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 Anita Johnson, soprano (Norina)
Career highlights have included Marie in The Daughter of the Regiment and
Oscar in Un Ballo in Maschera with Michigan Opera Theatre; Konstanze
in Die Entführung aus dem Serail with Italy’s Spoleto Festival;
the Princess in L’enfant et les sortilèges and Clara in Porgy
and Bess with New York City Opera; Barbarina in Le Nozze di Figaro with
the Metropolitan Opera; Olympia in Les contes d’Hoffman as the
resident lyric coloratura soprano with Germany’s National Theater Mannheim;
Musetta in La bohème with Opera Pacific; Norina in Don Pasquale with
Florentine Opera, and Lucia in The Rape of Lucretia with Opera Theatre
of Saint Louis. Concert highlights have included the Mermaid in Weber’s
Oberon with the Collegiate Chorale at Carnegie Hall; Mendelssohn’s A
Midsummer Night’s Dream with the Baltimore Symphony, and Carmina
Burana with the Louisville Orchestra. She has created many performance opportunities
for children, including a multi-media performance of international
music and a unique show, ABC’s: American
Black Composer’ Contributions to our Musical Heritage.
 Yeghishe Manucharyan, tenor (Ernesto)
Mr. Manucharyan
opened the 2005-2006 season with his role debut as Riccardo in Maria di Rohan by
Donizetti at the Wexford Festival followed by the tenor solo in Verdi’s Messa da
Requiem with the Boston Cantata Singers, Rodolfo in La bohème in
Salerno, Gerald in Lakmé with the Opera Orchestra
of New York at Carnegie Hall, and Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni at
the New York City Opera. He opens the 2006-2007 season of the Minnesota
Opera as Rodrigo in Rossini’s La donna del lago.
Other recent performances have included Alfredo in La traviata at
the Tulsa Opera, the Duke in Rigoletto with Baltimore Opera
and Nadir in Les pêcheurs de perles with
the Orquesta Sinfonica del Estado de Mexico. A native of Yerevan,
Armenia, he graduated from the Tchaikovsky Central Music School earning
a Bachelor of Music in French Horn Performance. He continued his
studies at the Komitas State Conservatory earning a Master of Music
in both French Horn and Vocal Performance. Toledo Opera audiences
will remember his outstanding performance as Count Almaviva in our
production of The Barber of Seville.
 Shon Sims, baritone (Malatesta)
Baritone Shon Sims recently made his Houston Grand Opera debut
as the Pilot in The Little Prince, following a performance of the same
role at Skylight Opera. Other recent engagements
include Figaro in Il barbiere di Siviglia with Syracuse Opera,
Eisenstein in Die Fledermaus with Knoxville Opera,
Dandini in La cenerentola with Utah Festival Opera and
Valentin in Faust with Opera Santa Barbara. Mr. Sims
has also performed Mercutio in Roméo et Juliette with Fort
Worth Opera, Figaro in Il barbiere di Siviglia with Harrisburg
Opera, and Valentin in Faust with Augusta Opera.
Mr. Sims made his European debut as Figaro in Il barbiere di Siviglia with
the Teatro Nacional de Sao Carlos in Lisbon and went on to sing
Russell Paxton in Kurt Weill and Ira Gershwin’s Lady in the Dark with
the Teatro Massimo in Palermo, and with Teatro
dell’Opera di Roma. He
has performed a variety of roles with New York City Opera including
Schaunard in La bohème, Fiorello in Il barbiere di Siviglia,
Morales in Carmen, and Yamadori in Madama Butterfly. A
Texas native, he is a graduate of the Manhattan School of Music.
 Matthew Lau, bass (Don Pasquale)
Career highlights
have included the title role in Don Pasquale and
Sulpice in La Fille du Régiment with Arizona Opera;
Figaro in Le nozze di Figaro and Padre Guardiano in La
forza del destino with Sarasota Opera; Mustafà in L’Italiana
in Algeri with Anchorage Opera; Osmin in Die Entführung
aus dem Serail with Lyric Opera of Kansas City; Daland in Der
Fliegende Holländer, Banquo in Macbeth, Oroveso
in Norma, and Leporello in Don Giovanni with Des
Moines Metro Opera. In recent seasons, he has premiered two intense
dramatic roles, first singing il Quindici for Teatro Grattacielo's
production of La Cena delle Beffe, and
then Col. Blagden in the New York premier of Robert Ward's operatic
setting of Hedda Gabler, entitled Claudia
Legere. Returning to comedy,
Mr. Lau appeared as Don Magnifico in La Cenerentola for
Louisville Opera. A versatile performer, Mr. Lau has been heard in
a wide variety of roles with Seattle Opera, Atlanta Opera, Portland
Opera, Opera Company of Philadelphia, Minnesota Opera and New York
City Opera. In concert he sang the role of Douglas in La Donna
del Lago and Wurm in Luisa Miller with Washington Concert
Opera.
 David Toulson, Director
Mr. Toulson is active as a freelance opera director around the country.
Recently, Mr. Toulson directed Face on the Barroom Floor for
Central City Opera, The Magic Flute for Opera Theatre of
Northern Virginia and Marc Bliztstein’s Regina for
The Catholic University Benjamin T. Rome School of Music, The
Student Prince for Central City Opera and Handel’s Imeneo in
Cortona, Italy. He has received critical acclaim for his direction
of outreach programs for Tulsa Opera, Connecticut Opera, Central
City Opera, Virginia Opera, Indianapolis Opera and Newberry Opera.
He recently returned to Opera Theater of Northern Virginia to direct
a double bill of Haydn’s La Canterina and Donizetti’s Le
convenienze teatrali. Toulson’s production of John Davies’ Jack
and the Beanstalk for FNB Productions, Inc. will be going on
its third tour this spring and has been well received by kids and
teachers alike. Mr. Toulson holds Masters degrees in both Opera
Stage Directing and Vocal Performance from The University of South
Carolina.
 Thomas Conlin, Conductor
Thomas Conlin is a frequent guest conductor with symphony orchestras
and opera companies on five continents, most recently in Belgium,
Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Croatia, Egypt, Germany, Ireland, Italy,
Japan, Korea, Norway, Poland, Russia, Spain, Turkey and throughout
the United States. Last season at the National Opera of Croatia he
led performances of La fille du Régiment and the
Eastern European premiere of Leonard Bernstein’s West Side
Story. Future appearances include an arena staging of Aida in
four cities in India and return engagements in Croatia, Germany,
Poland and Italy. Next summer he performs and records music by George
Gershwin with the Dallas Symphony.
Maestro Conlin’s recording of George Crumb’s Star-Child,
on which he conducts the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus,
won the 2001 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Classical Composition.
His music video, Symphonic Wonderworks, won the Gold Award
(1st Prize) at the 1992 Houston International Film Festival and was
nominated for a Telly Award. His CD of Crumb’s A Haunted
Landscape was nominated for an Indie Award as Best Orchestral
Recording of 2002, and his latest CD on the Bridge label, the Pulitzer
Prize-winning Echoes of Time and the River, was released
in 2004 to great acclaim. The first in a series of recordings of
works by the Brazilian composer Camargo Guarnieri was released on
the Naxos label last Year and will be followed by Vol. 2 in December.
Conlin has collaborated in concert with renowned vocalists Kathleen
Battle, Marilyn Horne, Robert Merrill, Roberta Peters, Giorgio Tozzi
and Frederica von Stade and with instrumentalists Emanuel Ax, Alicia
de Larrocha, James Galway, Yo-Yo Ma, Itzhak Perlman and Isaac Stern.
For Toledo Opera he has conducted recent productions of The Turn
of the Screw, La traviata, Sweeney Todd, Don Giovanni, La
bohème, The Crucible, The Barber of Seville, Faust,
Madama Butterfly, Pagliacci, Amahl and the Night Visitors, The
Marriage of Figaro and Così fan tutte and five
of TO’s Opera Galas: Three Tenors! – the Next Generation, A
Night in Old Vienna, The Greatest Wagner Concert Ever!,
Opera Goes to the Movies and From Broadway to the
Met. |
