Lyric Opera 2023-2024 Issue 5 - Cinderella

29 | Lyric Opera of Chicago under the baton of Jane Glover. His most personal work, Songs for Murdered Sisters , is a song cycle by composer Jake Heggie and author Margaret Atwood, conceived by Hopkins in remembrance of his sister, Nathalie Warmerdam. Following the critically acclaimed film and JUNO-nominated album releases, the chamber version of the work received its live world premiere with the composer at the piano at Houston’s Rothko Chapel in March 2022, in partnership with Houston Grand Opera. In 2023, the baritone gave the live world premiere of the work’s orchestral version with Canada’s National Arts Centre Orchestra. Hopkins has received numerous awards and distinctions, including most recently a JUNO Award for his portrayal of Athanaël in the Chandos recording of Massenet’s Thaïs in concert with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra conducted by Sir Andrew Davis. He was the winner of both the Verbier Festival Academy’s 2008 Prix d’Honneur and the Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award in 2006. NICHOLAS NEWTON ALIDORO Previously at Lyric: Father/ Hansel and Gretel (2022/23). Highlights for the bass-baritone this season include the Houston Grand Opera world premiere of Intelligence , created by composer Jake Heggie, librettist Gene Scheer, and director/choreographer Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, John Adams’s El Niño in a new production at the Metropolitan Opera, and Leporello in Don Giovanni at the Santa Fe Opera under the baton of Music Director Harry Bicket. Concert performances of the season include Handel’s Messiah with the Ann Arbor Symphony, and Terence Blanchard’s Fire Shut Up In My Bones in a new suite of music from the opera, performed with the composer, his E-Collective, and the Turtle Island Quartet in Austin, Houston, and Richmond. Last season, Newton made his European debut at the Salzburg Festival in Purcell’s The Indian Queen, a Detroit Opera debut in Handel’s Xerxes , and a Dallas Opera debut in Rigoletto. Earlier highlights include a Santa Fe Opera debut as Don Basilio in a new production of Il barbiere di Siviglia and the world premiere at Houston Grand Opera of Joel Thompson and Andrea Davis Pinkney’s The Snowy Day. Newton completed his training at the Houston Grand Opera Studio in the 2020/21 season and has appeared in numerous productions with the company. Past highlights also include La bohème and Sweeney Todd with Wolf Trap Opera, Rigoletto with Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, and both Susannah and Giulio Cesare at Rice University. TERESA CASTILLO CLORINDA Lyric debut This season the Costa Rican-American soprano will debut with the Littleton Symphony, singing Reflections on a Mexican Garden , which was written for her by composer Kevin Padworski. Recent highlights include a house debut at the Teatro Lirico di Cagliari, where she performed the role of Maria in Francesca Zambello’s production of West Side Story , and house and role debuts with Chicago Opera Theater as Miss Wordsworth in Albert Herring and Sara Turing in The Life and Death(s) of Alan Turing , as well as a debut with Opera Southwest as La Comtesse Adèle in Le Comte Ory . Last summer, Castillo made her Lincoln Center debut as Annetta in Ricci’s Crispino e la Comare with Teatro Nuovo. Additional recent engagements of note include house debuts with Opera San Jose (Frasquita in Carmen and Maria in West Side Story ) and Opera Lafayette (as Lucette in Gretry’s Silvain ). Castillo has had success in numerous competitions including the Lois Alba Aria Competition, Opera Index, The Jensen Foundation Vocal Competition, Mildred Miller International Voice Competition, The Anita Cerquetti International Competition, Altamura/Caruso International Voice Competition, Classical Singer Magazine Competition, and the Denver Lyric Opera Guild Competition. SOPHIA MAEKAWA TISBE Previously at Lyric: Shepherdess/ Jen ˚ufa (2023/24). The first-year mezzo-soprano with the Ryan Opera Center from Kyoto, Japan, was a 2022 Santa Fe Opera Apprentice Artist, understudying Rosina/ Il barbiere di Siviglia and Comrade Chin and Shu Fang/ M. Butterfly , and a 2021 Gerdine Young Artist with Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, understudying Kadin/ On the Edge . She recently received her Bachelor of Music degree from the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. While there, the mezzo performed in Ariodante (title role), Albert Herring , and L’enfant et les sortilèges . Other roles in her repertoire include Hermia/ A Midsummer Night’s Dream , Annio/ La clemenza di Tito , Mercédès/ Carmen , Second Woman/ Dido and Aeneas , and Mrs. Nolan/ The Medium . Concert appearances include the Wichita Symphony and Curtis Symphony Orchestra with Yannick Nézet- Séguin. Maekawa was a finalist at the 2022 Opera Grand Rapids Competition and semi-finalist in the 2021 Houston Grand Opera Eleanor McCollum Competition . Sophia Maekawa is sponsored by David and Janet Fox,Richard W.Shepro and Lindsay E.Roberts, and Mark and Gale Kozloff .