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.
Katrin König
Katrin König was born in Salzburg. During her high-school career, she attended the l’Universität Mozarteum as an associated student. After that, she studied at the University for Foreigners in Siena and then she got a degree at the DAMS-Musica in musical dramaturgy and theatrical organization at the University of Bologna.
During her studies, she had experiences as a stage manager at the Teatro Comunale di Bologna and she cooperated with the Wexford Festival. König volunteered in the staging of La Traviata directed by Willy Decker at the Salzburg Festival in 2005 and the following year, she was offered to be the stage manager of three operas.
From 2007 to 2011, she worked in the concert section of the Salzburg Festival with Markus Hinterhäuser and Matthias Schulz. In that period, she was the stage manager of the Salzburg Whitsun Festival in cooperation with the Ravenna Festival and she also worked in Pisa and Piacenza.
She regularly participated in the Mozartwoche and Dialoge at the Stiftung Mozarteum, first as a production assistant and then as the production manager with the Aix-en-Provence Festival.
Since October 2010, Katrin König has worked for the Salzburger Landestheater where, since 2013, she has been the casting manager and in charge of the organization of the opera department. In 2017, Katrin König was appointed Operndirektorin. She will be back in this function starting from 2025, after a sabbatical year she spent studying economics at the University of Vienna.
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.
Danele Borniquez
Daniele Borniquez got a diploma in Piano at the Conservatory A. Vivaldi in Novara and graduated in Economics at the University of Turin with a thesis in Industrial Law about piracy and plagiarism in the music industry. When he was very young, he started his career at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan.
Borniquez worked as Coordinator of the Training Academy for Opera Singers founded by Riccardo Muti under the artistic direction of Leyla Gencer; in that role, he had the opportunity to work with famous artists such as Mirella Freni, Renato Bruson, Teresa Berganza, Shirley Verrett, Luciana Serra, Luis Alva, and Luciana D’Intino among others. His activity in the field of music training covers all the roles in the opera sector (assistant conductors, choir artists, children choirs, contemporary music ensembles and concertmasters). Besides his work as an organizer, Borniquez directs the production of all the artistic events related to the teaching activity including the Progetto Accademia del Teatro alla Scala.
In his capacity as the coordinator of European research projects, he helped write the book Formazione e occupazione nel mondo musicale, which has been presented in several meetings patronised by the European Union.
Borniquez has been a member of the jury in some major international opera competitions and he is the Secretary General of the Leyla Gencer Voice Competition in Istanbul.
Presently, he holds the office as the Head of the Department of Music at the Accademia Teatro alla Scala.