Darren Keith Woods (born 1958, Texas) is an American opera director and operatic tenor. A graduate of the Moores School of Music at the University of Houston, he began his career as an opera singer in 1982, making his professional debut at the Santa Fe Opera (SFO) as Don Curzio in Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro . He spent most of his singing career portraying comprimario roles with opera companies throughout North America. Some of his performance credits include appearances with the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, the Connecticut Grand Opera, Glimmerglass Opera, the Lyric Opera of Kansas City, and the Seattle Opera among others. He was a frequent performer at the SFO during the 1980s and 1990s.
Towards the end of his singing career, Woods became the Artistic Director of both the Shreveport Opera and the Seagle Music Colony in upstate New York. He retired from the stage in 2001, at which time he left his post in Shreveport to assume the position of General Director of the Fort Worth Opera until his firing on February 13, 2017. [1] He also currently serves on the board of directors of OPERA America.
Woods has been married to wig and makeup designer Steven William Bryant since June 2012. [2]
The San Francisco Opera (SFO) is an American opera company founded in 1923 by Gaetano Merola (1881–1953) based in San Francisco, California.
Santa Fe Opera (SFO) is an American opera company, located 7 miles (11 km) north of Santa Fe, New Mexico. After creating the Opera Association of New Mexico in 1956, its founding director, John Crosby, oversaw the building of the first opera house on a newly acquired former guest ranch of 199 acres (0.81 km2). The company has presented operas each summer festival season since July 1957, and is internationally known for introducing new operas as well as for its productions of the standard operatic repertoire. Five operas are presented each season during the summer.
Risë Stevens was an American operatic mezzo-soprano and actress. Beginning in 1938, she sang for the Metropolitan Opera in New York City for more than two decades during the 1940s and 1950s. She was most noted for her portrayals of the central character in Carmen by Georges Bizet. From 1963 to 1968 she was director of the Metropolitan Opera National Company.
Richard Gaddes was a British opera company administrator based in the United States.
Donato Cabrera is an American conductor with an active international career. He is the Artistic and Music Director of the California Symphony, and was the Resident Conductor of the San Francisco Symphony and Wattis Foundation Music Director of the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra from 2009-2016.
Thomas Pasatieri is an American opera composer.
Fort Worth Opera is the oldest continually-performing opera company in the state of Texas and among the oldest in the United States, according to the company. While originally presenting operas one at a time over a fall/winter season, it changed to a "festival" format in 2007. In 2021, as the company celebrated its 75th anniversary season, Fort Worth Opera left the Festival format after fourteen years and returned to year-round programming.
William Sterling Walker was a baritone with the Metropolitan Opera (1962–1980) whose singing career included performances at the White House, at Carnegie Hall and other concert venues across North America and Europe, and some 60 appearances on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. From 1991-2002, he produced opera as General Director of Fort Worth Opera in Fort Worth, Texas.
Charles MacKay is an American arts administrator, known for leadership roles at the Santa Fe Opera, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, and Spoleto Festival USA/Festival of Two Worlds.
Daniel Okulitch is a Canadian bass-baritone. He first came to attention on Broadway as Schaunard in Baz Luhrmann's production of La bohème in 2002/03 – a role he repeated when the production traveled to Los Angeles the following year, for which he received the Ovation Award for Best Ensemble Performance from the Los Angeles Stage Alliance. He has since begun an international career with opera companies and orchestras throughout Europe and North America, and is admired for both his singing and powerful stage presence. He is sought after for many contemporary operas and world premieres, as well as the roles of Mozart, including Figaro and Don Giovanni.
Miguel Alberto Harth-Bedoya is a Peruvian conductor. He was formerly music director of the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra from 2000 to 2020 and chief conductor of the Norwegian Radio Orchestra from 2013 to 2020. Starting the Fall of 2023, Harth-Bedoya became the Mary Franks Thompson Director of Orchestral Studies and Music Director of the Baylor University Symphony Orchestra.
William L. Lewis is an American operatic tenor and academic.
Lee Venora is an American operatic soprano and musical theater actress. She was highly active with the New York City Opera between 1957 and 1967 and a regular performer at the San Francisco Opera between 1961 and 1966. She also appeared in a few Broadway musicals, Lincoln Center revivals, and national tours of musicals during her career. Composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein was an admirer of her voice, and she performed with him and the New York Philharmonic on a number of occasions during the late 1950s and early 1960s. She also sang with the orchestra on a couple of recordings and appears on a few musical recordings as well.
Robert Mosley was an American operatic bass-baritone. Part of the first generation of African-American opera singers to achieve wide success, he performed in numerous opera productions, recitals, and in concerts from the 1950s through the 1990s. In 1957 he won the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. He drew particular acclaim for his portrayal of Porgy in George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess, a role which he portrayed in the landmark 1976 Houston Grand Opera production, on Broadway, and at the Metropolitan Opera among other opera companies both in the United States and in Europe.
David T. Little is a Grammy-nominated American composer, record producer, and drummer known for his operatic, orchestral, and chamber works, most notably his operas JFK,Soldier Songs, and Dog Days which was named a standout opera of recent decades by The New York Times. He is the artistic director of Newspeak, an eight-piece amplified ensemble that explores the boundaries between rock and classical music, and is the Chair of the composition faculty at Mannes School of Music.
John Harger Stewart is an American tenor, conductor, and voice teacher who had an active international singing career in concerts and operas from 1964 to 1990. He began his career singing regularly with the Santa Fe Opera from the mid-1960s through the early 1970s; after which he appeared only periodically in Santa Fe up through the mid-1980s. He was particularly active with the New York City Opera during the 1970s and 1980s, and with the Frankfurt Opera from the mid-1970s through 1990. He also appeared as a guest artist with several other important American opera companies, including the Metropolitan Opera and the Washington National Opera, and at other European opera houses like the De Nederlandse Opera in Amsterdam, the Deutsche Oper Berlin, the Grand Théâtre de Genève in Switzerland, and the Wexford Festival Opera in Ireland. Now retired from singing, he is currently the Director of Vocal Activities at Washington University in St. Louis where he also teaches singing and conducts student opera productions and choirs. He also serves as the opera conductor at the Johanna Meier Opera Theater Institute at Black Hills State University.
Tom Cipullo is an American composer. Known mostly for vocal music, he has also composed orchestral, chamber, and solo instrumental works. His opera, Glory Denied, has been performed to critical acclaim in New York, Washington, and Texas.
Horace Lee Logan, Jr., known as Hoss Logan, was the program director for the Louisiana Hayride in Shreveport, Louisiana, which showcased country music singing stars in the 1950s. He originated the catch-phrase "Elvis has left the building."
William John Marsh was an American composer, organist, choir director, and educator most notable for composing "Texas, Our Texas," the official state song. He was a longtime figure in the Dallas–Fort Worth arts community, working as a composer, choir director, music professor, and music critic. He published over 100 original compositions, including the official mass of the Texas Centennial and The Flower Fair at Peking, the first opera written and produced in the state of Texas.
Edward Allen Baird was an American bass, music educator, and choral conductor. He had a celebrated career as a voice teacher at the University of North Texas where he taught from 1962 until his death in 2000. He had previously taught on the faculty of Midland College from 1957-1960; notably serving as that schools Chair of Fine Arts in 1959-1960. While working on his doctorate in vocal music at the University of Michigan (UM) he worked as a teaching fellow at that institution from 1960-1962. He was the first student at the UM to earn a Ph.D. diploma in vocal music. From 1985-1987 he was President of the National Association of Teachers of Singing. Several of his students had successful careers as singers, and three of his students won the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions.