Biography
At age twenty-nine, the youngest general director of an opera company in the United States, Michael McConnell began a ten-year creative and administrative association with Lyric Opera Cleveland as its Executive Director. During his tenure the company gained national attention for its innovative profile in opera and Music Theater, achieving international prominence during the 1993-94 season for the commission and subsequent production of MRS DALLOWAY, an opera by Libby Larsen and Bonnie Grice based upon the Virginia Woolf novel. Long-praised by local audiences and critics for his strong insights and keen theatricality, McConnell reaped additional praise for MRS DALLOWAY in OPERA NEWS and THE VILLAGE VOICE for work of “strong focus” and “theatrical urgency.” “The work made its intimate, probing points thanks to Michael McConnell’s urgent production,” wrote OPERA (UK).
A North Carolina native, he received his musical training as a pianist at the University of Cincinnati’s College-Conservatory of Music (CCM), where he was a student of the renowned Olga Conus. Later, as an honors graduate in musicology, he studied opera styles, stage direction and production with Italo Tajo and Roger Brunyate. He began his career on the production staffs of the Santa Fe Opera, the Cincinnati Opera and Opera Theatre of Saint Louis (both at home and at the Edinburgh International Festival), assisting such stage directors as Colin Graham, Lou Galterio, Frank Corsaro, James deBlasis and Gian Carlo Menotti.
His productions have been successfully mounted by the Skylight Opera Theatre, Opera Festival of New Jersey, The Lake George Opera Festival, Opera Memphis, Dayton Opera, Knoxville Opera, Opera Grand Rapids, Opera San José, The Mississippi Opera, The City Musick, Rochester Opera Theatre and Pittsburgh Opera Theater among others. In addition to much work in the standard repertory, his directing credits include numerous lesser-known and world premiere pieces such as Berlioz’s BEATRICE & BENEDICT, Agatha Christie’s BLACK COFFEE, Cavalli’s CALLISTO, Gershwin’s GIRL CRAZY; Monteverdi’s THE CORONATION OF POPPEA and THE RETURN OF ULYSSES, Larry Baker’s HAYDN’S HEAD, Mozart’s LA FINTA GIARDINIERA, Milhaud’s LES MALHEURS d’ORPHÉE, Handel’s AGRIPPINA, Luciano Chailly’s PROCEDURA PENALE, Stravinsky’s THE RAKE’S PROGRESS, Weill’s THE SEVEN DEADLY SINS, Britten’s THE TURN OF THE SCREW and Argento’s POSTCARD FROM MOROCCO.
Conservatory and other teaching credits include the University of Cincinnati’s College-Conservatory of Music, Baldwin-Wallace College’s Conservatory of Music and The Cleveland Institute of Music, where he was Director of Opera. As Associate Professor of Opera at Florida State University’s College of Music, he played a crucial role in the departmental reorganization that resulted in ongoing, capacity enrollment for the opera workshop, increased ticket sales for mainstage productions and recognition placement among the top five US university opera programs as ranked by US NEWS & WORLD REPORT in its prestigious survey. Most recently he was Visiting Associate Professor of Opera and Director of Opera Theatre at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.
He has directed educational programs and tour productions for Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, The Cleveland Orchestra, Lyric Opera Cleveland, Opera Memphis and the Cincinnati Opera. During the summer of 2010 he was a member of the directing staff of Georgia State University School of Music’s Harrower Opera Workshop. Summertime opera-abroad programs sponsored by both CCM and Oberlin have taken him many times to the Italian towns of Lucca and Urbania where, in his productions, numerous gifted student vocalists have received their first performance experience in the birthplace of opera.
Michael McConnell is the recipient of a Cleveland Critic’s Award (THE MIKADO) and Northern Ohio LIVE Award of Achievement Nominations for his production of THE TURN OF THE SCREW, for Lyric Opera’s Mozart Cycle and for the company’s 20th Anniversary Season. He has been an adjudicator for the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, a frequent panelist for the Opera/Music Theater Program of The National Endowment for the Arts, and has served on the Board of Directors of OPERA America. His master classes and lectures have been heard at The Cleveland Orchestra, Kent State University, University of Akron, Georgia Southern University, Opera San José, Wright State University and University of Memphis.
As a music journalist, he has written numerous articles and reviews for OPERA NEWS, THE MUSIC JOURNAL, NORTHERN OHIO LIVE and THE CHARLOTTE OBSERVER. He was also a contributor to OPERA America’s series of guides for the young, professional singer. His dozen or so complete sets of English supertitles plus English performing versions of DIE ZAUBERFLÖTE and CARMEN have seen frequent use by numerous regional and university opera companies.
