NEVERDARK SERIES 2019

UTE GFRERER, A native of Austria is an internationally acclaimed singer and performer, with a varied repertoire ranging from classical opera, operetta and Lied to 20th century masterpieces of Kurt Weill, French chanson and Broadway. After studying  Voice and Acting in Los Angeles, Ute Gfrerer was a soloist in opera houses and concert stages such as the Zurich Opera, the Vienna Volksoper, Alte Oper Frankfurt, the NHK Hall in Tokyo, The Megaron in Athens, the Festspielhaus Baden Baden and the Barbican Hall in London.

She worked with a number of renowned conductors, including Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Franz Welser-Moest, Thomas Hengelbrook, Latham König, Ralf Weikert, Carlos Kalmar, Bertrand de Billy and lngo Metzmacher on concert and opera stages in Zurich, Hamburg, Frankfurt, Munich, London, Tokyo, Amsterdam, Berlin, Lisbon, Salzburg, Bregenz und Vienna.

ADAM TURNER (Artistic Director) American conductor Adam Turner is quickly gaining momentum as a conductor to watch on international opera stages. Recently named Artistic Director of Virginia Opera (following four seasons as Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor), Maestro Turner garners critical acclaim for the breadth of his repertoire, artistic vision, and polished technique. Of his recent performance of Der Freischütz with Virginia Opera, Opera News hailed: “Conductor Adam Turner … ensured crackling rhythms as much as lyrical spaciousness, resulting in a performance that felt vital and spontaneous throughout.”

In his inaugural season as Artistic Director of Virginia Opera, Maestro Turner will conduct performances of Street Scene, Don Giovanni, The Elixir of Love, and Madama Butterfly, in addition to Jack Perla’s An American Dream. On top of his productions at Virginia Opera, he will conduct The Seven Deadly Sins for the Buffalo Philharmonic, Eugene Onegin with Intermountain Opera Bozeman, and Jake Heggie’s Three Decembers with San Diego Opera. Mo. Turner will also return to Central City Opera to conduct Madama Butterfly for the 2019 summer season. Last season, Mo. Turner conducted Händel’s Messiah at Virginia Symphony and The Halloween Tree with American Lyric Theatre at Arizona State University. In his post at Virginia Opera, he conducted performances of Samson et Dalila and A Midsummer Night’s Dream. As the inaugural recipient of the Julius Rudel/Kurt Weill Conducting Fellowship in 2015, he collaborated with renowned conductor John DeMain on Washington National Opera’s production of Kurt Weill’s final stage composition Lost in the Stars. Other recent guest conducting engagements include appearances with Washington National Opera, Hawaii Opera Theatre, Central City Opera, Eugene Opera, Lyric Opera Baltimore, and Northwestern University.