Opera Director

Universally acclaimed as one of Europe’s most original and progressive directors, and widely celebrated as the founder of the global #OperaHarmony movement, auteur-director Ella Marchment has also taken on leadership roles for international arts organisations and spoken and lectured at world-renowned companies and conservatoires, including Opera Europa in the Netherlands, Italy, and Germany, The Royal Opera House in London, The Juilliard School in New York, and The Royal College of Music in London. Her work has been broadcast nationally on BBC Radio 3, and internationally on Opera Vision.

Represented by Day Macaskill of Cruickshank Cazenove Limited in London, Ella’s career has seen her working successfully as both a director and an arts-company manager, and she is currently the Artistic Director of Opera Festival of Chicago, Director of Opera and Associate Professor at Shenandoah Conservatory, Artistic Director of Opera in the Rock, and has been the Director of the International Opera Awards since 2017. Additionally she was part of the Guildhall School of Music and Drama vocal faculty from 2019-2021, the head of opera and an Instructor at Northern Illinois University from 2020-2021, and a 2020-2021 Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity associate artist. She is also a founding member and creative associate of the campaign group and charity SWAP’ra—Supporting Women & Parents in Opera. During the coronavirus pandemic of 2020, Ella founded an international community group called #OperaHarmony which developed new operas remotely for broadcast worldwide on Opera Vision, and since the war in Ukraine broke out has been working in partnership with San Francisco Opera, Opera Vision Opera Lviv, Polish National Opera, Teatro Opera dell’Roma, Finnish National Opera, The Royal College of Music, Opera Europa, and Shenandoah University to record a Ukrainian Opera called The Golden Crown for distribution on World Opera Day. The filmed works were showcased worldwide by OperaVision. She is currently writing a book on arts management for Nick Hern Books, and is in the first year of an online distance PhD at Bristol University writing a treatise on gender inequity in the opera industry.

Ella has worked throughout the United Kingdom, Europe, Scandinavia, Russia, and America, and her directing credits include L’inganno felice (Wexford Festival Opera, Opera Festival of Chicago); Il Tabarro, Segreto di Susanna (Opera Festival of Chicago), Native American Inspirations (La Biennale di Venezia); (Scalia Ginsburg (Opera in the Rock); Little Women (Opera Holland Park); The Turn of the Screw and Mad King Suibhne (Bury Court Opera); International Opera Awards Ceremony (ENO London Coliseum and Sadler’s Wells Theatre, for the International Opera Awards); Operatic Mass Actions (European City of Culture, AUT DK); SWAP’ra Gala (Opera Holland Park); Tryl / Magic Flute (Copenhagen Opera Festival); Sideshows (Sadler’s Wells Studio); Il Letto and Hathaway (Buxton International Festival, Copenhagen Opera Festival, Grimeborn); L’occasione fa il ladro (CCF Glasgow, Teatro Signorelli, Teatro di Cortona); Say Hello, Wave Goodbye (Teatro Tuoro sul Trasimeno); King Roger (a film for Random Acts / Channel 4); Salon Russe (National Portrait Gallery); Il Tabarro (LSO St Luke’s); Macbeth and Un ballo in maschera (Opera Integra); María De Buenos Aires (The Vaults London, for a A Curious Invitation); Louise and Otello (Buxton International Festival); An Evening with Lucian Freud (Leicester Square Theatre); Stand and Deliver (King’s Head Theatre); Rock Tosca (Tête à Tête Festival); Façade and Eight Songs For a Mad King (Rose Theatre Kingston, Arcola Theatre, St Petersburg Philharmonia); Triptych (Mariinsky II); and a triple- header production of The Bear, Red as Blood, and Bare (Rose Theatre Kingston, Sage Gateshead, Greyfriars Kirk, St Cyprian’s).

Upcoming productions include Highway One (Opera in the Rock), The International Opera Awards (Teatro Real, Madrid), and Midsummer Nights Dream (Shenandoah Conservatory)

Director of Community and Learning – Houston Grand Opera

Jennifer Bowman joined Houston Grand Opera (HGO) as Director of Community & Learning after five years as the Director of Music Education at The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. Bowman leads HGO’s Community & Learning division (formerly HGOCo): which has been celebrated for providing authentic and enriching experiences through collaborative partnerships with schools, families, community organizations, and curious members of society since 2007.

As the Kennedy Center’s Director of Music Education, Bowman developed performances, programming, and educational initiatives in collaboration with the National Symphony Orchestra (NSO), Washington National Opera (WNO), and the Center’s hip hop, jazz, and chamber music programs. Among her notable achievements, she served as the Center’s lead representative for the Washington Musical Pathways Initiative for young BIPOC artists wishing to pursue advanced study in music; spearheaded WNO’s 18-month community engagement project in support of Blue, an opera about a Harlem family’s experience with police brutality; revamped the Center’s training programs for young musicians; commissioned new works that reflect the population of the region served by the Center; and introduced youth and family audiences to diverse artists making their Center debuts.

The Houston, Texas native’s career began at the Kennedy Center, where she coordinated professional development programs for chief executives and staff for over six hundred arts and cultural organizations in the U.S. and abroad. She also spent six seasons managing The Folger Consort, the early music ensemble at the Folger Shakespeare Library. In 2020, she co-led Music Academy of the West’s transition to an online summer festival in response to the pandemic. She serves on Music Academy’s Innovation & Education Committee as well as on the Board of Directors for the National Instrumentalists Mentorship & Advancement Network (NIMAN).

Director of Community and Learning – Houston Grand Opera

Rebecca Ann S. Kirk, M.Ed. combines her skills in community arts education and curriculum design, creative youth development, creative facilitation, and program management to build sustainable, equitable, and authentic community partnerships. She is currently the Director of Community & Learning for Boston Lyric Opera and has worked in the community arts sector for nearly twenty years with organizations including Washington National Opera, Jacobs Pillow, Caldera Arts, and the Tower Theater Foundation. She has a gift for seeing the potential in others and empowering them to creatively contribute in a way that honors their strengths and supports the community. Rebecca is passionate about cultivating relationships between sectors to build innovative partnerships that contribute to the goals of each partner. She believes the arts and artists have an essential role to play in fostering healthy, engaged communities.

Rebecca is a self-proclaimed life-long learner and integrates her experiences into her work. She embodies the heart and soul of an artist with training and practice in classical voice, dance, theater, and the visual arts. She is an educator with experience as a teaching artist, curriculum design, and has trained and mentored teaching artists. Rebecca is also a researcher who has contributed to the field of community arts education. She holds an M.Ed. from Lesley University in Art, Community, and Education and B.A. in Sociology from Whitman College.

Soprano, Arts Administrator, and Founder of Latina Women in Opera

Cynthia López Pérez is a Xicana operatic soprano, administrator and educator. She is the Executive Director and Co-founder of Latina Women in Opera, an organization dedicated to promoting and supporting femme-identifying Latina, and non-binary & gender non-conforming Latinx. She is a 2021 National Association of Latinx Arts and Cultures (NALAC) Leadership Institute Fellow, a non-profit dedicated to the professional development of Latinx artists and Latinx-led organizations. Cynthia is an alumna of Boston Conservatory at Berklee with a Master of Music degree in Opera Performance. As an arts professional, she is dedicated to championing Latinx representation with intentionality, centering historically-excluded folks within the community in the classical music industry. She has co-curated several concerts in New York City dedicated to highlighting social justice issues and political crises affecting Latinx in both Latin America and the United States, raising funds for nonprofits such as Raíces and SOS Venezuela. She has had the pleasure of combining her work as a professional in the arts and activist through concert work, new work workshops, lectures, panel discussions, and community outreach. She firmly believes that at the heart of leadership work is community, collaboration, and connection.