September 17, 2015 – Virginia Opera, The Official Opera Company of the Commonwealth of Virginia, is proud to announce a significant award received by Adam Turner, the company’s Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor. Earlier this week, the Kurt Weill Foundation named Turner the inaugural Julius Rudel/Kurt Weill Conducting Fellow under the new fellowship program established to honor the legacy of conductor Julius Rudel.
Photo Credit | Keitaro Harada
In the September 10, 2015 release from the Kurt Weill Foundation, they note they are pleased to announce the appointment of Adam Turner as the inaugural recipient of the Julius Rudel/Kurt Weill Conducting Fellowship. In keeping with Maestro Rudel’s artistic vision, this annual award enables a young conductor in the early stages of a career to assist a conductor in the preparation and performance of a work by Kurt Weill or Marc Blitzstein and expand his or her knowledge of the works of Weill and Blitzstein. The fellowship carries a stipend of $10,000.
Virginia Opera President and CEO Russell Allen commented “The Kurt Weill Foundation for Music is one of the most prestigious advocates of contemporary operatic repertory, with a focus on the music of Kurt Weill, and Julius Rudel was one of Weill’s staunchest proponents. With Kurt Weill’s music now so embedded in standard operatic repertory in America, it is time for Virginia Opera to explore his oeuvre as part of our First of First Series. To be able to do so at the beginning of the 2016-2017 Season (which Virginia Opera will do) with a conductor bearing the title of Julius Rudel/Kurt Weill Conducting Fellow is an exciting opportunity for our company. It is also wonderful to have the outside world acknowledge the Opera’s Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor with such an impressive honor.”
Turner, age 32, currently serves as the Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor at Virginia Opera, where he has garnered critical acclaim for the breadth of his repertoire, artistic vision, and polished technique. He says of his appointment, “To be closely associated with the enduring legacies of Julius Rudel and Kurt Weill is an exceptional distinction for which I am deeply honored. I look forward to the opportunities of the year ahead.” Turner will serve as cover conductor under John DeMain for the upcoming Washington National Opera (WNO) production of Weill’s Lost in the Stars, during the February 2016 run at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. DeMain says, “Adam Turner is a brilliant young conductor, with one foot in opera and another in musical theater. His involvement with Lost in the Stars at this level will allow him to bring all his talents to the production and encourage him to take on the stylistic complexities of other Weill works in the future.”
DeMain was himself a recipient of the New York City Opera’s Julius Rudel Award, which granted him an apprenticeship there. “It provided an opportunity to learn a variety of aspects of artistic direction and programming beyond just being Julius’s assistant,” DeMain recalls. “And his knowledge of Weill made his performances of those works stunning.” Rudel was an avid promoter of Weill’s works during his long career. He served as a trustee of the Foundation from 1980 to 2008.
Kim H. Kowalke, President of the Foundation, says of the award, “This fellowship has been established in recognition of Julius’s enormous contributions to musical theater in its broadest definition and in particular to the development of American opera for more than fifty years. It is so fitting that Turner will serve as cover conductor for Lost in the Stars, a work which Rudel introduced to the City Opera repertoire in 1958 and subsequently recorded. Fifty years later, it was the last work by Weill that Rudel conducted.”
Lost in the Stars runs at the WNO February 12-20, 2016, in a revival of Tazewell Thompson’s 2012 Glimmerglass Opera production, and will feature many of the same artists, including Eric Owens in the lead role and tenor Sean Panikkar. Lauren Michelle, winner of the 2015 Lotte Lenya Competition, will play Irina. Lost in the Stars anchors a 2015/2016 DC-area season chockfull of major performances of Weill and Blitzstein, including The Threepenny Opera at American University (October 15-24); Street Scene at the Peabody Institute (November 13-15); Blitzstein’s Regina at University of Maryland, College Park (April 8-16); The Seven Deadly Sins at National Symphony Orchestra (April 28-30) and seven staged performances thereof by Virginia Opera (September 30-October 16, with Turner conducting), which opens Virginia Opera’s 42nd season.
ABOUT THE KURT WEILL FOUNDATION
The Kurt Weill Foundation for Music, Inc. (http://www.kwf.org) is dedicated to promoting understanding of the life and works of composer Kurt Weill (1900-1950) and preserving the legacies of Weill and his wife, actress-singer Lotte Lenya (1898-1981). The Foundation administers the Weill-Lenya Research Center, a Grant Program, the Kurt Weill Book Prize and the Lotte Lenya Competition, and publishes the Kurt Weill Edition and the Kurt Weill Newsletter.
ABOUT VIRGINIA OPERA
Virginia Opera Association, Inc., in its 41st season, is known and respected nationwide for the identification and presentation of the finest young artists, for the musical and dramatic integrity of its productions, and for the ingenuity and variety of its education and outreach programs. Mainstage performances in three markets across the Commonwealth reach nearly 50,000 attendees annually. In March of 1994, by unanimous vote of the Virginia General Assembly, Virginia Opera was named The Official Opera Company of the Commonwealth of Virginia in recognition of the organization’s contribution to the state as well as to the world of opera. For tickets and information visit vaopera.org or call 866.673.7282.