Stage director Brian Luedloff joins UAOT for his first season.  His background includes directing operas in New York and Boston as well as throughout the Midwest, including Opera Theatre of St. Louis.  Scott Schoonover, UAOT Artistic Director and founder of Union Avenue Opera Theatre, will conduct. 

All performances are fully staged and performed in Italian with projected translations.   Puccini’s masterpiece Tosca will be performed on August 16, 17, 23, and 24. Audio Description services will be provided for the July 12 and August 16 performances.  Dr. Glen Bauer, Director of Music History and Literature at Webster University, will give a pre-concert program at 7 PM on the opening night of both operas.

All performances begin at 8 PM at Union Avenue Christian Church, 733 North Union Blvd., St. Louis, MO 63108.  Center Front tickets are $25.  General Admission tickets are $20 and tickets for students and seniors are $18.  Doors open at 7:15 PM.  For more information call 314-361-2881 or e-mail uaot@juno.com. 

Patricia Andress, Violetta, makes her debut in the title role of Verdi’s La Traviata and with Union Theater.  A native of New Mexico, Ms. Andress recently completed the coursework for her D.M.A. in Vocal Performance at the University of Kentucky.  She recently won a study grant for the Licia Albanese-Puccini Foundation Competition for which she will sing in Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center this November.  Ms. Andress won the regional final for the NATS Artist Awards competition and just returned from the national finals in San Diego where she was awarded second place.  She has been a MET Regional Finalist three times, and a national semi-finalist for several competitions including the Zachary Society Competition, the MacAllister Awards, and the 1998 NATS Artist Awards.  On the operatic stage, Ms. Andress has performed regionally with Opera Theater of Saint Louis, the Nashville Opera, Dorian Opera Theater and Opera in the Ozarks. Her operatic repertoire includes Norina in Donizetti’s Don Pasquale, Zerlina in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, and Pamina in Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte.

Brent Billock, Alfredo, has been winning critical acclaim for his performances all across the country. His Midwest performances include Rodolfo in La Bohème, Nemorino in L’Elisir d’Amore, Ernesto in Don Pasquale, Elvino in La Sonnambula, and Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly.  Recently, Mr. Billock sang the role of Wilhelm in Mignon with da Corneto Opera in its first Chicago performance since 1957.  Last summer, he made his debut as Don José in Carmen with the Ash Lawn-Highland Summer Music Festival in Virginia and then created the role of the Very Important Personage in the world premiere in Chicago of The Overcoat by Mae Cohen.  In addition to working on the operatic stage, Mr. Billock has demonstrated his versatility in a variety of musical genres and media. He has performed as a soloist in oratorio and pops concerts with the Elgin Symphony, the Sacramento Choral Society, and Antioch Festival Arts, and recorded an excerpt from Il Trovatore for a nationally broadcast television commercial.  Brent is a veteran of the Outreach Program at Cincinnati Opera, and has twice sung at the International Institute for Vocal Arts’ summer program in Italy including scenes from Rigoletto, Eugene Onegin, Abduction from the Seraglio, and Faust.
 

This years season at UAOT includes two masterpieces of the Italian tradition, Verdi's La Traviata and Puccini's Tosca. Traviata opened this past weekend to cheers and a long, standing ovation from a capacity audience which realized that it was hearing a first-class performance.

Not that things were flawless - I've rarely heard a flawless performance anywhere - but the transient intonation problems in the strings or the occasional fuzzy entrance did not seriously detract from the dramatic impact of the score, and the well-drilled chorus and strong principals brought Verdi's wonderfully melodic arias and ensembles powerfully to life. 

La Traviata offers several opportunities for supporting singers to be heard to advantage, and I thought Jermaine Smith, as the marquis d'Obigny and Mark Kent as the Baron Douphol were especially noteworthy for the quality of their acting as well as their singing. 

Among the principals, Joy Boland displayed a full, sweet voice as the servant Annina. Argentinian Gustavo Ahualli, as the father of the love-stricken young hero, posed rather than acted, but his huge baritone voice made his famous arias powerfully affecting. Brent Billock cut a dashing figure as the impulsive but good-hearted young Alfredo Germont, and though his voice seemed strained at times, he came through nicely in the big scenes. Patricia Andress, who is definitely on her way up in the opera world, made a charming and dramatically impressive Violetta. Her voice is big without being brash, capable of both lyric subtlety and dramatic flourish, and always solidly on pitch. It will be a pleasure to follow her career, especially since she is scheduled to sing Mimi in a touring production of La Boheme for Opera Theater of St. Louis this Fall.

As far as production values are concerned, the word for both set design and lighting is "minimal;" Stacy Snyder's period costumes, on the other hand, are lush and colorful.

All in all, the Union Avenue Opera Theater production of Verdi's La Traviata is very strong, indeed; in fact, the only serious flaw is that there are only two more performances, July 19 and 20 [2002], and tickets may be hard to get. The two weekend run of Tosca begins August 16. 
 

All performances are fully staged and performed in Italian with projected translations.  On August 16th audio description services will be provided and Dr. Glen Bauer, Director of Music History and Literature at Webster University, will give a pre-concert program at 7 PM.  Dr. Bauer recently visited Italy and all of the sites where the events of Tosca occurred. 

All performances begin at 8 PM at Union Avenue Christian Church, 733 North Union Blvd., located one block north of Delmar.  Center Front tickets are $25.  General Admission tickets are $20 and tickets for students and seniors are $18.  Doors open at 7:15 PM.  For more information call 314-361-2881 or e-mail uaot@juno.com. 

Carla Thelen Hanson, Tosca, has appeared in concert, opera and music theatre in Arizona, California and Minnesota, including appearances in the American Premiere of Dame Ethyl Smyth’s The Forest as Roschen with Plymouth Music Series under the direction of Philip Brunelle, with Rochester Arias Group as Susannah in Susannah, as Aldonza in Man of La Mancha with the Flagstaff Spectrum Series, as Violetta in La Traviata and Rosalinde in Die Fledermaus with NAU Opera Theatre, and as the cover for Lia in L’enfant Prodigue, as Woglinde for Arizona Opera’s Der Ring des Nibelungen and for Mimi in La Bohème with the Flagstaff Symphony.  On the concert stage, Ms. Hanson has been a featured soloist in performances of Vivaldi’s Gloria, Barber’s Hermit Songs and Verdi’s Requiem.  She currently resides in Rochester, MN where she teaches private voice and piano.   Ms. Hanson has studied with Dr. Lloyd W. Hanson and is a current student of Elizabeth Mannion.

Zeffin Quinn Hollis, Scarpia, is swiftly becoming recognized for his delicious portrayals of opera’s most famous rogues and devils. He has brought to the stage the polished malevolence of such characters as Méphistophèlés in Faust, Scarpia in Tosca, Olin Blitch in Susannah, The High Priest of Dagon in Samson et Dalila, and Count Ceprano in Rigoletto.  Equally skillful in the comedies, he has created revealing and witty portrayals of Figaro in Le Nozze di Figaro, Guglielmo in Così fan Tutte, Haly in l’Italiana in Algeri, and the Father in Hansel and Gretel.  Mr. Hollis began his career in the theatre and made his professional operatic debut in 1998.  In 1999 and 2000, he was a member of Santa Fe Opera’s distinguished Apprentice Artist Program for Singers, performing on the main stage as well as in the Apprentice Showcase Programs.  He was a Grand Finals Winner in the Ellen Faull Gordon Competition in 1999 and a Metropolitan Opera National Council Midwest Regional Finalist in 2002.  He performed the role of Dottore Grenvil in La Traviata for Opera Pacific and recently made his debut with Ocean State Lyric Opera of Rhode Island as Sharpless in Madama Butterfly.  Upcoming projects include a debut as Stravinsky’s gracefully devious Nick Shadow (The Rake's Progress) at Los Angeles' Dell Chamber Opera and the Four Villains in Offenbach's Les Contes d'Hoffman for Palm Beach Opera.

Russell Lamar Thomas, Cavarodossi, recently completed his debut season as a resident artist at the Tulsa Opera where he sang the roles of Borsa in Rigoletto, Ruiz in Il Trovatore, Nemorino in the company's tour of L'Elisir d'amore, and Janícku in Janácek's Diary of One Who Vanished, and also debuted at the Shreveport Opera as Elder Gleaton in Floyd's Susannah and John/William Still in Susan Kander's one act opera, She Never Lost a Passenger.  In the fall of 2001 Mr. Thomas made his debut with the Tulsa Philharmonic singing selections from Gershwin's Porgy and Bess.    During the 2000-2001 season Mr. Thomas was named a Roger R. Hinkley Artist at the Florida Grand Opera, where he performed Roderigo in Verdi's Otello, Male Chorus in Britten's The Rape of Lucretia and Ivan in the touring production of Wargo's The Music Shop.  Mr. Thomas has trained and performed with Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, Sarasota Opera, Opera North, and the Aspen Summer Music Festival.  In concert he has been heard in Handel's Messiah with St. Gregory's Episcopal Church and Orchestra, Rossini's Stabat Mater with Florida Grand Opera Chorus, and Lorenzitti's Grande Messe Symphonique with the Miami Bach Society.  Mr. Thomas recorded Thomas Sleeper's Aceldama: Field of Blood, which was released in the fall of 2001.  Future engagements include Rodolfo in La Bohème with Seattle Opera and recitals across the US.

Brian Clay Luedloff, stage director, recently staged Kurt Weill’s Down in the Valley and Malcolm Williamson’s The Happy Prince for Sarasota Youth Opera.  Earlier this season he directed The Daughter of the Regiment for Opera New England, and Cary John Franklin’s The Thunder of Horses for Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, as well as staging the second cast for The Dallas Opera student performances of Tosca.  In New York he directed Don Thompson’s Tibet Does Not Exist Off-Broadway, Carter Allen Winkle’s In The Third Person, and a sell-out Off-Off-Broadway revival of Martin Sherman’s Bent.  As an MFA Directing Fellow at Boston University’s School for the Arts, Mr. Luedloff taught acting in the school’s renowned Opera Institute, and directed Gilbert & Sullivan’s Trial by Jury, Christopher Hampton’s The Philanthropist, Harold Pinter’s The Birthday Party, Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler, The Diviners, and the musical Quilters.  Future engagements include La Bohème for Opera Theatre of Saint Louis’ fall educational tour, Barber of Seville for Opera New England, and assisting Olivier Tambosi on a new production of Un ballo in Maschera at Lyric Opera of Chicago.

Jolly Stewart, stage director, sang professionally as Julia Emoed-Wallace.  On her 24th birthday she debuted with the Salzburg Camerata under Bernhard Paumgartner in Modena, Italy, singing Fiordiligi in Mozart’s Così fan tutte.  Her Bachelor of Music degree is from Oberlin Conservatory and further degrees were earned at the Akademie Mozareum in Salzburg, Austria, as well as the United States. In 1990 she and her husband, John Stewart, moved to St. Louis where she directs the Washington University Opera and he is Director of Vocal Activities.  Ms. Stewarts’ production of Puccini’s Suor Angelica won the National Opera Association’s choice for first prize in 1995.  Last season she produced and directed Washington University Opera’s highly praised performances of Dominick Argento’s Miss Haversham’s Wedding Night and Menotti’s The Medium.  During the summers Ms. Stewart has given master classes in Salzburg, Austria, and conducted acting classes for Opera Theatre of Saint Louis’s Artist in Training program.  She is a regular director for the Black Hills Arts Festival and other regional companies.  For UAOT Ms. Stewart has directed Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro, Carlisle Floyd’s Susannah, Puccini’s La Bohème, and Bizet’s Carmen.