Das Rheingold

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Composer & Librettist: Richard Wagner
Premiere Date: September 22, 1869, National Theatre Munich, Germany

Desire for a coveted ring begins a mammoth adventure to Valhalla. Gods, dwarves, giants, river nymphs, and dragons scheme and dream of power in Das Rheingold, the influential masterpiece by Richard Wagner that echoes in our popular culture today. Never before presented in the southeast, this Rheingold features great American voices in an all-new production from Tomer Zvulun and the creative team that created Salome in February 2020. This is history in the making at The Atlanta Opera. Unmissable. Featuring Greer Grimsley as Wotan and Kristinn Sigmundsson as Fasolt. Arthur Fagen conducts. This production includes depictions of kidnapping and ransoming.

Sung in German with English Supertitles

Cast

Greer Grimsley
Wotan

Richard Cox
Loge

Zachary Nelson
Alberich

Julius Ahn
Mime

Elizabeth DeShong
Fricka

Ronnita Miller
Erda

Kristinn Sigmundsson
Fasolt

Daniel Sumegi
Fafner

Joseph Barron
Donner

Adam Diegel
Froh

Jessica Faselt
Freia

Cadie J. Bryan
Woglinde

Alexandra Razskazoff
Wellgunde

Gretchen Krupp
Flosshilde

Creative

Arthur Fagen
Conductor

Tomer Zvulun
Stage Director

Erhard Rom
Scenic & Projection Designer

Mattie Ullrich
Costume Designer

Robert Wierzel
Lighting Designer

David Zimmerman
Wig & Makeup Designer

Ran Arthur Braun
Live Action Designer

Erin Teachman
Projection Programmer

Cast

Greer Grimsley
Wotan

Richard Cox
Loge

Zachary Nelson
Alberich

Julius Ahn
Mime

Elizabeth DeShong
Fricka

Ronnita Miller
Erda

Kristinn Sigmundsson
Fasolt

Daniel Sumegi
Fafner

Joseph Barron
Donner

Adam Diegel
Froh

Jessica Faselt
Freia

Cadie J. Bryan
Woglinde

Alexandra Razskazoff
Wellgunde

Gretchen Krupp
Flosshilde

Creative

Arthur Fagen
Conductor

Tomer Zvulun
Stage Director

Erhard Rom
Scenic & Projection Designer

Mattie Ullrich
Costume Designer

Robert Wierzel
Lighting Designer

David Zimmerman
Wig & Makeup Designer

Ran Arthur Braun
Live Action Designer

Erin Teachman
Projection Programmer

Can’t make it to the show? Don’t worry!

You can experience Das Rheingold by watching our FREE livestream Friday, May 5. Sign up now for access.
Banner_Performance_RheingoldProduction2

Composer & Librettist: Richard Wagner
Premiere Date: September 22, 1869, National Theatre Munich, Germany

Desire for a coveted ring begins a mammoth adventure to Valhalla. Gods, dwarves, giants, river nymphs, and dragons scheme and dream of power in Das Rheingold, the influential masterpiece by Richard Wagner that echoes in our popular culture today. Never before presented in the southeast, this Rheingold features great American voices in an all-new production from Tomer Zvulun and the creative team that created Salome in February 2020. This is history in the making at The Atlanta Opera. Unmissable. Featuring Greer Grimsley as Wotan and Kristinn Sigmundsson as Fasolt. Arthur Fagen conducts. This production includes depictions of kidnapping and ransoming.

Sung in German with English Supertitles

Forte Friday

Young professionals enjoy a pre-show cocktail hour + ticket to the show
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Final Dress Rehearsal

Teachers with students may attend the final dress rehearsal for FREE
More Info >

Student & Military Rush Tickets

Students, veterans, and active military with ID may purchase discount tickets two hours in advance at the Cobb Energy Centre
$25 – 35 per seat

Get the Feeling

Community Events

Goethe-Zentrum: Notes on Opera in Wagner’s Das Rheingold
Sunday, April 23, 2-4pm | Goethe-Zentrum Atlanta German Cultural Center | 223 Peachtree Street, NE, Suite 100, Atlanta, GA 30303 | 404-892-2388
Goethe-Atlanta members: $20; Non-members: $25 | Get tickets here

Are you a “Ring-Nut” or a “Ring-let”? A longtime fan or a newbie to the Wagner universe? However deeply you have engaged in the music and imagination of Richard Wagner, you are invited to hear more. Presented in English by David Kerr, educator and staff member at the German Cultural Center of Atlanta, the lecture focuses on Das Rheingold, the first of four-opera cycle of Das Ring des Nibelungen. Learn about the composer, his music, the plot, the characters, the historical background and more. No pre-existing knowledge of either music or German, Italian or other language required.

Opera Insights with Jay Hunter Morris
Saturday, April 29 at 7-7:30pm | Cobb Energy Performing Arts Center, 2800 Cobb Galleria Pkwy, Atlanta, GA 30339 | Orchestra Level, Portal B
Free with performance ticket

Meet Grammy award-winning tenor Jay Hunter Morris. As one of the handful of singers who can credibly handle the demands of Richard Wagner’s tenor role of the hero Siegfried, Morris will present the pre-opera talk each night. One hour prior to curtain. Free with your ticket!

Wagner’s Jews – Film Screening and Panel Discussion
Sunday, April 30, 3 – 4:30pm | The Breman Museum | 1440 Spring Street, NW, Atlanta, GA 30309 | 678-222-3700
Free – Registration required

Richard Wagner was a revolutionary whose inspired compositions and expansive vision changed the course of classical music forever. At the same time, he was a man of his time, a German nationalist who absorbed and even amplified the casual and cruel social anti-Semitism of the 19th century. Despite being surrounded by exceptional Jewish musicians who championed his career and supported his artistic vision, Wagner publicly encouraged the growing political racism of the time. Yet, his actions and personal relationships often belied this position.

As lovers of his music, how do we reconcile this racist and small thinking with the vast inspiration of his musical imagination?
Is there more to understand about Wagner as revealed by his personal relationships?
Does art transcend prejudice and bigotry? 

Join the Atlanta Opera, The Breman Museum, and the Goethe Zentrum of Atlanta to explore this perplexing dichotomy in the life of Richard Wagner in Hilan Warshaw’s documentary Wagner’s Jews.

The screening will be followed by a panel discussion with Tomer Zvulun (Carl W. Knobloch, Jr. General & Artistic Director, Atlanta Opera), Hilan Warshaw (filmmaker and President, Overtone Films), Arthur Fagen (Music Director, Atlanta Opera), and Rabbi Joe Prass (Director of the Weinberg Center for Holocaust Education at The Breman Museum).

German Language Breakfast with Arthur Fagen
Wednesday, May 3 at 9:30am | Goethe-Zentrum Atlanta German Cultural Center | 223 Peachtree Street, NE, Suite 100, Atlanta, GA 30303 | 404-892-2388
Get tickets here

Germanic mythology is the starting point for worlds of imagination that surround us today. Stories of The Lord of the Rings, The Chronicles of Narnia, and even the current crop of Marvel superheroes grow from these roots. However, before any of these, the world of gods, dwarves, dragons, and a ring of power was created by Richard Wagner in his epic cycle of operas, Das Ring des Niebelungen. The first of the four-opera cycle, Das Rheingold, will be performed by The Atlanta Opera this spring (April 29 – May 7).

Join Arthur Fagen, music director and conductor of The Atlanta Opera, as he discusses how the music dramas of Richard Wagner changed the face of music and had a staggering influence on the path of the 20th century.

Synopsis

ACT I

In the depths of the Rhine, the three Rhinemaidens guard the Rhinegold, a treasure of immeasurable value. The Nibelung dwarf Alberich is dazzled by the sight of it. The girls explain that whoever wins the gold and forges it into a ring will gain power over the world, but must first renounce love. Frustrated by his unsuccessful attempts to catch one of the girls, Alberich curses love and steals the gold.

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Wotan, lord of the gods, is reproached by his wife Fricka: he has promised to give Freia, goddess of youth, to the giants Fasolt and Fafner in return for their building a fortress for the gods. When the giants demand their reward, Loge, the god of fire, suggests an alternative payment: the ring Alberich has forged from the Rhinegold, and his other treasures. The giants agree, and Wotan and Loge leave for the Nibelungs’ underground home.

Here they meet Alberich’s brother Mime, who has forged the Tarnhelm, a magic helmet that transforms its wearer into any shape. Mime tells Wotan and Loge how Alberich has enslaved the Nibelungs to work for him. Alberich appears and mocks the gods. Loge asks for a demonstration of the Tarnhelm and Alberich turns himself into a dragon, then into a toad, which the gods capture. Dragged to the surface, the dwarf is forced to summon the Nibelungs to heap up the gold. Wotan wrests the ring from his finger. Shattered, Alberich curses the ring: ceaseless worry and death shall be the destiny of its bearer.

The giants return and agree to accept the gold. The gods have to give up even the Tarnhelm, but Wotan refuses to part with the ring. Erda, goddess of the earth, appears and warns him that possession of it will bring about the end of the gods. Wotan reluctantly gives the ring to the giants, and Alberich’s curse claims its first victim as Fafner kills his brother in a dispute over the treasure. As the voices of the Rhinemaidens are heard, lamenting the loss of their gold, the gods walk toward their new home, which Wotan names Valhalla.

– courtesy of the Metropolitan Opera

Characters & Cast

Wotan

Greer Grimsley

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Loge

Richard Cox

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Alberich

Zachary Nelson

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Mime

Julius Ahn

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Fricka

Elizabeth DeShong

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Erda

Ronnita Miller

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Fasolt

Kristinn Sigmundsson

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Fafner

Daniel Sumegi

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Donner

Joseph Barron

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Froh

Adam Diegel

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Freia

Jessica Faselt

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Woglinde

Cadie J. Bryan

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Wellgunde

Alexandra Razskazoff

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Flosshilde

Gretchen Krupp

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A First Timer’s Guide

The Opera Experience

Operas on our mainstage are grand theatrical experiences. You can always expect the unexpected, and for our productions to be presented at the highest quality.

Supertitles

Many operas are in a foreign language. Supertitles are similar to subtitles in a film, except they are projected above the stage. These translations will help you follow what’s happening on stage.

What to Wear

There is no dress code at The Opera and you will see everything from jeans to evening gowns and formal suits. Most people use it as a chance to enjoy dressing up in their own style.

Arriving in Good Time

If you are late, you will be escorted to the nearest late seating area. At intermission ushers will show you to your seat. Plan ahead to arrive with extra time.

Directions & Parking at Cobb Energy Center

Enhance Your Visit

Pre-Performance Talk

Learn about the history of the opera, the composer, and more from artists and opera aficionados. One hour prior to curtain. Free with your ticket!

Learn More

Familiarizing Yourself with the Story

Because of the foreign languages, classical music, and often complex plots, you will very likely enjoy the performance better if you spend a few minutes familiarizing yourself with the story and characters in advance. Some people even like to listen to the music in advance and others prefer to let it wash over them during the show and perhaps look it up afterwards.

Visit our Study Guides Library

How is an Opera Staged?

Auditions

Actors first audition for roles up to a year in advance, or for more experienced artists, directors also invite them to play a role.

Rehearsals

Most of the rehearsals are held in our rehearsal hall, and not the actual theatre. The conductor begins orchestra rehearsals about a week and half before opening night. They have four rehearsals with the conductor, and then the singers are added into the mix.

Sets & Costumes

The Atlanta Opera Costume Shop alters the costumes to fit our singers. Sometimes they do have to make costumes if there aren’t enough, or if there is nothing that fits, etc. Once the sets are in place, the cast begins rehearsing at the theatre. The Opera production staff works with staff at the theatre to get all of the lighting and technical aspects of the production together.

Sitzprobe & Dress Rehearsal

The orchestra comes together with the singers in a special rehearsal called sitzprobe. There are no costumes during the sitzprobe, this is mainly to hear the voices with the orchestra. There is a piano dress rehearsal, when the singers rehearse in full costume for the first time so they can get used to wearing them. Finally, all of the pieces are put together for two full dress rehearsals leading up to opening night.

Composer

Richard Wagner
(1813 – 1883)

Richard Wagner molded opera according to his own creative definition with revolutionary zeal. Consequently, his innovations in melodic structure, harmony, characterization and orchestration have inspired awe among audiences and music professionals alike for over a century. Impressionist and expressionist composers have spent most of this century struggling to overcome his influence, rebelling against him. Wagner was a man who lived in capital letters and bold print, a study in superlatives: huge creative canvases, legendary feuds and hatreds, gigantic depressions and losses, enormous successes, and passionate romantic liaisons. His music represents the dynamic and incandescent final flowering of romanticism.

Egocentric from childhood, Wagner began at age twenty to record details of his personal and creative life in a series of journals, all in anticipation of drafting an extensive autobiography in later life. He never seems to have doubted his destiny or his own titanic genius. At first, Wagner fancied himself a writer and planned a career in the literary world, drafting a ghoulish drama, Leubald  which killed off forty-two characters in the first four acts, with some returning as ghosts in the fifth.
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Attendance at performances of Weber’s Der Freischutz and Beethoven’s Fidelio  turned his attention toward a lifelong obsession with operatic composition. With his mother’s encouragement, he undertook the serious study of music, an academic process peppered with bouts of drinking, dueling, and gambling. Wagner’s father, at least in name, was Karl Friedrich Wagner, a police court clerk who died while his son was in infancy. In recent years, evidence gathered would indicate that Wagner’s biological father was actually Ludwig Geyer, a talented painter, dramatist and actor. Geyer married Wagner’s mother shortly after she was widowed.

He introduced his love of literature, art and theater into the household. Although Geyer died while Wagner was only eight years old, the stepfather’s influence had an indelible effect on the boy.

Wagner’s earliest works, two orchestral overtures, were completed in 1829 and received scornfully. A spare six months of formal music education came from Theodor Weinlig, cantor of the Thomasschule, in 1831. Those studies culminated in the composition of a Wagner symphony which was well-received in Leipzig and Prague. He began work on an opera Die Hochzeit , and tossed it aside unfinished, then completed a full operatic work Die Feen , which was destined not to be performed until five years after the composer’s death.

He undertook a series of conducting posts with small, sordid operatic companies, and there built the instinct and skills which would forge his colossal vision of musical drama. In 1836, Wagner married Minna Planer, an impulsive act he almost instantly regretted. Although mediocre, the union lasted until 1862.

Wagner struggled to establish himself in opera in Paris, living on the verge of starvation, from time to time imprisoned for his debts. Minna took in boarders. His preliminary sketches of the operas Rienzi  and Das Liebesverbot were rejected by producers despite introductory letters from Giacomo Meyerbeer. Wagner staggered briefly under the humiliation, then turned to a new concept, The Flying Dutchman, and although impoverished and unknown declared himself victorious at its completion in 1841. He was not far from wrong. La Rienzi  opened in Dresden in 1842 to enormous acclaim. A triumph followed the next year for The Flying Dutchman, in the same city.

Wagner became Kapellmeister of the Dresden opera and should have realized financial security at last. However, he continued to live far in excess of his means, accumulating impossible debts. Within the five years which followed, he had completed Tannhauser  and Lohengrin. However, Lohengrin, which he considered his greatest effort to date was rejected by Dresden opera and, in anger, Wagner turned to revolution. He wrote handbills sympathetic to Dresden rioters who were creating a growing insurrection in the state of Saxony. When the revolution failed, Wagner was forced to flee to Paris.

During the thirteen years of Wagner’s exile, Lohengrin was presented in Weimar and was received tentatively just as Tannhauser had been. However, in the decade which followed both operas were embraced by German audiences. In fact, by the time his exile ended in 1860, Wagner was one of the few Germans who had never witnessed a performance of Lohengrin.

Years of high living had nearly bankrupted Wagner when, in 1864, the newly-crowned eighteen year old King Ludwig II became the composer’s devoted benefactor. Wagner produced Tristan and Isolde, Meistersinger, Das Rhinegold, and Die Walküre, in the five years between 1865 and 1870. However, his enormous persuasive influence on King Ludwig placed Wagner at the mercy of warring political factions who demanded the composer’s allegiance. Wagner refused all of them categorically. His refusal to engage in intrigue, combined with his involvement in a scandalous affair with the married daughter of Franz Lizst, Cosima von Bulow, drove Wagner from Munich. Wagner had indulged in numerous romantic liaisons in the past. However, in this case he had fathered a child whom his betrayed friend, Cosima’s husband Hans von Bulow, graciously accepted as his own. Cosima and Wagner acknowledged von Bulow’s discretion by naming the girl Isolde.

Once more in exile, Wagner continued receiving financial support from King Ludwig at a retreat near Lucerne, Switzerland. And, when his legal wife, Minna, died in 1866, he at last married Cosima.

The final years of Wagner’s life were dedicated to completion of the gargantuan music project – The Ring – which was to combine all the noblest forms of Art in its presentation: innovative melodic structure, ambitious orchestration and instrumentation, intensely dramatic characterization and evocative sets. His concept was immense: an orchestral, vocal and theatrical portrayal of the legendary struggle between gods and men for control of the earth. This compelling mythological drama would be presented over consecutive days in a series of four sequential operas: Das Rhinegold, Die Walküre, Siegfried, and Götterdämmerung.

And to that end, he also undertook the construction of his concept of the perfect operatic performance facility at Bayreuth. When the theater opened for the first full performance of The Ring cycle on August 13, 1876, the event was attended by the luminaries of the musical world including Tchaikovsky, Saint-Saëns, Gounod, Grieg, and Liszt. Tchaikovsky noted, “Whether Wagner is right in pursuing his idea to the limit, or whether he stepped over the boundary of aesthetic conventions which can guarantee the durability of a work of art, whether musical art will progress further on the road started by Wagner, or whether the “Ring” is to be the point from which a reaction will set in remains to be seen. But in any case what happened in Bayreth will be well remembered by our grandchildren and our great-grandchildren.” And so it has been.

Wagner died suddenly of heart disease in 1883, having been seriously debilitated by his efforts at premiering his final work, Parsifal. He was buried in the garden of his home Wahnfried, at Bayreuth to the music of “Siegfried’s Death.”

Courtesy Arizona Opera Virtual Opera House

ARCHIV - Der Komponist Richard Wagner (Archivfoto von 1877). Nach groflem Wirbel um die Besetzung der Titelpartie beginnen an diesem Mittwoch (25. Juli) die Bayreuther Festspiele mit der Oper ´Der Fliegende Holl‰nderª. dpa/lby (nur s/w,zu dpa-Themenpaket vom 23.07.2012)  +++(c) dpa - Bildfunk+++

Conductor

Arthur Fagen

Arthur Fagen has been the Carl and Sally Gable music director at The Atlanta Opera since 2010, and continues to be in great demand as a conductor of symphony and opera both in Europe and the United States. He is a regular guest at the most prestigious opera houses, concert halls, and music festivals at home and abroad, and his career has been marked by a string of notable appearances including the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Staatsoper Berlin, Munich State Opera, Deutsche Oper Berlin, and New York City Opera.

From 1998 to 2001, Fagen was invited regularly to be guest conductor at Vienna State Opera. On the concert podium, Fagen has appeared with internationally renowned orchestras, including Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Czech Philharmonic, Munich Radio Orchestra, Tokyo Philharmonic, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie, and RAI Orchestras of Turin, Naples, Milan, and Rome. From 2002 to 2007, he was the music director of Dortmund Philharmonic Orchestra and Opera. He serves as Chair and Professor, Department of Orchestral Conducting at Indiana University in Bloomington.

A former assistant of Christoph von Dohnanyi (Frankfurt Opera) and James Levine (Metropolitan Opera), he served as principal conductor in Kassel and Brunswick, as chief conductor of Flanders Opera of Antwerp and Ghent, as music director of Queens Symphony Orchestra, and as a member of the conducting staff for Lyric Opera of Chicago.

Fagen was born in New York and studied with Laszlo Halasz, Max Rudolf (Curtis Institute) and Hans Swarowsky. Fagen has an opera repertoire of more than 75 works and has recorded for Naxos and BMG. His Naxos recording of Bohuslav Martinůs works was awarded Editor’s Choice in the March 2010 issue of Gramophone Magazine.

Headshot_ArthurFagen23

Director

Tomer Zvulun

General and Artistic Director of The Atlanta Opera since 2013, Israeli born Tomer Zvulun is also one of leading stage director of his generation, earning consistent praise for his creative vision and innovative interpretations. His work has been presented by prestigious opera houses in Europe, South and Central America, Israel and the US, including The Metropolitan Opera, Washington National Opera, Seattle Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Dallas, San Diego, Boston, Pittsburgh, Minnesota, Montreal, Buenos Aires, Israeli Opera, and the festivals of Wexford, Glimmerglass and Wolf Trap, as well as leading educational institutes and universities such as The Juilliard School, Indiana University, and Boston University.

Tomer spent seven seasons on the directing staff of the Metropolitan Opera where he directed revivals of Carmen and Tosca and was involved with more than a dozen new productions. He is a frequent guest director in companies such as Seattle Opera (Semele, La Bohème, Eugene Onegin, Lucia di Lammermoor), Dallas Opera (Die Fledermaus, La Bohème), Houston (Flying Dutchman, Rigoletto), Wexford Festival (Silent Night, Dinner at Eight), Cincinnati Opera (Magic Flute, Don Giovanni, Flying Dutchman), Wolf Trap (Falstaff, Don Giovanni), Israeli Opera (Dead Man Walking, Giulio Cesare) among others. His European premiere of Silent Night at the Wexford Festival received two Irish Times Awards and traveled from Ireland to Washington National Opera, The Glimmerglass Festival and the opera companies of Atlanta, Austin and Salt Lake City.

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Zvulun directed over 15 new productions in his home company in Atlanta, including Dead Man Walking, Flying Dutchman, Soldier Songs, Silent Night, Maria de Buenos Aires, La Boheme, Madama Butterfly, Lucia di Lammermoor, Magic Flute, and Eugene Onegin to name but a few. During Tomer’s tenure, the company’s fundraising has tripled, resulting in twice the number of productions presented annually. His focus on innovation has garnered national attention and resulted in a Harvard Business School case study chronicling The Atlanta Opera’s turnaround, an International Opera Awards nomination, an ArtsATL Luminary Award, and an invitation to deliver a TEDx Talk about innovation in opera.

His upcoming projects include a new Rigoletto in Houston; a new Salome in Atlanta and Kansas City; revivals of his acclaimed production of Eugene Onegin in Montreal, Seattle and Palm Beach; Silent Night at Utah Opera; and Madama Butterfly and Glory Denied in Atlanta. He is currently working on developing a world premiere based on Anne Frank’s Diary and Sensorium Ex, a world premiere based on a story about artificial intelligence.

Tomer’s recent shows have traveled across continents, receiving critical acclaim for their striking visuals and cinematic quality. Some of them included The Flying Dutchman (Houston, Cincinnati, Atlanta), Dinner at Eight (Wexford Festival, Minnesota Opera), Eugene Onegin (Seattle, Atlanta, Detroit, Kansas City), Lucia di Lammermoor (Seattle, Atlanta, Cleveland) Silent Night (Wexford, Atlanta, Glimmerglass, Washington, Austin), Soldier Songs (Atlanta, San Diego), Dead Man Walking (New Orleans, Atlanta), La Bohème (Seattle, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Atlanta, Dallas), Lucrezia Borgia (Buenos Aires), Gianni Schicchi (Juilliard, IVAI Tel Aviv), L’heaure Espagnole (Juilliard), Magic Flute (Cincinnati, Atlanta, Indiana University), Don Giovanni (Wolf Trap, Cincinnati), Die Fledermaus (Dallas, Kansas City), Falstaff (Wolf Trap, Des Moines), Rigoletto (Boston, Atlanta, Omaha, Charlotte), Madama Butterfly (Atlanta, Castleton Festival, New Orleans), Tosca (National Theatre Panama, Atlanta) and Semele (Seattle).

Tomer Zvulun was born and raised in Israel, attended the open University in Tel Aviv and Harvard Business School and makes his home in Atlanta.

Headshot_ZvulunTomer

Scenic & Projection Designer

Erhard Rom

Erhard Rom has designed settings for over 250 productions across the globe. In 2015 he was named as a finalist in the Designer of the Year category for the International Opera Awards in London. His design work has frequently been displayed in the Prague Quadrennial International Design Exhibition and at the National Opera Center in Manhattan.  Originally from Seattle Washington, he now lives just outside of New York City and teaches design at Montclair State University in the Department of Theatre and Dance.

From a very early age he showed strong interests in both theatrical design and in music, which ultimately led him to pursue, first a degree in music, at the University of Washington and then an M.F.A. in design at NYU Tisch School of the Arts. Following his graduation in 1992 he began working regularly for regional companies throughout the country. While the bulk of his work has been for opera (including 14 world premiers) he has designed extensively for theater companies as well, and brings a theatrical sensibility to his operatic work that is combined with a deep understanding of the music.

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His work has been seen at San Francisco Opera, The Royal Swedish Opera, Washington National Opera, Wexford Festival Opera, Seattle Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Dallas Opera, Vancouver Opera, The Glimmerglass Festival, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, Minnesota Opera, the Bord Gáis Energy Theatre in Dublin, Fort Worth Opera, Boston Lyric Opera, Florida Grand Opera, Opera Colorado, Opéra de Montréal, The Atlanta Opera, Wolf Trap Opera, Opera Boston and Lyric Opera of Kansas City, among many others. His many credits include productions of Susannah, The Marriage of Figaro, Lucia di Lammermoor and Nixon in China (San Francisco Opera); Don Giovanni, Silent Night and Samson and Delilah (Washington National Opera); Semele, Eugene Onegin and La bohème (Seattle opera); Rigoletto (Houston Grand Opera); Jane Eyre, The Rape of Lucretia, Carmen, Faust and La bohème (Opera Theatre of Saint Louis); Tosca, La bohème, Sweeney Todd, Don Pasquale, Falstaff, Alcina, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Così fan tutte, Ariadne auf Naxos, Don Giovanni and The Rake’s Progress (Wolf Trap Opera); Valentino, Carmen,  Romeo and Juliet, The Merry Widow and Rusalka (Minnesota Opera). His theatrical work has been seen in places such as Syracuse Stage, Geva Theatre Center, Indiana Repertory Theatre, Folger Shakespeare Theatre, Shakespeare Santa Cruz, Merrimack Repertory Theatre and the Woolly Mammoth Theatre in Washington, D.C. His work in these venues includes productions of Romeo and Juliet, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Ghosts, The Triumph of Love, The Weir, Inherit the Wind, Death of a Salesman, 12 Angry Men, Brighton Beach Memoir, The Whipping Man and The Illusion.

He has collaborated with many of the world’s leading directors of opera, including Francesca Zambello, Nicholas Muni, Michael Cavanagh, Tomer Zvulun, Thaddeus Strassberger, Leon Major, Colin Graham and Lillian Groag. His list of world premieres includes John Musto and Mark Campbell’s Volpone and The Inspector, both for Wolf Trap Opera, as well as Later the Same Evening for Maryland Opera Studio and the Manhattan School of Music. Other premieres include The Shining for Minnesota Opera and the 2011 Glimmerglass Festival production of A Blizzard on Marblehead Neck with music by Jeanine Tesori and libretto by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Tony Kushner.  In 2014 he designed the European premiere of Kevin Puts recent opera, Silent Night.  The production was awarded two accolades at the 2015 Irish Times Theatre Awards Ceremony, including the audience choice award and best opera production of 2014.

Lighting Designer

Robert Wierzel

Robert Wierzel has worked in opera, theater, dance, museums, and contemporary music. Opera credits include productions with the opera companies of Paris Garnier, Tokyo, Toronto, Bergen, Norway, Glimmerglass Festival, Seattle, Boston Lyric, Minnesota, San Francisco, Houston, Virginia, Chicago Lyric, Opera Theatre of Chicago, Montreal, Vancouver, Portland, Wolf Trap, NYCO, and San Diego. His dance work includes the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company. Broadway credits include Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar & Grill starring Audra McDonald; Fela! (Tony Award nomination), and David Copperfield’s Broadway debut, Dreams and Nightmares. Off-Broadway includes productions with the NYSF/Public Theater, The Signature Theatre, Roundabout Theatre Company, and Playwrights Horizons. Robert’s extensive regional theater work includes productions at the Alliance Theatre (Atlanta); Goodman Theatre; A.C.T. San Francisco; Arena Stage (Washington, D.C.), Center Stage, Chicago Shakespeare Theater; Shakespeare Theatre (Washington, D.C.); Hartford Stage; Long Wharf Theatre; The Guthrie; Mark Taper Forum; Actors Theatre Louisville, and The Old Globe. He is adjunct faculty at N.Y.U.’s Tisch School and is a Creative Partner at Spark Design. 

Costume Designer

Mattie Ullrich

Mattie has designed costumes for opera, theater, film, and dance.  You may have seen her work at LA Opera, Norwegian Opera,  Theater an der Wien (Vienna, Austria), Palau des les Artes (Valencia, Spain), Washington National Opera, Opera de Montreal, Florida Grand Opera, Opera Philadelphia among many others. She is known for large scale, character-driven designs that focus on rich storytelling. Mattie’s opera highlights include the world premiere of David T. Little and Royce Vavrek’s JFK (Fort Worth Opera and Opéra de Montréal). The Israeli Opera’s Gulio Cesare performed in the midivil Crusader Fortress (Acco, Isreal). An award-winning production of Phillip Glasses’s Satyagraha at The Ekaterinburg State Opera (Russia) and the Bolshoi in Moscow, I due Foscari a co-production with LA Opera, The Royal Opera House, Theater an der Wien, and Palau des Artes. Notable theater designs include the The Starry Messenger with Mathew Broderick, The Pride directed by Joe Mantello (Wicked), Fault Lines directed by David Schwimmer (Friends), and The Things We Want directed by Ethan Hawke.