Young Artist Institute

Pictured here: Javier Arrey, Louis Salmeno, Raquel Gonzales, and the MDLO Orchestra

From the very beginning MDLO has been committed to training young artists at the dawn of their careers, by offering them exposure to experienced professionals. As part of our program young artists receive daily voice lessons and daily vocal coaching, as well as the opportunity for recital and concert projects. Young artists have a chance to join the artistic process of the company and to participate in MDLO performances – concerts and fully-staged productions alike.

We are incredibly fortunate to have an amazing music staff for the Institute. The young artists are personally coached by:

Louis Salemno, Music Director
William Stone, MDLO Institute Voice Teacher
Husan Park, Associate Conductor
Christopher Koelzer, Assistant Conductor

Many young artists who benefited from the Institute’s training are now pursuing international careers and are performing with major international and American opera houses, as well as with regional companies and music festivals. We are proud of the following artists who graduated from MDLO Young Artist Institute in the last three years:

Soprano:

Nayoung Ban
Simone Brown
Sarah Joyce Cooper
Manli Deng
Mary Feminear
Kelly Glyptis
Symone Harcum
Youna Jang Hartgraves
Maeve Höglund
Melissa Mino
Maria Natale
Yulia Petrachuk
Nanyoung Song
Alexandra Razskazoff

Mezzo Soprano:

Daryl Freedman
Caroline Hewitt
Chelsea Laggan
Olga Syniakova
Chantel Woodard
Nina Duan

Tenor:

Joseph Michael Brent
Antonio Chase
Dashuai Chen
Yang Chen
Yongxi Chen
Yi Li
Jonathan Tetelman
Yang Wang
Mauricio Miranda

Bass/Baritone:

Javier Arrey
SeungHyeon Baek
Adam Cioffari
Hunter Enoch
Yazid Gray
Kenneth Kellogg
Michael Pitocchi
Jose Sacín
Wei Wu
Chunlai Shang
Christian Bowers

If you are interested in more information about our program and want to apply, please contact Artistic Administrator Adam Cioffari at acioffari@marylandlyricopera.org

MDLO Young Artist Institute Timeline

August 4, 2017

The Italian Embassy. First Gala Concert.
Performers: Brad Clark and Christopher Koelzer (piano); Yulia Petrachuk (soprano), Simone Brown (soprano), Symone Harcum (soprano), Jonathan Tetelman (tenor), Javier Arrey (baritone)

December 15, 2017

The Mansion at Strathmore. Concert.
Performers: Brad Clark and Rafael Andrade (piano); Kelly Glyptis (soprano), Melissa Mino (soprano), Evelyn Tsen (soprano), CongCong Wang, (soprano), Chelsea Laggan (mezzo-soprano), Yi Li (tenor), Chaz’men Williams-Ali (tenor), Javier Arrey (baritone)

February 23, 2018

Imagination Stage. Concert.
Performers: Rafael Andrade (piano); Dashuai Chen (tenor), Hunter Enoch (baritone), Maria Natale (soprano), CongCong Wang (soprano), Chantel Woodard (mezzo-soprano)

April 20, 2018

Bethesda United Methodist Church. Concert.
Performers: Rafael Andrade (piano); Nayoung Ban (soprano), SeungHyeon Baek (baritone), Joseph Michael Brent (tenor), Yongxi Chen (tenor), Sarah Costa (soprano), Nina Duan (mezzo-soprano), ChunLai Shang (baritone)

October 19 & 20, 2018

Bethesda United Methodist Church.
First Concert with full MDLO Orchestra, conducted by Louis Salemno. “An Evening of Mozart, German Operatic Masterpieces” . Nick Olcott (Stage Director & Narrator), Joan Sullivan Genthe (Lighting Designer). Nayoung Ban (soprano), SeungHyeon Baek (baritone), Daryl Freedman (mezzo-soprano), Maeve Höglund (soprano), Yi Li (tenor), Yang Wang (tenor)

March 15 & 16, 2019

Bethesda United Methodist Church.
Concert with full MDLO Orchestra, conducted by Louis Salemno. “An Evening of Mozart – The Da Ponte Operas”. Joan Sullivan Genthe (Lighting Designer). Joseph Michael Brent (tenor), Adam Cioffari (bass), Youna Hartgraves (soprano), Mary Feminear (soprano), Caroline Hewitt (mezzo-soprano),
Jose Sacin (baritone), Nanyoung Song (soprano)

November 1, 2019

The Music Center at Strathmore.
MDLO Institute Fall Gala.

MDLO Orchestra, conducted by Louis Salemno. “Excerpts from six operas in three different languages: Beethoven’s Fidelio, Gounod’sFaust, Verdi’s Falstaff, Donizetti’s Don Pasquale, Bizet’s Carmen, and Strauss’s Der Rosenkavlier.  Alexandra Razskazoff (soprano), Sarah Joyce Cooper (soprano), Olga Syniakova (mezzo-soprano), Joseph Michael Brent (tenor), Yi Li (tenor), Mauricio Miranda (tenor), Christian Bowers (baritone), Michael Pitocchi (bass)

Louis Salemno

Louis Salemno

Music Director

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Louis Salemno is the Music Director of Maryland Lyric Opera and is the principal conductor for all its performances, including the recent Thaïs, La fanciulla del West, and the MDLO Orchestra concert featuring pianist Leon Fleisher. He oversees the recruitment and training of the emerging artists of the MDLO Institute and leads the team responsible for auditioning, hiring, and managing the MDLO Orchestra and Chorus.

Maestro’s long and storied international conducting career includes posts at some of the world’s leading opera houses, including Teatro alla Scala in Milan, Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona, Lyric Opera of Chicago, San Francisco Opera, Houston Grand Opera, and New York City Opera, among many others. He studied with Nadia Boulanger in France and was mentored by the legendary Kurt Herbert Adler, Krzysztof Penderecki, Gianandrea Gavazzeni and Bruno Bartoletti.  As a pianist, he has appeared in recital with Montserrat Caballe and Denyce Graves.

As a mentor, he held the post of Resident Coach for Washington National Opera’s acclaimed Domingo-Cafritz Young Artist Program for nearly a decade, where he also trained conducting students as well as visiting conductors in preparation for performances. He has also mentored singers at the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía in Valencia and the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires. He studied piano with Mieczyslaw Horszowski and conducting with Max Rudolf at The Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia.

William Stone

William Stone

Head of Voice Faculty

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William Stone is a North Carolina native whose warm and powerful baritone lends elegance and style to a repertoire ranging from Mozart to Berg, with a special emphasis on the Bel Canto masterworks.  Mr. Stone's engagements at the major opera houses in North America are impressive.  His stage debut at the Metropolitan Opera was as Capulet in Romeo et Juliette, followed by Die Fledermaus (Falke), the new production of Moses und Aaron conducted by James Levine, Lucia di Lammermoor (Enrico), Sharpless in Madama Butterf1y and John Plake in the new production of Sly with Placido Domingo.His long association with the Lyric Opera of Chicago began with his creation of the role of Adam in the world premiere of Penderecki's Paradise Lost and continued with the title role in Il barbiere di Siviglia, Schaunard in La Boheme,and most recently Sharpless in Madama Butterfly.  His appearances at the New York City Opera reflect most of the leading roles in his repertoire (Germont in La traviata, the Count in Le nozze di Figaro [Live from Lincoln Center Telecast], Figaro in Il barbiere di Sivigliaand Enrico in Lucia di Lammermoor) and include particularly memorable performances of the title role in new productions of Hindemith's Mathis der Maler, and Busoni's Doktor Faust.   In addition, Mr. Stone has appeared with the opera companies of Atlanta, Austin, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Washington, Seattle, Spoleto-Charleston, and Santa Fe.

William Stone is one of the only American baritones in recent years to have sung extensively in the major opera houses of Italy, and has twice opened the May Festival in Florence: as Wozzeck and as Oreste in Gluck's Iphigenie en Tauride, conducted by Riccardo Muti.  At the Rome Opera he sang the title role in Eugene Onegin, Golaud inPelleas et Me1isande and Malatesta in Don Pasquale.  Other Italian opera engagements include Ezio opposite Samuel Ramey in Attila at La Fenice in Venice (telecast throughout Europe), and leading roles at La Scala, the Teatro Giuseppe Verdi in Trieste, and San Carlo in Naples.  For three summers he also performed at the Spoleto Festival in Italy, where he was seen in the world premiere of Napoli Milionaria, directed by Eduardo de Filippo.  His most recent appearance at Genoa's Teatro Carlo Felice was the role of Sharpless in a production of Madama Butterf1y, directed by Renata Scotto and conducted by Bruno Bartoletti.

Frequently engaged in Belgium, the baritone made his stage debut as Germont in the highly acclaimed Karl Hermann production of La traviata at the Theatre Royale de la Monnaie in Brussels. He has since been re-engaged by the theater for the title role inSimon Boccanegra, Ford in Falstaff, Alfonso XI in La favorita, Chorebe in Les Troyens, and Renato in Un ballo in maschera.  At De Vlaamse Opera in Antwerp, he gave his first performances of Jack Rance in La fanciulla del West and Michele in Il tabarro as part of Robert Carsen's Puccini celebration.

Mr. Stone performed the Count in Le nozze di Figaro on a Chamber Orchestra of Europe tour conducted by Sir Georg Solti.  In addition to these appearances with Maestro Solti in London, Paris and Cologne, Mr. Stone appeared as Sharpless in a new production of Madama Butterf1y at the Opera Bastille in Paris, Figaro in Il barbiere di Siviglia in Stuttgart, Germont in La traviata in Frankfurt and in Nantes, Ford in Falstaff (telecast from the Aix-en-Provence Festival) and as Rodrigo in Don Carlos at the Netherlands Opera in Amsterdam.

A distinguished concert artist, William Stone is sought after as a baritone soloist by every major orchestra in North America.  He made his debut with the New York Philharmonic under Kurt Masur in performances of Carmina Burana, followed by performances of the Bach B-minor Mass and the St. Matthew Passion, also with Maestro Masur.  His debut with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Seiji Ozawa in the North American premiere of Takemitsu's My Way of Life led to his invitation to return to the orchestra the next season for the world premiere of Kirchner's Of Things Exactly As They Are, also with Maestro Ozawa.  His numerous European concert engagements include a command performance for Pope John Paul II at the Vatican.

Among his many recordings with Robert Shaw and the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, William Stone can be heard on two Grammy Award Winning Telarc recordings: Walton's Belshazzar's Feast and Hindemith's When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomed, and on a solo recording of Arias and Songs by Robert Ward [Bay Cities].  His portrayal of Ford with Jose van Dam from the Aix- en Provence Festival is available on DVD.

For the past three years Mr. Stone, Professor Emeritus of Voice and Opera at Temple University, has been a voice teacher for the Domingo-Cafritz Young Artist Program with Washington National Opera, and The Curtis Institute of Music. He currently is teaching on the Voice Faculty at the Academy of Vocal Arts in Philadelphia, and is the voice teacher for the Maryland Lyric Opera, and maintains a private studio in Philadelphia.

Husan Park

Husan Park

Associate Conductor

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Ms. Husan Park has collaborated as assistant conductor and continuo-player for over twenty years at theaters such as Teatro Municipal in Santiago de Chile, Music Festival in Perpignan, Festspiele Erl in Tirol in Austria, Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg, Theater an der Wien in Austria, Performing Art Center in Nanjing, Music festival in Shanghai, Teatro de la Zarzuela in Madrid, Festival de Ópera Alfredo Kraus in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Teatro Principal Palma de Mallorca, Teatro Campoamor in Oviedo, Teatro Arriaga in Bilbao, Palau de Les Arts Reina Sofía, and Palau de la Música in Valencia, Spain. 

Ms. Park has worked with conductors Jesús López Cobos, Riccardo Frizza, Speranza Scappucci,  Corrado Rovaris, Andrea Licata, Sachio Fujioka, Ramón Tebar, David Giménez, and Leonardo García-Alarcón, among others; and with stage directors such as Emilio Sagi,  Guy Joosten, Giancarlo del Monaco, Joan Anton Rechi, Gustavo Tambascio, Davide Livermore, and Carlos Wagner. 

She collaborated with international opera singers including José Carreras, Plácido Domingo, Jaime Aragall, Isabel Rey, José Bros, Cristina Gallardo-Domás, Ángeles Blancas, Juan Diego Flórez, Aquiles Machado, David Menéndez, Ana Ibarra, Sabina Puértolas, Davinia Rodríguez, Giovanna Casolla, Bruno de Simone, Giacomo Prestia, Gloria Scalcchi, Franco Farina, Pietro Spagnoli, Norah Amsellen, Carlo Colombara, Luciana D’Intino, Daniella Barcellona, Fabio Sartori, Elena Prokina, KS Peter Weber, KS Edith Lienbacher, and Anton Scharinger. 

In 2014, she collaborated at the world première of "El Juez", an opera composed by Christian Kolonovits for the tenor José Carreras, under the direction of Emilio Sagi and David Giménez. During her career Ms. Husan Park has given recitals as soloist and as collaborative pianist at Musikverein Wien and Konzerthaus Wien in Austria, Teatro Real de Madrid, Palau de Les Arts, Palau de la Música de Valencia in Spain and at theaters in Germany, Italy, France, Finland, El Salvador, and in South Korea. 

As vocal coach and assistant, Ms. Park has collaborated at masterclasses with Plácido Domingo, KS Walter Berry, KS Hilde Zadek, KS Hilde Rössel-Majdan, KS Edith Lienbacher, Paul Hamburger, Margit Fleischmann, Maggie Zimmermann, Ana Luisa Chova, and David Menéndez. Her extensive repertoire spans operas from Monteverdi to Adès, and from different epochs and styles (including Operettes and Zarzuelas) in Italian, German, French, English, Spanish and Russian. 

She majored in Piano at Konservatorium der Stadt Wien; Vocal Coaching (Liedbegleitung) and Opera Coaching (Opernkorrepetition) at Hochschule f. Musik u. darst. Kunst in Wien, Austria. At the same city in 2001 she became an Austrian citizen. As vocal coach and professor she taught at the Universität f. Musik u. darst. Kunst in Vienna, Austria, and in Conservatorio Superior de Música de Valencia Joaquín Rodrigo, Spain.

Currently, Ms. Park combines work as vocal coach at the Centre de Perfeccionament Plácido Domingo at the Palau de Les Arts Reina Sofia in Valencia, Spain with opera productions throughout Europe.

Christopher Koelzer

Christopher Koelzer

Assistant Conductor

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Grammy® Award Nominated Christopher Koelzer has performed across the world as a solo and collaborative pianist. Christopher has worked as a vocal coach and pianist with many opera companies,including Washington National Opera (Washington, D.C.), Wolf Trap Opera (Vienna, VA), Northern Lights Music Festival (Minnesota), Maryland Lyric Opera (Bethesda, MD), and has coached and performed with the Maryland Opera Studio from 2013-2017. He has performed and recorded several new musicals written by Blake Allen in New York City (shards, Boston|Nebraska), as well as world premieres of new operas in D.C. and South Carolina. He is nominated for a 2019 Grammy® Award for his work performing and recording with the National Orchestral Institute Philharmonic on the album Ruggles, Stucky & Harbison: Orchestral Works with conductor David Alan Miller. Christopher was appointed Assistant Conductor at the start of the 2019-2020 season.

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