Thanks to the incredible support of our boards and the assistance of a fantastic group of volunteers, the 2006 Utah District MONC auditions were a great success. Twenty-eight singers from five states participated in preliminary auditions for the Utah District of the Metropolitan Opera National Council on Friday, February 3, 2006. The singers included 4 mezzo-sopranos, 2 tenors, 2 baritones, 1 bass-baritone, 1 bass and 18 sopranos! Most of the singers were from Utah schools, though there were 10 singers from University of Nevada, Las Vegas. UNLV historically sends singers to audition in California, but the dates of the California auditions this year conflicted with their school opera performance (a good example of why the Met changed their residency requirements for auditioners a few years ago – it would have been a shame for these singers not to be able to audition this year). Each singer presented an aria of his or her choice followed immediately by an aria selected by the judges from a list of five prepared by the singer. The judges selected 8 singers to return to sing in the finals on Saturday, February 4th.
Following the preliminary auditions, Charles Black hosted a dinner at his home for donors who gave at the $250 level or above and special guests including the three judges, Dolora Zajick, Joel Revzen and Alan Smith. It was a lovely, elegant yet casual evening with wonderful company.
On Saturday night, each of the eight singers sang one aria from their list and after a short intermission, each singer returned to sing a second aria selected by the judges (the judges asked two of the singers to also present a third aria). After approximately 20 minutes of deliberations, the judges selected two singers to advance to the Rocky Mountain Regional Finals to be held Saturday, February 18th in Denver:
Melissa Gillespie, a 26 year-old soprano from Orem, Utah who graduated from Brigham Young University with a Bachelor of Music in 2002 (Melissa sang ‘Steal me, sweet thief’ from Menotti’s The Old Maid and the Thief and ‘Caro nome’ from Verdi’s Rigoletto); and Nina Yoshida Nelsen, a 26 year-old mezzo-soprano currently living in New York who graduated from Boston University with a Master of Music in 2003 and sang Rebecca Nurse in The Crucible with Utah Festival Opera last summer (Nina sang ‘Va! laisse couler mes larmes’ from Massenet’s Werther, ‘Voi, che sapete’ from Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro and ‘Près des ramparts de Séville’ (Seguidilla) from Bizet’s Carmen). These two singers each received a cash award of $1,000. Ms. Nelsen went on to win Regional audition and represent the Rocky Mountain Region as a National Semi-Finalist in New York. The judges also awarded three encouragement awards of $500 each to three young men from UNLV: Dominick Chenes a 21 year-old tenor; Douglas Carpenter a 20 year-old baritone; and Carnell Johnson a 24 year-old bass-baritone.
When we accepted the invitation to become the directors of the Utah District auditions last May, we set a number of goals for the next few years including: to increase the awareness about and participation in the auditions by local student populations; to bring our organization in-line with the national Metropolitan Opera National Council (MONC) recommendations; and to return a sense of glamour to the auditions. On the back side of this page is our progress report. Please let us know if you have any ideas to help us improve upon or move closer to these goals.
We are interested in making sure not only that young singers who are ready to be heard in audition are doing so, but also that singers who need more time for development are experiencing the auditions as observers. We think we made good progress toward this goal with singers participating from BYU, University of Utah, Utah State University and Southern Utah University. We had four enthusiastic volunteers from the University of Utah Opera class and approximately 75 student observers at both the preliminary and final auditions. We would like to continue to increase all of these numbers and will explore ways to make more direct contact with academic institutions in Utah in the months leading up to the auditions next year. The first goal of the MONC mission statement is ‘To discover exceptional young talent’. To help make sure we recognized the best talents, we sought to bring the very best judges available for this year’s auditions and succeeded in finding three judges who were not only extremely knowledgeable about the business of opera, but who can potentially further the singers’ careers immediately by recommending and/or engaging them for work. The 2006 judges were Dolora Zajick, an internationally renowned mezzo-soprano and former national winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions; Joel Revzen, who conducts at major opera houses in the United States and Europe and is the Artistic and General Director of Arizona Opera as well as the Conductor Emeritus of Berkshire Opera Company in Massachusetts; and Alan Smith, a respected vocal coach and director of Keyboard Collaborative Arts at the University of Southern California. The notoriety of the judges provided the added benefit of ‘buzz’ and excitement on the part of donors and audience members. We will continue to invite the highest quality judges.
We are also in regular communication with the MONC national office regarding our plans and Julie attended the MONC Fall Meeting last December to network with other Regional and District Directors and obtain some suggestions for improving our planning.
Our decision to change venue for the auditions to Libby Gardner Concert Hall on the University of Utah campus contributed greatly to our goal of returning glamour to the auditions. The hall is not only a beautiful setting, but also provides a wonderful acoustic and comfortable setting for the singers. We received compliments from many people who attended the auditions who commented on the wonderful atmosphere and smooth running. We are grateful to The University of Utah School of Music, Dr. Robert Breault and Dr. Robert Walzel for their help in securing this incredible hall and for their flexibility and support throughout the two days of auditions. We are greatly appreciative of the increased publicity from the two Utah public radio stations KUER and KBYU (both on air and on their websites). However, we feel we have the potential to expand the publicity even further and plan to include additional post-event publicity to announce the winners and celebrate the event.
Some of the changes implemented this year resulted in an increased budget, however we are very pleased to announce that donations will meet the increase, thanks in large part to the generous gift of Ruth S. Walker. (Please read about Ruth and her gift in the enclosed program.)
We are grateful for all of the help and support provided by our boards and volunteers and look forward to many more years of auditions.
Twenty-eight singers from five states participated in preliminary auditions for the Utah District of the Metropolitan Opera National Council on Friday, February 3, 2006. The singers included 4 mezzo-sopranos, 2 tenors, 2 baritones, 1 bass-baritone, 1 bass and 18 sopranos! Most of the singers were from Utah schools, though there were 10 singers from University of Nevada, Las Vegas. UNLV historically sends singers to audition in California, but the dates of the California auditions this year conflicted with their school opera performance (a good example of why the Met changed their residency requirements for auditioners a few years ago – it would have been a shame for these singers not to be able to audition this year). Each singer presented an aria of his or her choice followed immediately by an aria selected by the judges from a list of five prepared by the singer. The judges selected 8 singers to return to sing in the finals on Saturday, February 4th.
Following the preliminary auditions, Charles Black hosted a dinner at his home for donors who gave at the $250 level or above and special guests including the three judges, Dolora Zajick, Joel Revzen and Alan Smith. It was a lovely, elegant yet casual evening with wonderful company.
On Saturday night, each of the eight singers sang one aria from their list and after a short intermission, each singer returned to sing a second aria selected by the judges (the judges asked two of the singers to also present a third aria). After approximately 20 minutes of deliberations, the judges selected two singers to advance to the Rocky Mountain Regional Finals to be held Saturday, February 18th in Denver:
The first goal of the MONC mission statement is ‘To discover exceptional young talent’. To help make sure we recognized the best talents, we sought to bring the very best judges available for this year’s auditions and succeeded in finding three judges who were not only extremely knowledgeable about the business of opera, but who can potentially further the singers’ careers immediately by recommending and/or engaging them for work. The 2006 judges were Dolora Zajick, an internationally renowned mezzo-soprano and former national winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions; Joel Revzen, who conducts at major opera houses in the United States and Europe and is the Artistic and General Director of Arizona Opera as well as the Conductor Emeritus of Berkshire Opera Company in Massachusetts; and Alan Smith, a respected vocal coach and director of Keyboard Collaborative Arts at the University of Southern California. The notoriety of the judges provided the added benefit of ‘buzz’ and excitement on the part of donors and audience members. We will continue to invite the highest quality judges.
We are greatly appreciative of the increased publicity from the two Utah public radio stations KUER and KBYU (both on air and on their websites). However, we feel we have the potential to expand the publicity even further and plan to include additional post-event publicity to announce the winners and celebrate the event.
Some of the changes implemented this year resulted in an increased budget, however we are very pleased to announce that donations will meet the increase, thanks in large part to the generous gift of Ruth S. Walker. (Please read about Ruth and her gift in the enclosed program.)