In May, OPERA America announced the second round of recipients of the 2022 Opera Grants for Women Stage Directors and Conductors. Four companies will receive funding to hire women into these pivotal roles.

The grants enrich the performance of new operas and works from the inherited repertoire and give women valuable experience they can use to build their CVs. “So often in this industry, you amass the experience but have trouble breaking into work at larger theaters,” says Chloe Treat, The Glimmerglass Festival’s grant-funded director. “Someone has to gamble on you first.” These grants help companies take that “gamble” and bring a new and exciting perspective to their productions.

The program provides companies with up to $10,000 and covers up to 50 percent of the fees for women stage directors or conductors who are contracted in these roles by a company for the first time. Programs such as this play an important role in the fight for gender and pay equity in the arts community.

Opera Grants for Women Stage Directors and Conductors are supported by the Marineau Family Foundation. 

The Glimmerglass Festival 

Chloe Treat
Stage director for Holy Ground (Damien Geter/ Lila Palmer)

Treat is a New York-based director and choreographer originally from Texas. Her theater work includes productions at Heartbeat Opera, Polyphone, Hangar Theatre, 54 Below, Mannes Opera, Manhattan School of Music, and Indiana University. She has choreographed for the Santa Fe Opera, HERE Arts Center, Yale School of Drama, and Chicago Opera Theater, among other companies.  

Pocket Opera 

Margo Hall
Stage director for The Magic Flute (Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart/Donald Pippen)

Hall is an award-winning actor, director, playwright, and educator who serves as artistic director of Lorraine Hansberry Theatre. She made her theater directing debut with the world premiere of Joyride, which was the Bay Area Critics Circle Winner for Best Original Script. She has since directed or co-directed numerous productions, including Bulrusher, Once on This Island, Hamlet, Ragtime, and A Streetcar Named Desire.  

Houston Grand Opera 

Louisa Muller
Stage director for The Wreckers (Dame Ethel Smyth/Henry Brewster)

Louisa Muller recently made her debut with Garsington Opera directing a new production of The Turn of the Screw, which received a Royal Philharmonic Society Award. Her upcoming engagements include Rinaldo at Pinchgut Opera, Ernani at Lyric Opera of Chicago, and titles to be announced at the Santa Fe Opera and Garsington Opera. 

Opera Saratoga

Emily Senturia
Conductor for Sky on Swings (Lembit Beecher/Hannah Moscovitch)

Senturia made mainstage conducting debuts with Houston Grand Opera and Washington National Opera in 2018, both with Il barbiere di Siviglia. More recently, she has conducted La clemenza di Tito with Opera Steamboat, La traviata and The Tragedy of Carmen with Hawai‘i Opera Theatre, Ariadne auf Naxos with Wolf Trap Opera, and Fellow Travelers with Boston Lyric Opera.