VOCAL ARTS
Vienna Summer Music festival offers an unparalleled experience for emerging opera singers by offering participants the opportunity to perform and train with Vienna's most important musicians.
From Our Artistic Director
Our lives have changed dramatically during the COVID-19 pandemic, and it has felt a little overwhelming at times. This summer we are taking every safety measure possible because it’s important to make music again and create again.
Artists have adapted and survived for hundreds of years because creativity takes courage. Action is a foundational key to success and it’s important for your careers and education to be back on stage now more than ever. I invite you to apply for our 2021 season as The Vienna Summer Music Festival Takes Florida. Music and art are powerful catalysts for positive change in the world and it’s important that we change it for the better one song at a time because...the show must go on.
Warmest Regards,
Vincent Connor
Artistic Director
OPERA INSTITUTE
June 6th - June 28th, 2021
The Opera Institute gives singers the experience of performing professional-level opera on stage with a live orchestra. Participants work with renowned faculty, conductors, stage directors, and coaches from the world’s leading institutions, including the Wiener StaatsOper, Volksoper, Metropolitan Opera, and more.
PROGRAM FEE: €4500 (Financial assistance is available to reduce the tuition to $3750 - USD)
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Includes: housing, private lessons, coachings, facilities, faculty, masterclasses, visiting guests, cultural excursions
SCHOLARSHIPS ARE AVAILABLE
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CURRICULUM
Private Lessons
Vocalists will receive applied voice lessons with a private voice instructor from the Opera Institute faculty. Applied lessons will be individualized to the vocalist’s experience and will focus primarily on vocal technique and repertoire.
Vocal Coachings
Vocalists will receive coachings with a vocal coach from the Vocal Arts faculty. Coachings will be individualized to the vocalist’s personal experience and will focus on repertoire, diction, musicianship, and interpretation.
Masterclasses
Vocalists will participate in regular master classes with renowned artists. Vocalists will have the opportunity to perform in a masterclass with an aria from their repertoire. These master classes will be geared towards crafting an audition ready performance.
Acting for Singers
Vocalists will participate in weekly acting seminars. These acting seminars will be three hour intensive sessions based on a system of exploration, and covering material such as monologues, improvisation, fundamentals of performance, exploration of characterization and motivation, movement, aspects of tone, and vocal production and flexibility for speech.
Song Repertory
Vocalists will attend one song repertory seminar focused on German romantic composers and taught by a member of the Vienna Summer Music Festival Faculty.
Headshots
For an additional $150, we can provide you with professional headshots with a professional photographer.
Manager Day
We are happy to annouce that we will have five artist agency representatives join on program from the U.S.A and Europe
VSMF 2021 Productions
Performances will take place during the last week of the program
VSMF is passionate about fully producing our shows with quality orchestra and world renowned music and stage directors. In addition to producing the standard repertoire, VSMF is proud to producing new opera by living composers. See a complete list of the productions scheduled for the 2021 season.
2021 SHOWS
La Boheme, Puccini
La Femme Boheme, Puccini
Hansel & Gretel
Humperdinck
The Loathly Lady
Paul Richards
IMPROV OPERA
Carnival of the Animals, Saint-Seans
Improvisation is a cornerstone of creativity. It allows for character development, thinking on the spot, internalizing a sense self confidence and so much more. We at the Vienna Summer Music Festival are proud to announce that we will do an improv opera with music by Camille Saint-Seans, “Carnival of the Animals”
Meet the VSMF Voice Faculty
Our world-class faculty have major careers working as professional singers, maestri, vocal coaches, and stage directors.
Jennifer Rowley
Featured Guest Voice Teacher
A highly-decorated soprano who has been recognized by many international competitions, Jennifer Rowley was awarded the 2012 Richard Tucker Career Grant, was one of the top prize winners in the 2013 Licia Albanese Puccini Foundation Competition and the 2011 Opera Index Vocal Competition, a winner of the 2011 William Mattheus Sullivan Musical Foundation awards, a first prize-winner of the 2011 Gerda Lissner Foundation International Vocal Competition, a grant winner of the 2011 Licia Albanese-Puccini Foundation Competition, and the winner of the 2010 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions for the Michigan District.
Ms. Rowley made her professional debut in Cleveland Opera’s production of Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte, conducted by Anton Coppola. As a young artist, she worked with the Scuola dell’Opera Italiana at the Teatro Comunale di Bologna where she made her first main stage appearance as Magda in Puccini’s La rondine, as well as performances with The Opera Theatre of St. Louis, the Caramoor Music Festival, Brevard Music Center, the Instituto Superior del Arte of the Teatro Colón, and regionally at Michigan Opera Theatre.
Jennifer holds a Master of Music degree from Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music and a Bachelor of Music degree from Baldwin Wallace College Conservatory of Music. She holds a Certificate of Performance Achievement from the Instituto Superior del Arte of the Teatro Colón and was a Max Kade Scholar at Middlebury College’s German for Singers Program. Ms. Rowley serves as an advisory board member for Classical Singer Magazine.
Vincent Connor
Artistic Director
A native of Winter Park, Florida,Vincent Connor has established himself as prominent and versatile stage director. (Click here to learn more)
Christian Schulz, Maestro
Artistic Director of the Mozart Collegium Vienna and Music Director of the concert series Schwingungen in the Golden Hall of the Wiener Musikverein, originates from a well-known Viennese family of musicians.
Kirsten Chambers
Voice Teacher
Kirsten Chambers is most known for her portrayal of the title role of SALOME, which she has sung at the Metropolitan Opera, Opera Hong...,
Gregory Buchalter
Featured Metropolitan Opera Conductor
Gregory Buchalter is the Artistic Director and conductor of Opera Fairbanks, Opera Camerata of Washington and formerly of Opera Las Vegas. In Fairbanks he has conducted La Boheme, Carmen, L’elisir d’amore, Don Giovanni, Tosca, La Cenerentola, L’Italiana in Algeri, Hansel and Gretel, Magic Flute, Pagliacci and concerts featuring Vivica Genaux. During his leadership with these companies, he has brought in many internationally renowned singers including Paul Plishka, Sondra Radvanovsky, Francisco Casanova, and Alessandra Marc.
Maestro Buchalter is also an active symphonic conductor. He recently had a great successes in Fairbanks conducting Mahler’s Fourth Symphony and Bernstein’s West Side Story Symphonic Dances as well as a recent concert in Belgrade featuring the Sibelius Violin Concerto.
He has conducted Salomé at the Savonlinna Opera Festival in Finland with Maria Ewing and Helga Dernesch, Die Fledermaus at the Vienna Volksoper, and Mozart’s Entführung aus dem Serail at the Spoleto Festival, Eugene Onegin with the New Opera World Festival in Moscow, Così fan Tutte with the Mediterranean Opera Festival in Sicily and at the Varna International Festival he has conducted Suor Angelica/Gianni Schicchi, Così fan Tutte and Candide, L’enfant et les Sortilèges, La Rondine and the Bulgarian premiere of Kurt Weil’s Street Scene.
Mr. Buchalter conducted the American Premiere of Mercadante’s I Due Figaro, Von Winter’s Das Labyrinth, and Donizetti’s Olivo e Pasquale with New York’s Amore Opera and received glowing reviews for the performances. He was the first American to conduct with the Kazakhstan State Opera; the performances there included a televised Gala concert for the President of Kazakhstan.
Mr. Buchalter has been Chorus Master of Santa Fe Opera, where he received great acclaim for his choral preparation for Peter Grimes, Turandot, and many other operas. In addition he was Chorus Master at the Bregenz Festival in Austria, Theater des Westens in Berlin, and the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra.
James Pearson, Coach
Professor James E. Pearson was born in Minneapolis (U.S.A.) in 1948 and received piano instruction from the age of nine.
Daniel Sarge, Coach
Daniel has enjoyed his tenure at the state operas of Hamburg and Vienna, and regularly works with the leading singers of the world such as Erwin Schrott, Elena Zhidkova, Anna Netrebko, and Camilla Nylund.
Evelyn Schorkhuber
Evelyn Schörkhuber was born in Steyr, Austria and received her earliest musical training in Waidhofen/Ybbs.
Sylvia Edelmann
Voice Teacher
Born in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria/Spain. She studied voice at the Conservatory in her hometown and worked as a soloist in the ballet of Las Palmas.
Stephanie Houtzeel
Voice Teacher
American mezzo‐Soprano STEPHANIE HOUTZEEL was born in Kassel, Germany and grew up near Boston.
Szymek Komasa
Voice Teacher
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Jennifer Davison, Director/Teacher
Jennifer Davison has won acclaim from audiences and critics alike for her work on the operatic and concert stages of both Europe and the United States.
Elizabeth Hagedorn
Voice Teacher
With her "brilliant and richly coloured sound" (Die Welt), Elizabeth Hagedorn has made a name for herself through multi-faceted character portrayals in the spinto soprano repertoire.
Michael Gruber, Agent
Micheal Gruber is an agent affiliated with Opera4u and will be visiting the Vienna Summer Music Festival and listen to our singers.
Ryan Speedo Green
Voice Teacher
Praised by Anthony Tommasini of the New York Times for his “robust voice” and Anne Midgette of The Washington Post as an artist “fully ready for a big career,”
Giuseppe Montesano, Conductor
The musician from Turin studied piano and composition at his hometown conservatory while simultaneously deepening his literary and philosophical interests at the University of Turin.
Charlie Rueter, Conductor
Charlie Reuter Currently a conductor for the premiere of The Prince of Egypt, conducted the National Tour of Cinderella.
APPLICATION INSTRUCTIONS
Applicants for the Opera Institute are required to submit two contrasting operatic arias, one of which needs to be sung in French, Italian, or German.
Applicants will provide their Name, Address, Phone number, Email Address, Date of Birth, Education, Voice Type, Current Applied Teacher, Previous Voice Teachers, Web Address, Headshot, Resume, and Audition Materials via the online form provided below.
All application and audition materials including YouTube links, audio files, headshot, resume and must be submitted via a single link to an approved file sharing site such as Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive, or iCloud. For questions regarding submitting via file sharing visit the application section of the FAQ page.
Resumes may be submitted as PDF or Word Document files only, and should include the applicant’s first and last name and program of interest.
Video auditions need to be submitted as YouTube links, and audio auditions should be submitted as MP3 files, and should be included in the materials included in the single file sharing link. File names should include the applicant’s first and last name, program of interest, and the creation date of the recording. (Example: Emily Brown_Opera Institute_08/16.MP3)
All applicants will be contacted by The Vienna Summer Music Festival for a phone or video conference interview, and should receive an initial response in 7-10 business days.
An application fee of $35 is required for submission.
Scholarships
Scholarships are available, and will be awarded up to €1,750 to select applicants. For those applicants that are interested in applying for scholarship, you should contact us directly at info@viennasummermusic.com
Judith Halasz
Voice Teacher
Judith Halasz, studied at the Vienna Conservatory with Hilda De Groote and Julia Conwell and graduated with honors in 2002.
Keith Chambers
Conductor
Keith Chambers has conducted over 150 performances of 45 different operas for companies including The Dallas Opera, Indianapolis Opera, Shreveport Opera, Asheville Lyric Opera...