Adult Education and the Community 10-28-2008 OCP knows you're excited to learn more about opera! We would like to remind you to mark your calendar for our Taste of Opera lecture for The Italian Girl in Algiers on Sunday, November 9, 2008 from 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. and to encourage you to attend Opera Overtures, our pre-opera lectures that begin one hour before every performance. For more information about adult education opportunities, click here. Tony Award-winning Broadway star and Curtis Institute alumnus Shuler Hensley stars in the title role of Curtis Opera Theatre’s Wozzeck. The Opera Company of Philadelphia is committed to helping everyone in our community learn more and gain exposure to this art form. Each season, OCP seeks out innovative and diverse partnerships to enrich the public’s understanding of opera and the arts at large. As Philadelphia’s professional opera company, we are proud to work with many other opera providers in the city, such as the Curtis Institute of Music and the Academy of Vocal Arts, to feature singers cultivated from our longstanding relationships with these worldclass institutions. In addition to casting these rising talents, such as AVA soprano Ailyn Pérez (Fidelio and Gianni Schicchi) and tenor Stephen Costello (Gianni Schicchi), in our productions, last season OCP entered into a groundbreaking collaboration with Curtis Opera Theatre and Kimmel Center Presents to present Osvaldo Golijov’s Grammy-winning opera Ainadamar. The collaboration continues this season with Alban Berg’s electrifying Wozzeck, featuring Tony Award-winning Broadway star and Curtis alumnus Shuler Hensley in the title role alongside the rising stars of Curtis Opera Theatre and OCP Music Director Corrado Rovaris leading the Curtis Symphony Orchestra. Another innovative partnership began in February 2007 with Hip H’opera, a program that celebrated the urban experience within a classical music setting in collaboration with the Art Sanctuary’s North Stars program. Hip H’opera fused the hip-hop style poems of students from the North Stars afterschool program with the music of classically trained area composers. OCP is currently in a planning cycle with Art Sanctuary to reprise this exciting program in the near future, reaching an even broader audience. Hip H’opera participant TyAnn Brown (right) and her grandmother Eileen Brown met with Governor Ed Rendell at the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts’ Poetry Out Loud Award Ceremony, where her Hip H’opera poem was performed. In addition to Hip H’opera and the award-winning Sounds of Learning™ program, the Opera Company is embarking on new ways to use technology to reach area students. On November 6th, OCP participated in a broadcast to local universities using Internet 2, a high-bandwidth educational internet network which allows interactive video conferences with locations across the globe. Italian Girl in Algiers star Lawrence Brownlee talked with music students from Temple University, Rutgers University Camden, Bucks County Community College, and Montgomery County Community College about his life, his career, and the challenges of being an opera performer. Reaching out to Philadelphia’s visual arts institutions, the Opera Company continues its partnership with the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts this season to present our Taste of Opera lecture series after partnering with the Locks Gallery on Washington Square. The Locks Gallery featured ceramic sculpture and works on paper by Fidelio designer Jun Kaneko to bring the world-renowned artist’s works to our Philadelphia audience. We look forward to continuing to reach into the community to develop these innovative partnerships and forge new bonds in order keep Philadelphia’s operatic tradition strong and its future bright.
OCP knows you're excited to learn more about opera! We would like to remind you to mark your calendar for our Taste of Opera lecture for The Italian Girl in Algiers on Sunday, November 9, 2008 from 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. and to encourage you to attend Opera Overtures, our pre-opera lectures that begin one hour before every performance. For more information about adult education opportunities, click here.
Tony Award-winning Broadway star and Curtis Institute alumnus Shuler Hensley stars in the title role of Curtis Opera Theatre’s Wozzeck.
The Opera Company of Philadelphia is committed to helping everyone in our community learn more and gain exposure to this art form. Each season, OCP seeks out innovative and diverse partnerships to enrich the public’s understanding of opera and the arts at large.
As Philadelphia’s professional opera company, we are proud to work with many other opera providers in the city, such as the Curtis Institute of Music and the Academy of Vocal Arts, to feature singers cultivated from our longstanding relationships with these worldclass institutions. In addition to casting these rising talents, such as AVA soprano Ailyn Pérez (Fidelio and Gianni Schicchi) and tenor Stephen Costello (Gianni Schicchi), in our productions, last season OCP entered into a groundbreaking collaboration with Curtis Opera Theatre and Kimmel Center Presents to present Osvaldo Golijov’s Grammy-winning opera Ainadamar. The collaboration continues this season with Alban Berg’s electrifying Wozzeck, featuring Tony Award-winning Broadway star and Curtis alumnus Shuler Hensley in the title role alongside the rising stars of Curtis Opera Theatre and OCP Music Director Corrado Rovaris leading the Curtis Symphony Orchestra.
Another innovative partnership began in February 2007 with Hip H’opera, a program that celebrated the urban experience within a classical music setting in collaboration with the Art Sanctuary’s North Stars program. Hip H’opera fused the hip-hop style poems of students from the North Stars afterschool program with the music of classically trained area composers. OCP is currently in a planning cycle with Art Sanctuary to reprise this exciting program in the near future, reaching an even broader audience.
Hip H’opera participant TyAnn Brown (right) and her grandmother Eileen Brown met with Governor Ed Rendell at the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts’ Poetry Out Loud Award Ceremony, where her Hip H’opera poem was performed.
In addition to Hip H’opera and the award-winning Sounds of Learning™ program, the Opera Company is embarking on new ways to use technology to reach area students. On November 6th, OCP participated in a broadcast to local universities using Internet 2, a high-bandwidth educational internet network which allows interactive video conferences with locations across the globe. Italian Girl in Algiers star Lawrence Brownlee talked with music students from Temple University, Rutgers University Camden, Bucks County Community College, and Montgomery County Community College about his life, his career, and the challenges of being an opera performer.
Reaching out to Philadelphia’s visual arts institutions, the Opera Company continues its partnership with the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts this season to present our Taste of Opera lecture series after partnering with the Locks Gallery on Washington Square. The Locks Gallery featured ceramic sculpture and works on paper by Fidelio designer Jun Kaneko to bring the world-renowned artist’s works to our Philadelphia audience.
We look forward to continuing to reach into the community to develop these innovative partnerships and forge new bonds in order keep Philadelphia’s operatic tradition strong and its future bright.
