The Minnesota Opera

The company is an industry leader, widely recognized for bold, forward visioning in all that it does one-of-a-kind education programs, new engagement efforts, and a groundbreaking commitment to reinvigorate the American canon by commissioning, developing and producing new American opera.Nearly 1 million persons are served annually by MN Opera programming, through performances (presented live and in-broadcast), education programs, and engagement efforts. The company's producing home is the Ordway Center of the Performing Arts in downtown St. Paul. MN Opera also regularly partners with Minnesota Public Radio and Twin Cities Public Television on broadcasts of mainstage productions.The fundamentals of Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Access (IDEA) are a top priority for MN Opera. MN Opera is committed to becoming an anti-racist and anti-oppressive organization.In continuing to adjust to the variable nature of the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2021-22 season was a welcome return to live opera in venues new and familiar to MN Opera. Despite rapidly changing health and safety guidelines and shifting audience attitudes towards returning to in-person spaces, MN Opera built on the successes of the 2020-21 season's ventures into the digital space with new programming and a renewed focus on local communities not previously engaged with MN Opera. Our work in the fiscal year was guided by our mission, vision, values, and commitment to becoming and anti-racist, anti-oppressive arts institution. MN Opera's 59th season opened with Opera Afuera at Allianz Field, the company's first live performance in front of an audience since early 2020. Performed by a cohort of Resident, Company, and guest artists with the MN Opera Orchestra and Mariachi mi Tierra, the program highlighted Latinx music alongside operatic classics. In attendance at this one-night event were 1,502 people, including 25 children who participated in a creative development program designed to introduce them and their families to opera as an art form.Digital offerings filled out the rest of the fall and early winter, with streaming presentations of the new chamber opera Interstate, the second iteration of the MNiatures program, and the Edward Tulane Choral Suite. Delivering on its vision to sing every story, MN Opera's characteristic innovation shone through in the digital realm with compelling storytelling, varied and groundbreaking musical styles, and engagement with various art media. In particular, MNiatures with the requirement that its Minnesota-born participants' primary work is outside of the classical tradition, continued to ask the question, "what is opera?" There were 4,120 views of the MNiature works on-line. With the Edward Tulane Choral Suite, a preview of the 2022-2023 season opener, MN Opera engaged a stop motion animator for the first time in this highly stylized and otherworldly presentation. There were 6,500 views of the Edward Tulane Choral Suite. Another highlight of the fall season was a long-anticipated workshop with the renowned Bangladeshi/English dancer and choreographer, Akram Khan. For two weeks, MN Opera Resident Artists and invited dancers from throughout the Twin Cities gathered to create two distinct works of vocal and movement-based prowess, enabling Akram to gain an understanding of the operatic artform and our Resident Artists to experience a workshop process outside of a more traditional vein. This "sandbox"-style creative space was new to Minnesota Opera, and unprecedented in many opera circles where the creative process is less openly collaborative. MN Opera's return to the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts happened in February 2022 with The Anonymous Lover, a work by Black composer Joseph Bologne whose aspirations to become music director at the Paris Opera were cut short due to pervasive racism in 18th century France. This new production by Minnesota Opera, a comic romance set in the Caribbean that featured brightly colored sets and elaborate period costumes, delighted Opera audiences during the coldest weeks of Minnesota winter. Attendance for the live performances of Anonymous Lover totaled 4,617, with an additional 25,000 views on videos related to Anonymous Lover. A fiery and visceral production of Georges Bizet's classic tale of dangerous romance, Carmen, finished off the 2021-2022 season. Denyce Graves made her directorial debut in this new co-production with the Glimmerglass Festival. Attendance for the live performances of Carmen totaled 12,816, with an additional 200,900 views on videos related to Carmen. Around the same time as Carmen, Minnesota Opera was host to the 2022 OPERA America Conference, a gathering of over 600 industry artists, administrators, and trustees from around the United States, Canada, Mexico, and Europe. MN Opera's continued relationship with OPERA America as a founding member of this trade organization has fostered deeper ties with companies around the country, particularly in conversations around equity, diversity, and inclusion to guarantee a future of opera that is welcoming of all who seek to engage with the artform. MN Opera's innovation was further highlighted with the announcement of the next phase of the New Works Initiative. Three composers and three librettists will join the company over the next seven years to create three new grand operas and three new chamber operas. A departure from previous new work production models of heavily-resourcing just one new production every two years, this updated model capitalizes on the strengths of the system MN Opera has built in new work development and enables greater volume of new work - encouraging ongoing relationships with creators, rather than continuing to build single, project-based transactional relationships. In its education and engagement work, MN Opera launched a new pair of core courses that degender and deracialize how middle and high school students are socialized to the artform and eliminated all participation costs in the process. The company diversified its administrative and teaching staff in terms of ethnic and gender identity, and brought the hourly wage of the teaching staff more in line with market rates. MN Opera also oversaw the renovation of the Luminary Arts Center. With its completion and opening in August 2022, Minnesota Opera looks forward to a 60th anniversary season presenting shows at the Luminary alongside community theater groups who have historically utilized the space when it was known as the LAB Theater, and engaging with other performing arts organizations looking for a home in the Twin Cities. While the pandemic has certainly left its mark on MN Opera, the company charts a path forward with cautious optimism buoyed by its response to the last two years that has by many accounts met the moment.