Carolin Wielpütz
President
Carolin Wielpütz studied applied theatre and media studies along with English language at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg (Friedrich-Alexander-Universität), including study visits to Spain, USA and Ireland. Parallel to her studies, the passionate chorus singer took part in chorus activities as well as vocal and musical training at the Institute of Sacred Music. After graduation, Carolin Wielpütz moved to Dublin, Ireland, to work in the field of international exchange for a leading business confederation. Following her return to Germany, she started her career in opera as assistant director at the Theater Bonn, followed by her work as a personal advisor to the artistic director of the same theatre.
Carolin Wielpütz spent several years as a project manager and advisor to the casting director of the Bregenzer Festspiele under David Pountney, before returning to the Theater Bonn as director of artistic planning in opera. Since 2020, Carolin Wielpütz has been director of artistic planning and part of the management team at the Musik Theater an der Wien under artistic director Stefan Herheim. She is also frequently invited as a jury member to voice competitions, such as OPERALIA, LAS VIÑAS and CLIP.
Michel Beaulac
Michel Beaulac was born in Montreal, and started studying piano as a teenager.
After studies in pedagogy and some ten years as a teacher, he furthered his studies at the UQAM, in art and voice.
Nominated by the McAbbey Foundation (sculpture), he exhibited his work on the Montreal university circuit, in the Maisons de la culture network, and at the Galerie du Petit Musée in Quebec City.
His passion for opera led to hosting a radio show on which the Opéra de Montréal’s director at the time took notice of him and invited him to join the company’s communications team in 1989. He then went on to take up various other functions at the company, including work as a set and costume designer, as assistant to the Artistic Director, and later as Artistic Administrator, a position he filled for close to ten years until his nomination as Artistic Director in 2007.
As a set designer, co-set designer, and costume designer, he worked on over seven productions and co-productions for the Opéra de Montréal, including Andrea Chénier, Carmen, Fedora, Manon, Manon Lescaut, Don Carlo, Carmina burana (staged version), as well as productions for the Atelier lyrique’s Canadian tours, including The Elixir of Love and The Barber of Seville.
He hosted and directed 19 editions of the Gala (1996-2014) a yearly Holiday Season opera concert presenting famous singers from around the world.
His first decade as artistic director brought national premieres of such repertoire works as La Fanciulla del West (2007), Roberto Devereux (2010), Rusalka (2011), Porgy & Bess (2013), Elektra (2016) and Hamlet (2024).
He has also promoted contemporary works at the company by presenting Dead Man Walking (2012), SilentNight (2015), JFK (2018), Svadba (2018), Champion (2019), Twenty-seven (2019 ), Ainadamar (2023) and five world premieres: Les Feluettes (2016), Another Brick In The Wall – The Opéra (2017), L’hiver attend beaucoup de moi (2020), La Beauté du monde (2023) and La Reine-garçon (2024).
Collaborations with Canadian and French institutions have given three new works: Le Flambeau de la nuit (2021) with BOP, Yourcenar (2022) with the Opéra de Québec and Les Violons du Roy, and Enigma (2022) with the Opéra de Metz Métropole.
The productions of Pagliacci/Gianni Schicchi and Dead Man Walking each earned the institution an Opus Prize.
The recent production of La Reine-garçon is nominated for the 2024 International Opera Festival to be held in Munich in October.
In 2022, he was inducted into the Order of Canada for his contribution to the development of opera in Montreal and across the country and he will be awarded in November 2024 a “Rubie” which is a most prestigious prize for his work in opera and his promotion of the art form in Canada and around the world.
Michel Beaulac is the Opéra de Montréal’s fourth Artistic Director.
Paulo Abrão Esper
Paulo Abrão Esper was born in Jacareí, Brazil, where he was awarded the title as a well-deserving citizen by the local Chamber of Deputies.
In 1991, he created the “Cia Ópera São Paulo”, of which he is the General Manager and Artistic Director, and the Friends of Opera Association in Jacareí.
He started his artistic career as a tenor and had his debut at the Teatro Comunale de São Paulo. With the Cia de Ópera he has staged over 1,700 shows all over Brazil, 70 operas and 300 recitals.
In 1993, Abrão Esper created the Maria Callas Brazilian Voice Competition and an event called Great Voices of Opera, which have brought to Brazil artists such as Magda Olivero, Fedora Barbieri, Fiorenza Cossotto, Teresa Berganza, Luigi Alva, Gabriella Tucci, Renato Bruson, Juan Pons, Jaime Aragall, Katia Ricciarelli, Mariella Devia, Daniela Dessì, Fabio Armiliato and many others for concerts, recitals, masterclasses and as members of juries.
He has been a member of the jury in several international voice competitions. The city of Sirmione awarded him a prize for his competition named after Maria Callas, which will reach its 21st consecutive edition in 2023, during the celebrations for the hundredth anniversary of the birth of the famous Greek singer.
Since 2001, Paulo Abrão Esper has been an advisor at the Istituto di Cultura Italiano in São Paulo and the organizer of the “A Caminho do Interior” tour, in which Italian operas such as Gianni Schicchi and Pagliacci are staged in different cities.
Dominique Meyer
Dominique Meyer was born in France, in 1955.
He has been a professor, a researcher and a guest lecturer of Macroeconomics, History of Economics, and Administration of Music and Live Performances, in many prestigious universities.
Mr. Meyer worked as a Commissioner and Advisor in the Cabinet of the French Minister of Culture and Communication and in the Cabinet of the French Prime Minister.
He covered the role as Director of the Vienna State Opera, General Director of the Opéra de Paris (Palais Garnier and Opéra Bastille) and of the Lausanne Opera, General and Artistic Director of the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées.
Since March 2020, he has been the Superintendent of the Teatro alla Scala in Milan.
Since July 2024, he is the executive director of the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne.
Nicola Valentini
Nicola Valentini is the conductor and founder of “Dolce Concento” ensemble. In 2017 and 2018, he was the associate conductor of the orchestra of Friuli Venezia Giulia region and now he is one of the most talented and brilliant young conductors in Italy.
His encounter with Ottavio Dantone deeply marked his education, which he started at an early age, and sparked his lifelong interest in Baroque performance techniques.
After he completed Classical Studies, he graduated in cello at the Conservatory of Parma under the guidance of E. Contini and studied composition with F. Agostinelli and conducting with G. Serembe in Parma, Pescara and Faenza. He also devoted himself to constant in-depth analysis of the vocal and instrumental repertoire of the seventeenth and eighteenth century under the guidance of Ottavio Dantone, hence working on the scores of renown authors, as well as on unpublished ones. He has collaborated to the organization of concerts and recording sessions, and to the staging of oratories and operas.
In his role as an assistant, Valentini participated in important productions at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan, Teatro La Fenice in Venice, Teatro Comunale in Ferrara, Teatro Alighieri in Ravenna, Teatro Verdi in Trieste, Metropole of Lausanne, Opéra National du Rhin in Strasbourg, Palau de Les Arts in Valencia and Teatro Campoamor in Oviedo, as well as in prestigious festivals such as those in Glyndebourne and Salzburg.
In December 2010, he successfully made his debut on the podium. Ever since, he has given concerts all around Europe as a conductor and a cellist. He has conducted orchestras on both modern and period instruments. Among them: the Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, the Opera Orchestre National Montpellier, I Pomeriggi Musicali in Milan, the Haydn Orchestra in Bozen, the Philharmonic Orchestra in Brno, the Orchestra Toscanini in Parma, the Orchestra Sinfonica Principato de Asturia in Oviedo, the Virtuosi Brunenses, the Orchestra Sinfonica Rossini in Pesaro and the Filharmonie in Brno.
In July 2012, at the Staatstheater Oper in Nuremberg, he debuted as an opera conductor in Ezio by C. W. Gluck. Then, he conducted Rossini’s Il Barbiere di Siviglia and La Cenerentola at the Campoamor Theatre in Oviedo, the Jovellanos in Gijòn and the Gayarre in Pamplona.
In 2014, he created his own ensemble, Dolce Concento, whose members play on period instruments and aims to the performance of not only the Baroque, but also the classical and romantic repertoires. In 2017, by conducting Dolce Concento, he debuted at the Teatro Claudio Abbado in Ferrara in Gluck’s Alceste. He gained great success also the following year with the staging of Esther, the first English oratory by G.F. Handel.
In 2013, Valentini collaborated for the first time with the Accademia di Bel Canto in Modena, of which he was the musical director in 2014-2015, managed by famous soprano Mirella Freni.
In 2019 He conducted for the first time an opera by Puccini, Madama Butterfly, in the new staging at the prestigious Theater Basel in Switzerland.
For 20 years, Nicola Valentini has constantly devoted himself to the activity as a transcriber and an editor of published and unpublished operas, oratories, symphonies, concerts, arias and overtures for international entities such the Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, the Teatre Metropole in Lausanne, “De sono” association in Turin, Ut-Orpheus and Cose belle d’Italia in Milan.
The favor of critics and the warm welcome of the public has brought the international attention towards him, and, despite his young age, he is considered an experienced and knowledgeable conductor for the baroque, classical and bel canto repertoires: “A new and engaging impulse” has been recently said to characterize his performance of the bel canto and romantic repertoires.
Evamaria Wieser
Evamaria Wieser was born in Vienna in a family of musicians. She started to study piano at the age of four. After she got a high-school diploma, she went to the University of Vienna to study interpreting in Italian and English. She got a Magister artium degree in 1976. In that same period, she also studied voice at the Academy of Vienna.
In 1976, Ms. Wieser started her cooperation with the Starka / Ioan Holender Theatrical Agency in Vienna. From 1980 to 1987, she held the position as Artistic Administrator at the Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich. From 1992 to 2001, she worked as the Artistic Administrator of the Salzburg Festival under the direction of Gerard Mortier.
From 2001 to 2004, Ms. Wieser was the Director of the Artistic Administration of the new Ruhrtriennale festival in North Rhine-Westphalia (Germany), organized in close cooperation with the Artistic Director Gerard Mortier. In that period, Evamaria Wieser also worked on the artistic planning with Gerard Mortier, in his new role as Superintendent of the Opera National de Paris for the 2004/2005 season.
In the same period, Ms. Wieser was also the Artistic Consultant for opera productions at the Easter Salzburg Festival under the direction of Claudio Abbado (2002), Sir Simon Rattle (2003-2012) and Christian Thielemann (from 2013 to 2015).
From September 2004 to September 2011, Ms. Wieser returned to the Salzburg Festival as the Director of the Artistic Administration under Artistic Directors Peter Ruzicka (2005-2006), Jürgen Flimm (2007-2010) and Markus (2011).
In 2015, Ms. Wieser returned to the Salzburg Festival as the Director of the YSP (Young Singers Project), and from October 2016 to October 2018, as the Director of the Artistic Administration of the Festival.
Besides the positions held in Salzburg, Ms. Wieser worked as Artistic Consultant at the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma (2011-2013), and, starting from the 2008/2009 season, she has been the European Casting Consultant of the Lyric Opera of Chicago.
Since November 2018, she has been working as a freelance Casting Director of the Salzburg Festival and of the YSP.
Evamaria Wieser is often invited as a member of the jury at important voice competitions such as the Placido Domingo’s Operalia, the Neue Stimmen by the Bertelsmann Foundation, the Debut in Weikersheim etc.
