Brabson Library and Educational Foundation Albuquerque, NM

PO Box 27671 | Albuquerque, NM 87125 | 505.243.0591 | www.operasouthwest.org

!Brabson Library and Educational Foundation c/o John Brabson 169 Big Horn Ridge Road NE Albuquerque, NM 87122 Dear John, The second and final opera of Opera Southwest’s 41st Season will be opening in a few days, but since we have already completed the first phase of the Amleto project, I am taking this time to send you our Final Report. The Project:

Next season’s production of Franco Faccio’s long-lost opera Amleto is the opera for which BLEF’s 41st Season $20,000 grant was allocated. This is a larger than usual project for Opera Southwest since the work has not been performed in living memory and thus has all of the usual difficulties of a world premiere; it requires a readable conductor’s score, a piano-vocal score, new orchestral parts, new supertitles, a new set design and physical production to be built, and cover singers (understudies) to be engaged. OSW ordinarily does without covers for operas in the standard repertoire because in a true emergency it is always possible to find someone to fly in who at least has sung the role before. Not so with a new work. What’s more, this particular work calls for a slightly larger orchestra than we are accustomed to (46 players instead of 40), and a huge cast of fourteen principal singers and at least 40 chorus and extras.

Leveraging BLEF support:

To help offset some of these costs, especially those related to covers, we are taking advantage of an exciting new cooperation with Baltimore Concert Opera and Arizona Theatre Company. The week before staging rehearsals begin in Albuquerque, Baltimore Concert Opera will present an unstaged, piano-only version of the work in Baltimore, using some, but not all, of the same principal singers. The benefits of this are twofold: the five main roles will have a crucial additional week of rehearsal, and it ensures that there will be singers in Baltimore who might be flown to Albuquerque on short notice in the event of an emergency with one of the nine smaller principal roles. This past season, rising rents at our warehouse and scenic shop facility rendered it uneconomic for us to continue to operate our own scenic facility. We have been


able to arrange a partnership with the large, not-for-profit, Arizona Theatre Company in Tucson, Arizona, to construct the scenery for Amleto. The scenery will be built in Tucson at their state-of-the-art facility and then shipped to Albuquerque, NM for the premiere of Amleto.

Accomplishments to date:

Score Preparation For the past several years, Maestro Anthony Barrese has been researching and transcribing a microfilm copy of the autograph manuscript that survived the bombings of the Second World War in the Casa Ricordi archives. With BLEF support, this year he has produced the actual working edition of the orchestra parts, piano-vocal score, and conductors score for Amleto. Excerpt Recordings On March 11, 2014, during part of a rehearsal for our Spring 2014 production of The Pearl Fishers, Anthony Barrese and the OSW orchestra recorded approximately 90 seconds of excerpts from the score, which we can now use for radio and online advertising of the production. Staging, Design and Casting OSW stage director David Bartholomew has worked extensively with scenic designer Carey Wong to create a concept and design for the opera. Additionally, Maestro Barrese and Mr. Bartholomew have cast all the major roles, including New Mexico native Alex Richardson in the title role of Amleto, as well as most of the minor roles and covers.

As all of this has unfolded, we have begun to draw international attention for the project. A letter of support (included herewith) for the entire project has been received from Plàcido Domingo, who heard Maestro Barrese playing a small section of the score for some friends several years ago, and was delighted to hear that OSW would be bringing the dream to fruition. For a project this big it is essential to spend at least a year of preparation, and the funds from the Brabson Foundation have made this necessity a reality. With profound respect and gratitude, Justine M. Opel Tony Zancanella P.S. We have also enclosed a copy of our Annual Report for FY2013, which reviews some recent highlights of the company.

AMLETO BUDGET

FY2013-14 FY2014-15Preparatory Work BUDGET ACTUAL Direct ProductionPersonnel Production Personnel

Score Preparation, Arrangement 10,000$ 7,583$ Singers and Dancers 40,000$ Excerpt Recording Session -$ 974$ Singers Travel 4,000$ Preparatory Staging and Design Work 5,000$ 7,556$ Orchestra 40,000$ Design Work 5,000$ 4,320$ Artistic Staff 20,000$ Travel (Auditions, Research) 1,000$ 701$ Artistic Staff Travel 1,500$

Total Personnel 21,000$ 21,134$ Production/Technical Staff 60,500$ Prod./Tech. Staff Travel 1,350$

Non-Personnel Total Prod. Personnel 167,350$ Score Printing, Postage, Misc. 2,500$ 1,235$

Tot. Non-Personnel Non-PersonnelRent (Rehearsal/Theater) 11,000$

TOTAL PROJECT COSTS Year 1 23,500$ 22,369$ Set Materials/Trucking 10,000$ Audio/LX rental/Material 2,500$ Prop Materials/Rental 1,500$ SUBTOTAL S/L/AV/P 9,350$

Funding Costume Material/Rental 5,000$ Brabson Foundation 20,000$ 20,000$ Wig/Makeup Material/Rent 2,000$ REDW -$ 1,200$ Misc. (Scores/Recordings) 1,200$ New Mexico Arts 3,500$ 1,171$ Tot. Non-Personnel 28,050$ TOTAL PROJECT FUNDING Year 1 23,500$ 22,371$ Total Direct Production 195,400$

Allocatable Administrative and General Costs 15,000$ Marketing and Promotional Costs 20,000$

Brabson Funding over 2-year life of project: 28% TOTAL PROJECT COSTS Year 2 230,400$

FundingBrabson Foundation 50,000$ Other Foundation Support 25,000$ New Mexico Arts 4,000$ Ticket Sales 75,000$ Individual Giving 77,000$

TOTAL PROJECT FUNDING Year 2 231,000$


OPERA SOUTHWEST ANNUAL REPORT FY2013

“Opera Southwest’s mission is to produce quality, professional, enjoyable and accessible opera in an intimate setting for audiences of all ages.”

Opera Southwest is Albuquerque’s local opera company, and has made significant progress over the last five years, culminating in the 2012-13 40th Anniversary Season: Artistic Output Both Rossini’s Otello and Puccini’s Madama Butterfly were given ambitious new productions with original sets. Otello was given its first US staging in sixteen years, and capped off a four-year Rossini cycle which has earned the company critical and audience accolades. With its alternate endings subject to audience vote, Otello attracted national press attention, including a mention in Opera News, the largest circulation classical music publication in the US. During our 40th Season, as we continued to settle into our beautiful new home theatre at the National Hispanic Cultural Center, we saw the results from increased investment in our singers and artists. In 2013, the Metropolitan Opera roster included four singers who have recently sung with Opera Southwest. We were also able to continue to increase the number of musicians in our pit orchestra, hiring many musicians of the defunct New Mexico Symphony Orchestra. Expanding the Audience In our 40th season, ticket income and attendance continued to rise steadily, and it was almost entirely sold-out, at 96% capacity. This is a result not only of improved production quality, but also from increased investment in marketing. In particular, 2012-13 saw the rollout of an attractive new logo and visual identity for the company. We also instituted an audience survey program – our first in five years- after the conclusion of Madama Butterfly. Among other things, we were pleased to learn that 93% of our audience rated their experience as “Excellent” or “Very good.” Education Programs The 40th season was our second year of the Brabson Library and Educational Foundation Composers Competition. We re-mounted the winning entry, Ethan Frederick Greene’s A Way Home, and that year reached more than three thousand students. In 2012-13, we were also awarded a two-year grant by the Urban Enhancement Trust Fund that continues to fund an exciting new children’s program that aims to integrate our mainstage programming with our youth outreach programming.


Institutional Growth All of the foregoing achievements have been enabled by our positive financial results and some serious institutional gains. 2012-13 marked Opera Southwest’s first season with a paid Managing Director. Our Board of Trustees stood at 19 members in the last year, up from only 12 just five years ago, and total annual board giving has more than tripled over that same period. The 40th Season continued our five-year trend of double-digit percentage increases in community support, with total gross contribution, fundraising, and grant income topping $350,000 for the first time ever, up 84% from less than $190,000 just five years ago. Condensed statement of activity from FY2013 Audit (a copy of the complete audit is available upon request)

SUPPORT AND REVENUE Ticket sales $ 182,153 Grants- Unrestricted 118,836 Contributions 195,288 Fundraising less direct expenses of $28,679 17,468 Interest and other income 12,591 TOTAL 526,336 EXPENSES Production Expenses 460,069 Support Services General and Administrative 59,586 Special Events 5,341 TOTAL EXPENSES 524,996 NET OPERATING SURPLUS/(Deficit) 1,340

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Brabson Library and Educational Foundation Albuquerque, NM