Fort Worth Opera Green Room - LIVE Audition Panel
Opera for Peace & OLA’s Escena Program – Mentorship
This season, Brian Jagde mentored two emerging artists as part of a collaboration between Opera for Peace & Ópera Latinoamérica’s Escena program. Colombian soprano Betty Garcés and Mexican baritone Juan Carlos Heredia received voice lessons and career guidance from Brian Jagde as part of this partnership.
Thanks to the alliance between Opera for Peace and Ópera Latinoamérica / Escena Digital, the singers Betty Garcés and Juan Carlos Heredia, belonging to this platform, received personalized vocal tutoring from the American tenor Brian Jagde. And this is expected to be just the first of many.
The artists belonging to the Escena Digital community, the Colombian soprano Betty Garcés and the Mexican baritone Juan Carlos Heredia, received personalized vocal tutoring from the American tenor Brian Jagde, recognized for having performed roles in important opera houses, such as San Francisco Opera , The Metropolitan Opera, Royal Opera House, among others.
The initiative was materialized thanks to the collaborative alliance between Ópera Latinoamérica / Escena Digital and Opera for Peace (OFP), a non-profit cultural organization that promotes the development of opera throughout the world and of which Jagde is an ambassador.
In the words of Julia Lagahuzère, OFP’s co-founder and executive director, the objective of this meeting is “to encourage and nurture young artists in all their capacities”, in addition to connecting Stage artists “with our network of Opera for Peace artists. , established opera professionals, to teach, guide and support their development and careers ”.
The experiences
For the tenor and this time professor Brian Jagde, the meeting was an extremely gratifying experience and he claims to have met two “wonderful young singers, extremely talented and for whom I have great hopes”.
For his part, the baritone Juan Carlos Heredia comments that this experience meant growth for him. “Not all singers are good teachers, but Brian manages to share a lot of valuable information and even talk about technique and add value through his examples. I have found a great mentor, including a new friend, colleague and above all, someone who understands how complex this career is and even more so for a young person in the pandemic ”, he states.
In turn, what most caught his attention of the meeting, is the constant work and preparation by Brian, who despite being a renowned singer, has never stopped studying. “Like all great singers, he is someone who continues to prepare. A great example of this was hearing from him mentoring that he studies three times a week with his vocal technique teacher and that the largest monetary investment in his career has been singing classes. That speaks to me and confirms to me once again that all the singers who manage to reach the big leagues are constant and tireless workers in their discipline, ”says Heredia.
All online
The greatest difficulty of the meeting was the fact that it was carried out virtually, since the operatic voice is not intended to be compressed through online platforms, but there are also other aspects that could be used to the maximum. In Jagde’s words, “We don’t just sing at these meetings, there is also a lot of conversation going on regarding the industry and that works very well.” Heredia shares a similar opinion, who assures that “the information shared between Brian and I, the visual and some auditory examples made me obtain more tools and solid bases for my day-to-day life in the long term. In short, it was an excellent help and experience. in the sense of mentoring, coach and relationships “.
Finally, the objective is that this collaboration between Latin American Opera / Escena Digital and Opera for Peace be maintained in the long term; in fact, there are already plans in place for several future tutorials.