner’s Ring Cycle, Rusalka, and Manon Lescaut.

Ms. Sanikidze is a prize-winner of numerous national and international piano competitions. She has received top scholarships, including a personal scholarship from the former president of the Republic of Georgia Edward Schevardnadze. She has also received the Vocal Piano Fellowship Award from the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara and participated in summer programs at Wolf Trap Opera Company, Merola Opera Program at San Francisco Opera, SongFest, Cleveland Art Song Festival and Aspen Music Festival. She has made several recordings for the Excelsior label and her performances have been broadcast on NPR, as well as Georgian and Russian National Television and Radio.

Sought after for her coaching skills and extensive experience, Ms. Sanikidze has been invited to work with young singers at the Merola Opera Program, Wolf Trap Opera Center, and the Young Artist Programs both at Washington National Opera and Los Angeles Opera.

In 2015 Tamara joined faculty of Butler School of Music at University of Texas, Austin and Music Academy of the West.  In January 2019 Ms. Sanikidze became Director of Butler Opera Center.

Tamara Sanikidze holds a Doctor of Musical Arts Degree from the University of Maryland, College Park.

Bill Schuman is internationally celebrated as one of the world’s leading teachers of singing. His students represent some of the most important names in the music world.

A native of Portland, Oregon, Mr. Schuman began his vocal studies under B. Gibner King, the coach of such Met luminaries as Ezio Pinza and Margaret Harshaw. Following his studies with Margaret Woodward at Brigham Young University and with Rita Streich at the Conservatory of Music in Vienna, he became a protégé of the famed vocal pedagogue, Luisa Franceschi Verna, herself the teacher of Zinka Milanov, among others. He finished his studies in New York, studying Italian style and repertory with Rita Saponaro Patanè.

Since beginning his teaching career, Mr. Schuman’s success has been completely unique in the opera world. His operatic students are not only major stars in the great opera houses around the world, but they have won an unprecedented number of international vocal competitions and awards. For four years in a row, his students were honored with the Richard Tucker Award, America’s most prestigious award for opera singers. Three of his students were also consecutively bestowed the Beverly Sills Award.

Over the years, Mr. Schuman has also maintained his work with non-classical singers, where his students have included some of the biggest stars from the Broadway, film, TV and popular music worlds and have included numerous Tony, Grammy and Emmy award winners and Academy Award nominees.

Mr. Schuman has been associated with the Metropolitan Opera Young Artist Program, the Curtis Institute of Music and was personally invited by Placido Domingo to be one of the inaugural teachers at the Washington Opera Young Artist Program. Since 1989, Mr. Schuman has been on the faculty of the Academy  of Vocal Arts in Philadelphia, where he has exclusively based his academic career.

Mr. Schuman is in demand worldwide for master classes and lectures. He has been featured in numerous articles and books on the art of singing and has been the subject of articles in various publications including Opera News and the Wall Street Journal. In 2008, Mr. Schuman was honored by the Licia Albanese-Puccini Foundation, becoming the youngest voice teacher to ever receive their coveted Lifetime Achievement Award.

American pianist Howard Watkins is a frequent associate of some of the world’s leading musicians on the concert stage and as an assistant conductor at the Metropolitan Opera.   His appearances throughout the Americas, Europe, Asia, Russia, and Israel have included collaborations with Renée Fleming, Joyce DiDonato, Lawrence Brownlee, Diana Damrau, Thomas Hampson, Kathleen Battle, Grace Bumbry, Mariusz Kwiecien, Anna Netrebko, and Matthew Polenzani at such venues as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Spivey Hall, Kennedy Center, the United States Supreme Court, Alice Tully Hall, the three stages of Carnegie Hall, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg, and the Bolshoi Theater in Moscow.

His current and former faculty affiliations include The Juilliard School, the Bard College Conservatory of Music, the Merola Opera Program, the Santa Fe Opera Apprentice Program, the Yale School of Music as a Visiting Presidential Fellow, the Tanglewood Music Center, the Aspen Music Festival, the Mannes School of Music, the North Carolina School of the Arts, the International Vocal Arts Institute (Israel, Japan, and China), IIVA in Italy, the Brancaleoni Music Festival in Italy, the Tokyo International Vocal Arts Academy (TIVAA) as a founding member, and VOICExperience in Orlando, Tampa, and Savannah.  Currently a guest Master Coach for the Cafritz Young Artists of Washington Opera and the Opera Theater of St. Louis, Mr. Watkins has worked on the music staffs of Palm Beach Opera, the Washington National Opera, and the Los Angeles Opera.

A native of Dayton, Ohio, Mr. Watkins completed the Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Accompanying and Chamber Music at the University of Michigan.  Honored as the 2004 recipient of the Paul C. Boylan award from the University of Michigan for his outstanding contributions to the field of music, he is also the 2019 recipient of the Lift Every Voice Legacy Award from the National Opera Association.  He was recently recognized as one the 2022 Top Professionals of the Year by Musical America in part for his work to celebrate the music of Black composers and singers.

Mr. Watkins appears courtesy of the Metropolitan Opera.

Originally from China, Mo Zhou is a stage director whose international career spans all artistic disciplines including opera, theater, musical theater, dance, and film.

Equally passionate about invigorating the classical canon and spearheading new works, Zhou’s productions have been seen at Staatsoper Unter den Linden in Berlin, the Elbphilharmonie and Laeiszhalle in Hamburg, National Centre for the Performing Arts in China, Santa Fe Opera, Florida Grand Opera, Wolf Trap Opera, The Juilliard School, and WP Theatre. She has also worked as a member of the directing staff at Lyric Opera of Chicago, Houston Grand Opera, the Dallas Opera, and Des Moines Metro Opera.

Zhou makes her debut with Minnesota Opera in the 2022-23 season with a new production of Handel’s Rinaldo. She also directs Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi alongside Michael Ching’s sequel, Buoso’s Ghost for Florida Grand Opera, Gluck’s Iphigénie en Tauride with Boston Baroque, La bohème at Music
Academy, and Don Giovanni at University of Michigan - Ann Arbor, where she joined the faculty in the fall of 2022. For the 2023-24 season she will stage the world premiere of The Big Swim from composer Meilina Tsui and librettist Melisa Tien for Houston Grand Opera.

Ms. Zhou completed her training as the James Marcus Opera Directing Fellow at The Juilliard School, the Directing Fellow at Wolf Trap Opera, Artistic Fellow with New York Theater Workshop, Time Warner Directing Fellow with Women’s Project Theater and as an Apprentice Stage Director with both Merola Opera Program in San Francisco and the Glimmerglass Festival in Upstate New York. She is also a winner of the OPERA America Robert L.B. Tobin Director-Designer Prize.

Collaborative pianist Maureen Zoltek enjoys a diverse career working with leading vocalists, instrumentalists, orchestras, and opera companies across the United States.

Dr. Zoltek currently serves as the Music Director of the Houston Grand Opera Studio. She was previouly an assistant conductor, vocal coach, and orchestral keyboardist on the staff of San Francisco Opera and as a member of the Vocal Institute Faculty at the Music Academy of the West. Her 2020-21 scheduled engagements (pre-Covid cancellations) included a return to San Francisco Opera for productions of Ernani, Rigoletto, The Handmaid’s Tale, and Der Zwerg, to Opera Omaha for Eugene Onegin, and to the Music Academy of the West for Ellen Reid’s Odysseus Cycle and Philip Glass’ Les Enfants Terribles. An active proponent of new music, she recently served on the music staff for the world premieres of Mark Adamo’s The Gospel of Mary Magdalene, Bright Sheng’s Dream of the Red Chamber, and John Adams’ Girls of the Golden West, as well as the west coast premiere of Jake Heggie’s It’s a Wonderful Life.

Dr. Zoltek is a graduate of the Patrick G. and Shirley W. Ryan Opera Center and has collaborated with the Lyric Opera of Chicago on several productions, including La clemenza di Tito, Tosca, Idomeneo, and the world premiere workshop of Jimmy López and Nilo Cruz’s Bel Canto. At the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis she served as music staff, pre-concert lecturer, and keyboardist for Puccini’s La rondine, as well as a coach for Tobias Picker’s Emmeline. Dr. Zoltek has also been an assistant conductor at Canadian Opera Company (Elektra) and Opera Omaha (Les enfants terribles, Die Enfürung aus dem Serail).

As an orchestral keyboardist, Dr. Zoltek has performed with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra with major conductors including Boulez, Salonen, Conlon, Dudamel, Gilbert, and Gergiev, in addition to premiering works by composers-in-residence of the CSO Augusta Read Thomas and Marc Anthony Turnage. She has appeared with the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, the Elgin Symphony Orchestra, Chicago’s Latino Music Festival, and at the 2010 Fischoff Competition, in which she was a semi-finalist.

Dr. Zoltek attended both the Aspen Music Festival and School (2009) and Music Academy of the West (2010, 2012). During her second summer as a fellow at the Music Academy, she won first prize in the pianist division of the Marilyn Horne Song Competition. Her association with Marilyn Horne also includes participation in the legendary mezzo-soprano’s series “The Song Continues” (2011, 2012), with performances and masterclasses held through Carnegie Hall’s “Marilyn Horne Legacy” program. Among the other star performers with whom Zoltek has recently collaborated are mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato, soprano Patricia Racette, bass-baritone Eric Owens, and Welsh singer-songwriter Katherine Jenkins. Ms. Zoltek is also featured alongside mezzo-soprano J’Nai Bridges in Nicole Miller’s new commission and installation, “To the Stars,” a multi-sensory work that weaves together film, sound, and laser light at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art’s Phyllis Wattis Theater.

Dr. Zoltek completed her D.M.A. degree at the Manhattan School of Music, and holds a master’s degree in piano performance and musicology from Roosevelt University in addition to a bachelor’s degree in piano performance from DePaul University. Her teachers include Mary Sauer and Warren Jones. When she is not in rehearsal, Zoltek enjoys true crime podcasts, baking various and sundry desserts, and going out and about with her standard poodle and travel companion, Henry.