What's Up - Your guide to what's happening in Fayetteville, AR this week!
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young, I didn't start pursuing it until relatively late. After college, I worked as a high school math teacher, and I took voice lessons on the side (kind of like an expensive hobby). Fast-forward a few years, and I started studying with a new teacher in New York City, Deborah Birnbaum, who inspired me to fully commit to a singing career. I left my teaching post, and I enrolled in music school that fall. As a graduate student at Indiana University, I got to perform a wide range of operatic repertoire. "The character of Ruggero is so relatable for me, I feel like I barely have to act! As a lyric tenor, I will often play lecherous noblemen, murderous soldiers, or Shakespearean heroes. But Ruggero? He's a naive student in the big city. He falls in love with a beautiful woman and then gets dumped? Story of my life! "Think of opera like wine. Everyone will enjoy it — have you ever met someone who doesn't like wine? — but the more you know about it, the more interesting it is. And yes, opera lovers (like wine lovers) can come off as pretentious, but that's only because they're so passionate!" After OIO, Rosenthal will be singing the role of Don Jose in "Carmen" with MIOpera. Early next year, he will be performing selections from Gounod's "Romeo et Juliette" and Bernstein's "West Side Story" in concert with Illinois Symphony Orchestra. Autumn Schacherl Milwaukee Desirée Armfeldt in 'A Little Night Music' "My parents actually met in their college marching band and cultivated a love of music in my brothers and me. As a kid, I was always singing along to every song and musical number I knew! "As many singers, I started out in local choirs and school musicals. I began taking private voice lessons, where my love for singing classical music grew. For my undergraduate degree, I attended the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire where I performed in my first opera and realized that this is the world that I want to be in. After receiving my BM in Vocal Performance in 2017, I decided to spend a gap year in France working as an au pair and studying French. I then continued my studies at the University of Wisconsin- Milwaukee where I earned my MM in Vocal Performance in 2020. Since then I have been singing in Milwaukee and have established my own small studio there. "I am so excited to be singing Sondheim's iconic song 'Send in the Clowns' and having the privilege to hear the rest of the cast sing 'A Weekend in the Country.' … If you come to see 'A Little Night Music,' be prepared to laugh a lot, maybe cry a little and leave humming some wonderful tunes!" Schacherl says after OIO, she plans to "keep singing, learning, auditioning and seeing where the road takes me!" JULY 26-JULY 2, 2022 WHAT'S UP! 41 COVER STORY PRESIDENT Brent A. Powers EDITOR Becca Martin-Brown 479-872-5054 bmartin@nwadg.com Twitter: NWAbecca REPORTERS Monica Hooper mhooper@nwadg.com April Wallace awallace@nwadg.com (479) 770-3746 DESIGNER Deb Harvell ! UP WHAT'S ON THE COVER Emily Cotten (from left) and Sara Nealley help Autumn Schacherl during rehearsal for Mozart's "Cosi fan tutte" at Opera in the Ozarks near Eureka Springs. (NWA DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE/SPENCER TIREY) What's Up! is a publication of the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Opera Continued From Page 9 Schacherl Sara Nealley (from left), Emily Cotten, Hunter Eisenmenger, Kobe Kendrick, Mathew Cook and Autumn Schacherl will take part in not only Mozart's "Cosi fan tutte," shown here in dress rehearsal, but also in Puccini's "La rondine" and Sondheim's' "A Little Night Music." This summer, Opera in the Ozarks will produce 22 mainstage performances in Eureka Springs; more than a dozen performances of "Pinocchio," this year's children's outreach production at venues throughout the region; the always exciting Chamber Music concert on July 18 at Inspiration Point; and not one but two Broadway Cabarets, one in Fayetteville on July 14 at Mount Sequoyah and the other in Eureka Springs on July 19 at the Crescent Hotel. (NWA Democrat-Gazette/Spencer Tirey) Nealley (from left), Eisenmenger, Cotten, Kendrick, Cook and Schacherl are all students at Opera in the Ozarks, which returns to full strength this year with 36 singers, 23 orchestra members and about 30 faculty and staff members on campus.