Mobile Opera

Last updated

Mobile Opera is an opera company located in Mobile, Alabama and is one of the oldest performing arts organizations in the United States, [1] as well as the oldest in the State of Alabama, having been founded as the "Mobile Opera Guild" in 1945. Under its founder, Madame Rose Palmai-Tenser, a European concert artist from Czechoslovakia, two performances were presented in April 1946. As its General Director, Mrs. Tenser continued to lead the company until 1971. [2]

Contents

In July 2002, Mobile Opera relocated its offices to the Josephine Larkins Music Center, a newly renovated rehearsal and administrative facility located in the designated downtown arts district, which the company shares with the Mobile Symphony. This collaboration between the city's performing arts organizations has been instrumental in the revitalization of the downtown area. With a 2,400-square-foot (220 m2) rehearsal hall, seven private music studios, conference room, catering kitchen, patron ticketing services, landscaped courtyard and administrative offices, the Larkins Music Center is a significant cultural and community asset.

Growth under Katherine Willson and others since 1971

After 1971, Willson became the company's Production Coordinator and General Manager. During the company's 1995/1996 season, she became the first female President of the Board, celebrating Mobile Opera's 50th Anniversary Season and her own thirty-five year involvement with the company. Under Pelham "Pat" Pearce, Mobile Opera maintained its productions' quality and its innovative programs dedicated to education and community outreach. The development of Mobile Opera as a nationally recognized company continued with the ten-year supervision of Jerome Shannon as General Director and conductor. Shannon was succeeded by Earl Jackson who retired in 2011. The company currently operates under the direction of General Director Scott Wright.

Mobile Opera continues to encourage young American operatic talent. Artists such as Christine Weidinger, Michael Devlin, Susan Quittmeyer, Anthony Laciura, Barry McCauley, Stella Zambalis, Linda Zoghby, Amy Johnson, Philip Webb, Hal France and Sylvia McNair have made appearances with major opera companies such as the Metropolitan Opera, New York City Opera, Chicago Lyric Opera, San Francisco Opera and opera houses and festivals of Europe.

Under General Director, Scott Wright, Mobile Opera continues. Andy Anderson has served as Artistic Director and conductor since 2008. In addition to mainstage productions, programs of opera excerpts are presented in schools and community venues throughout the region. Education and Community Outreach, under the direction of Stacey Driskell, produced "Pigaro's Diner" beginning in 2009. This program on child nutrition has been seen by more than 40,000 Alabama school children.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Opera Australia</span> Principal opera company in Australia

Opera Australia is the principal opera company in Australia. Based in Sydney, New South Wales, its performance season at the Sydney Opera House accompanied by the Opera Australia Orchestra runs for approximately eight months of the year, with the remainder of its time spent at the Arts Centre Melbourne, where it is accompanied by Orchestra Victoria. In 2004, the company gave 226 performances in its subscription seasons in Sydney and Melbourne, Victoria, attended by more than 294,000 people.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Santa Fe Opera</span> Opera company in Santa Fe, New Mexico

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.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Los Angeles Opera</span> Opera company in Los Angeles, California

The Los Angeles Opera, originally called the Los Angeles Music Center Opera, is an American opera company in Los Angeles, California. It is the fourth-largest opera company in the United States. The company's home base is the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, part of the Los Angeles Music Center.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vancouver Opera</span>

Vancouver Opera is the second largest performing arts organization in British Columbia and the largest opera company in western Canada. Its mainstage performances occur in the Queen Elizabeth Theatre, other venues in Vancouver and occasionally elsewhere in British Columbia. Vancouver Opera has one of only two professional opera orchestras in Canada. After many regular seasons with four mainstage productions a year, the company saw its first festival season in 2017. Vancouver Opera also runs a school touring and education program, and various community events.

Opera Omaha is a major regional opera company in Omaha, Nebraska. Founded in 1958, the professional company is widely known for the International Fall Festival events it held in the 1980s and 1990s, which garnered international attention and served as the U.S. and world premieres for a number of notable works. One of these performances, the 1990 U.S. premiere of the 1841 work Maria Padilla, was among the primary debuts for noted soprano Renee Fleming. "I’ve been calling all my singer friends and saying, 'You’ve got to sing for this company.'" Fleming said at the time. It has "a lot of vision." In 2007, the Toronto Star said "Opera Omaha has grown into one of the continent's most enterprising regional opera companies."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Florida Grand Opera</span> Opera company in Miami, Florida, United States

Florida Grand Opera (FGO) is an American opera company based in Miami, Florida. It is the oldest performing arts organization in Florida and the seventh oldest opera company in the United States. FGO was created in 1994 from the consolidation of two opera companies in the Miami-Fort Lauderdale region: Opera Guild of Greater Miami, founded in 1941 by Arturo di Filippi; and the Opera Guild, Inc. of Fort Lauderdale, formed in 1945.

Opera Lyra Ottawa (OLO) was a non-profit professional opera company based in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It was founded in 1984 by Canadian soprano Diana Gilchrist after the demise of the National Arts Centre's annual summer opera productions. The company performed fully staged and concert version operas in their original language with French and English surtitles at the National Arts Centre as well as running outreach and young artist programs.

Opera Colorado is an opera company located in Denver, Colorado. Founded in 1981, it presents an annual season of three to four fully staged productions. Its primary performance venue is the Ellie Caulkins Opera House.

The Tucson Symphony Orchestra, or TSO, is the primary professional orchestra of Tucson, Arizona. Founded in 1928, when the season consisted of just two concerts, the TSO is the oldest continuously running performing arts organization in the Southwest. The TSO's season now runs from September to May and consists of over 60 concerts, including a Classics Series of eight programs, a Pops Series of four programs, a Masterworks series of five chamber orchestra programs, a number of one-night only specials, and run-out concerts to surrounding areas, such as Oro Valley, Green Valley, Bisbee, Safford, Thatcher, and Nogales. The TSO also provides educational programming that reaches over 40,000 school children each season. Within the TSO are a number of standing chamber ensembles, including a string quartet, string quintet, piano trio, harp trio, brass quintet, and woodwind quintet. These ensembles help provide educational programming through school visits, perform recitals annually, and also perform at private and community events.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Gaddes</span> Arts administrator (1942–2023)

Richard Gaddes was a British opera company administrator based in the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pittsburgh Opera</span> Pittsburghs Opera company and venue

Pittsburgh Opera is an American opera company based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Pittsburgh Opera gives performances in several venues, primarily at the Benedum Center, with other performances at the Pittsburgh Creative and Performing Arts School (CAPA) Theater. Pittsburgh Opera headquartersArchived 2009-09-07 at the Wayback Machine is located in the former George Westinghouse Air Brake Factory, 2425 Liberty Avenue, in the Strip District. Pittsburgh Opera has been awarded LEED Silver Certification by the U.S. Green Building Council and is the first "green" opera company in the U.S. in the Operations and Maintenance Category. Pittsburgh Opera's headquarters is also the oldest green building in Pittsburgh.

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.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Opera Memphis</span>

Opera Memphis is a Memphis, Tennessee non-profit arts organization chartered in 1956 by a group of Memphians interested in producing regional opera. Charter signatories included noted Memphians Philip Belz and Walter Chandler. Early productions consisted mainly of local singers and local directors. During this initial period the Metropolitan Opera Company toured regularly through the area and performed in Memphis two to three times per year. As the company grew, the performers and directors became more regional and the sets and costumes more professional. By the mid-1970s, Opera Memphis began bringing in well-known singers like Leontyne Price, Beverly Sills, Joan Sutherland, Sherrill Milnes, and Birgit Nilsson to perform in lead roles.

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.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rialto Center for the Arts</span> Performing arts center in Atlanta, Georgia

The Rialto Center for the Arts is an 833-seat performing-arts venue owned and operated by Georgia State University and located in the heart of the Fairlie-Poplar district in downtown Atlanta, Georgia. The venue is home to the Rialto Series, an annual subscription series featuring national and international jazz, world music, and dance. The Rialto also routinely presents Georgia State University School of Music performances, the annual National Black Arts Festival, and many others.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Colorado Ballet</span> American ballet company and academy

Colorado Ballet encompasses a 31-member professional performing ballet company, a studio company for advanced dance students, an academy, and an education and outreach department. Based in downtown Denver, Colorado, Colorado Ballet serves more than 125,000 patrons each year.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Toledo Opera</span> Opera company in Toledo, Ohio, United States

The Toledo Opera is an American opera company in Toledo, Ohio, performing in the Valentine Theatre in downtown Toledo. The company's season consists of two to three fully-realized operas, plus additional community programming for the Northwest Ohio region.

The Utah Opera is an American opera company that has been merged with Utah Symphony since July 2002, with a combined audience of more than 150,000 annually.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Orchestra Iowa</span> American symphony orchestra in Cedar Rapids, Iowa

Orchestra Iowa is Iowa's premier American symphony orchestra based in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The current music director and conductor is Timothy Hankewich. Established in 1923 as the Cedar Rapids Symphony Orchestra, the orchestra has 68 professional musicians and a full season of over 180 performances, including a fine arts series, a chamber series, a popular series, and performances with the Cedar Rapids Opera Theatre and Ballet Quad Cities. The orchestra principally performs at the Paramount Theatre located in downtown Cedar Rapids. They also perform regular concerts at Iowa City West High School. The chamber series is performed at the Coralville Center for the Performing Arts in Coralville, Iowa. The orchestra showcases its artistic excellence each season through an accomplished array of classical, ballet, opera, popular and chamber performances, in addition to extensive community education and involvement.

W. R. McPhee, was a Canadian singer and arts administrator. He worked for 19 years as the head of the Calgary Opera.

References

  1. Recognized by OPERA America as the 13th oldest opera company in the United States (source: Mobileopera.org)
  2. Zietz, Karyl Lynn (1995). "Mobile Opera". Opera Companies and Houses of the United States : A Comprehensive, Illustrated Reference. McFarland & Company. p. 3. ISBN   9780899509556.