Opera and Art Song

Bottom with Titania, Puck, and the fairies in a scene from A Midsummer Night's Dream (2014).

About the WWU Opera Studio

Western's nationally-recognized Opera Studio offers students exceptional performing experience in a yearly complete production, in a range of staging formats, including those designed for our state-of-the-art studio space to fully-produced works in collaboration with the WWU Orchestra on the WWU Mainstage. In addition to the opera itself, the studio presents a touring production at elementary schools and libraries in Whatcom County, and a scenes program in which students have the opportunity to take on all production roles including directing and design. The Opera Studio provides valuable experience and many pathways for young singers to grow in the broad range of skills called for in dynamic, exciting performance - from strong musicianship and singing, to acting, movement, and collegiality. In recent seasons, WWU productions have twice received First Place awards in the National Opera Association Opera Production Competition for Così fan tutte (2016, Division II) and A Midsummer Night's Dream (2014, Division III).

Wedding Scene from Così fan tutte (2016).

Production

Studio directors Amber Sudduth Bone and Mark Davies work to build a supportive environment while maintaining high standards of excellence in performance and production. Along with conductor Ryan Dudenbostel and artistic consultant and coach Jay Rozendaal, they bring an impressive breadth of operatic experience to Western's opera program.

This year Western’s Opera Studio presents Cole Porter’s sophisticated and sassy golden-era musical Kiss Me, Kate on the Mainstage with the WWU Orchestra, featuring the stage direction of Heather Dudenbostel and the choreography of Dance Professor Penny Hutchinson. In collaboration with the WWU Opera Club, the studio will also present an Opera Workshop scenes production showcasing baroque to modern operatic selections. The school tour will be a premiere of a new children's opera based on the beloved folktale The Golden Goose by Bellingham composer Evan Ingalls.

Performances

Repertoire is chosen to showcase our talented students, and has included works from Purcell to Britten, from Mozart to Puccini and Bernstein. Works are sung in original language with projected supertitles.

Join us in 2017 in January for Opera Scenes, in April for performances of Kiss Me Kate, and in May and June for The Golden Goose. Voice studio singers can also be heard on the quarterly Liederabend collaborative song recitals and in numerous other solo and choral performances per year. Voice faculty members Amber Sudduth Bone, Mark Davies, and Jay Rozendaal will present Hugo Wolf's Italienisches Liederbuch in recital in November.