Rebekah Diaz (protégé)
Founder, KahLee Consulting: Community Engagement in the Creative Arts

Rebekah Diaz is a dedicated and accomplished innovator, bringing a unique vision to what the future of opera looks like. She is currently working in Pittsburgh Opera's development department. Diaz was previously director of education and community engagement at Florida Grand Opera (FGO), where she initiated the Cadenza program, a nationally recognized collaboration with support groups for human trafficking victims that guides participants toward therapeutic betterment through opera. She developed strategic and meaningful connections with underserved populations, partnering with minority empowerment organizations, rehabilitation centers, institutions for the learning-impaired, civic offices, LGBTQIA+ groups, and public and private schools and foundations. Diaz also developed an unprecedented collaboration with Disney/Pixar to create custom opera animations for use in multimedia literacy-building experiences.

While at FGO, she was responsible for the creation of the inaugural regional adolescent opera academy in Southeast Florida, and she created the vocal/performing intensive "Teen Opera Intensive" in collaboration with the historic Olympia Theater. Her efforts at FGO earned a nomination in the Education and Outreach category at the 2018 International Opera Awards. She currently mentors numerous teaching artists and interns and has sponsored several Opera Teens programs. Diaz has also arranged, produced and directed five fully staged “choperas” and numerous showcases. Her original arrangement of Carmen is currently performed exclusively on the luxury cruise line Azamara Club Cruises.

Ana De Archuleta (mentor)
President and CEO, ADA Artist Management

Ana De Archuleta has quickly established herself as one of the most sought-after managers in the operatic field, representing a thriving roster of vocalists, conductors and directors worldwide. ADA Artists can be seen at companies such as the Metropolitan Opera, Deutsche Oper Berlin, English National Opera, Grand Théâtre de Genève, the Salzburg Festival, the Aix-en-Provence Festival, Lyric Opera of Chicago, San Francisco Opera, Washington National Opera and Houston Grand Opera. De Archuleta’s vast background in the arts — as an instrumentalist, dancer, operatic stage manager, assistant director, opera chorister and operatic soloist — has played a major role in her success as an artist manager.

She frequently offers her insights into the business aspect of the opera world via master classes and one-on-one consultations, and she has presented her seminar “The Business of Opera” at Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, Westminster Choir College, Opera Saratoga, Opera New Jersey, Minnesota Opera and Wolf Trap Opera, among others. Additionally, she has judged multiple vocal competitions, including those held by Fort Worth Opera, Shreveport Opera and Florida Grand Opera. De Archuleta holds a bachelor’s degree in communications from the University of the Sacred Heart in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and a Master of Music in vocal performance from the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music.

Julia Noulin-Mérat (protégé)
Associate Producer, Boston Lyric Opera
Co-Artistic Director, Guerilla Opera

Julia Noulin-Mérat is an American, Canadian and French citizen. In addition to her work as an associate producer for Boston Lyric Opera for the past seven years, Noulin-Mérat is the co-artistic director of Guerilla Opera, an international production designer and the founder of Noulin-Mérat Studio. She has worked on over 350 opera, theater and television productions, including 17 new operas and 22 new plays. Much of her work involves site-specific installations, including work at Boston Lyric Opera. Noulin-Mérat is an advocate for new audience development and has developed programs for social media engagement (such as final dress rehearsal tweet seats and live streaming of performances), tactile performances for visually impaired audiences, and community-specific performances and talkbacks, resulting in increased funding for new audiences. She has commissioned new operas from Lansing McLoskey, Hannah Lash, Anthony Green, Victoria Cheah, Andy Vores, Adam Roberts, Ken Ueno and many others.

Recent scenic design credits include Rigoletto with Minnesota Opera; The Barber of Seville, Tosca and The Threepenny Opera with Boston Lyric Opera; Falstaff with Opera Omaha; Gallo and Beowulf with Guerilla Opera; a TEDx talk about site-specific opera production; and Neverland with China Broadway, a $40 million, 50,000-square-foot immersive theater piece in Beijing based on Peter Pan, which required collaboration with 650 people to create a theatrical space from the ground up. Noulin-Mérat holds a B.F.A. in design for the theater from Concordia University, Montreal; an M.S. in arts administration for performing arts from Boston University; and an M.F.A. in scenic design from Boston University. She is currently an adjunct professor at Pace University.

Cheryl Hickman (mentor)
General and Artistic Director, Opera on the Avalon

Cheryl Hickman founded Opera on the Avalon in St. John’s, Newfoundland, in 2009. She has served as artistic director since the company’s inception and as general director since 2014. Hickman led a $3 million capital campaign to establish the company’s Creation Investment Fund, which resulted in Atlantic Canada’s first grand opera commission. She was also responsible for establishing the region’s only comprehensive summer training program for emerging artists. During Hickman’s tenure, Opera on the Avalon has increased its operating budget by 2,100 percent and achieved nine consecutive surplus seasons. The company’s commissions have demonstrated their capacity to bring in new audiences, with the opera house reaching more than 85 percent capacity on average.

In 2017, Hickman was appointed to the Canada Council for the Arts for a four-year term. She has been chair of the board for Opera.ca since 2015, having previously served as vice chair. She was appointed to the City of St. John’s Arts Advisory Board in 2015, leading the city’s cultural strategy and helping to secure $3.5 million toward increasing access to the arts. Hickman studied music and opera at the University of Toronto, followed by a Master of Music at The Juilliard School. In 2018, Atlantic Business named her one of Atlantic Canada’s Top 50 CEOs.

Tamara Vallejos (protégé)
Director of Marketing and Audience Development, Opera Colorado

Born and raised in Los Angeles, Tamara Vallejos grew up surrounded by world-class cultural offerings, fueling what has become an omnivorous passion for the arts. Her curiosity originally led her to arts journalism, before she ultimately made the transition to public relations and marketing for the arts. Before joining the Opera Colorado staff, she served as director of PR and publications at the Aspen Music Festival and School, and she also spent several years in Seattle working in PR at Seattle Opera, as well as at a boutique marketing agency. She earned her B.A. in English from Washington State University and her M.A. in arts journalism from Syracuse University's S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications. She began her career writing about music and culture for NPR, SPIN and Los Angeles magazines, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, the Charleston Post and Courier, and other regional and national outlets. In her personal time, she indulges in all the requisite passions of any proper Angeleno: rooting for the Dodgers, leaning into her Disney fandom and daydreaming about her next beach vacation.

Lisa Middleton (mentor)
Vice President, Marketing and Communications, Lyric Opera of Chicago

Lisa Middleton, vice president of marketing and communications at Lyric Opera of Chicago, is a nonprofit marketing executive with more than 25 years of experience in all aspects of marketing and development. She manages pricing, revenue management, direct marketing, advertising, communications and PR, and social and digital media for Lyric. Middleton loves data analytics and statistics, and she uses information gleaned from analysis to guide the development of strategic directions for database segmentation, pricing analysis and model building, all with an eye to maximize revenue and increase patron engagement. She previously held roles in marketing and development at the Stratford Festival of Canada, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Sunnybrook Hospital, the Kidney Foundation and the Canadian Diabetes Association. Middleton holds a B.S. from York University in Toronto.