Scott Piper, assistant professor of voice, received a BM in voice performance from Truman State University in 1993 and a MM (1995) and DMA (2012) in voice performance from the University of Michigan. He started his professional career at Madison Opera in 1999 in a much-acclaimed production of Verdi's La Traviata. Since that time, he has appeared with Houston Grand Opera, Dayton Opera, Madison Opera, Minnesota Opera, Opera Pacific, Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Michigan Opera Theater, New York City Opera, the International Music Festival of Macau, Vancouver Opera, Compañia Lírica Nacional de Costa Rica, the New People’s Theater of Moscow (Russia), and the Anna Livia International Opera Festival in Dublin, Ireland. In Italy he has appeared in Rome, Catanzaro, Modena, Ravenna, and at Teatro di Verdi in Busseto. As a concert soloist, Piper has appeared with many American orchestras and sang the North American Premiere of Perosi’s oratorio La Rissurezione di Christo with the Friends of Opera at U-M. He has received awards from the University of Michigan Friends of Opera, the National Society of Arts and Letters, the William C. Byrd Foundation, the Gerda Lissner Foundation, the Ken Boxley Foundation, the Licia Albanese-Puccini Competition, the George London Foundation, and received the Jim and Janice Botsford Study Grant.
Carmen Pelton
Professor of Voice
cpelton@umich.edu
734-764-6512
Education
University of Wisconsin-Madison, B.M.; Lois Fisher
The Eastman School, Performer's Certificate; Jan DeGaetani
The Britten-Pears School, Aldeburgh, England, (advanced training); Murray Perahia
Soprano Carmen Pelton has appeared in a wide range of works with orchestras, opera houses, chamber music groups, Equity drama theaters, and Off-Broadway productions. Conductors have included Robert Shaw, Jeffrey Tate, Donald Runnicles, Patrick Summers, Gerard Schwarz and Nicholas McGegan with such diverse groups as the San Francisco Symphony, Baltimore Symphony, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, Tulsa Opera, West German Radio Orchestra, Goodman Theater, the Smithsonian’s 21st-Century Consort, the New York Festival of Song and the Library of Congress. Ms. Pelton’s solo performances are on two recordings that won Grammy Awards for Best Classical Album of the Year: Barber, Bartok and Vaughan-Williams with the Atlanta Symphony in one of Robert Shaw's last recordings, and William Bolcom’s Songs of Innocence and of Experience, recorded by Naxos at the University of Michigan. Ms. Pelton's first success in New York City was in the unlikely role of Susan B. Anthony in Mother of Us All; she was subsequently invited to perform the final scene from the opera at the televised Kennedy Honors program for the President and Honoree Virgil Thomson. Her European operatic debut was more conventionally suited to Ms. Pelton's dramatic coloratura; Sir Peter Peers cast her as Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte at the Aldeburgh Festival and the outstanding reviews led immediately to her engagement by Scottish Opera as Constanze in Die Entführung aus dem Serail. Other leading Mozart roles include Königin der Nacht, Donna Anna and the title role of Lucia Silla. Ms. Pelton has taught on the faculties of the University of Washington, The Eastman School of Music, Brevard Music Center, and the Aspen Music Center and School.
Stanford Olsen
Professor of Voice
solsn@umich.edu
734-764-8773
Office: 3061 Moore
Distinguished American tenor Stanford Olsen joins the faculty of the University of Michigan School of Music, Theater, and Dance as Professor of Voice after 15 years as Artist-in-Residence and holder of the Shelfer Eminent Scholar in Music Chair at Florida State University. One of this generation’s most successful and versatile artists, his career spans more than 1,200 performances on five continents over the course of 30 years.
Since his professional operatic debut there in 1986, opposite Dame Joan Sutherland in Bellini’s I Puritani, Stanford Olsen has performed more than 160 times with New York’s Metropolitan Opera. Acclaimed for his performances of the leading tenor roles in the operas of Mozart, Rossini, Donizetti, and Bellini, Olsen enjoys an international reputation as a Mozartean of style and elegance, cited by The New York Times in 1990 in an article entitled “A Golden Age of Mozart Tenors.” Highly regarded for his interpretations of the bel canto roles of Nemorino, Almaviva, and Arturo, Olsen has been heard in this repertoire throughout the world at venues such as San Francisco Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Miami Opera, La Scala di Milano, Landestheater Stuttgart, Theatre du Chatelet, Teatro Bellini di Catania, Theatre La Monnaie, Australian Opera, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Nederlandse Oper, Tokyo Opera City, and most other significant opera companies in the USA and Europe. His recording of the fiendishly difficult role of Argirio in Rossini’s Tancredi (Naxos/Alberto Zedda) netted a Grammy nomination.
Since his professional concert debut as tenor soloist in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony in 1983, Stanford Olsen has performed with most of the world’s great orchestras, in repertoire from Bach to Bartok. He has been a frequent guest with the Boston Symphony, Chicago Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, Houston Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, St. Louis Symphony, and most other major American orchestras. Outside the U.S. Olsen, has often performed with the Berlin Philharmoniker, Concertgebouw, Internationale Bachakademie Stuttgart, L’Orchestre de Paris, L’Orchestre National de France, Philharmonia Orchestra, Israeli Philharmonic, Orchestre de Montréal, Oslo Symphony Orchestra, and Tokyo’s NHK Symphony. Olsen has performed and recorded with many of the leading conductors of our time, such as Pierre Boulez, Sir Colin Davis, Charles Dutoit, Christoph Eschenbach, John-Eliot Gardner, Alan Gilbert, Carlos Kleiber, James Levine, Kurt Masur, Sir Neville Marriner, Seiji Ozawa, Robert Shaw, and Michael Tilson-Thomas, among others. He counts among his credits more than 100 performances each of Beethoven’s 9th, Handel’s Messiah, and Orff’s Carmina Burana.
One of this country’s most successful recitalists, Olsen was declared First Place Winner of the 1989 Walter W. Naumburg Award for recitalists, the only tenor to do so in nearly 60 years. His New York recital debut was in Alice Tully Hall in 1989, singing Schubert’s Die Schöne Müllerin, a piece he repeated in 1997 in the concluding season of the 92nd Street Y’s 10-year “Schubertiade” project, this time accompanied by Maestro James Levine. His European recital debut at Paris’ Theatre du Chatelet in 1993 was quickly followed by engagements at Brussells’ La Monnaie and Italy’s Maggio Musicale di Firenze. He continues to be a sought after recitalist in the USA and Europe, particularly singing repertoire of Schubert, Wolf, and Britten.
Olsen graduated with the Bachelor of Music degree in vocal performance from the University of Utah, where he studied voice with Naomi Farr. He was an Opera Fellow at the Aspen Music Festival where he studied voice with Thomas Paul and Lieder with Brookes Smith. He received the Artist Diploma in Opera from the University of Cincinnati’s College-Conservatory of Music, studying opera with Italo Tajo and John Alexander, as well as Lieder with Kenneth Griffiths.
In addition to the Naumburg Award, Olsen won the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions in 1986, was a Richard Tucker Foundation Career Grant winner in 1989, and also has received wards from Opera America and Opera Index. He is a four-time Grammy nominee, and winner of an Emmy for the PBS broadcast of Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd with the New York Philharmonic, featuring George Hearn and Patti Lupone. Winner of the University of Cincinnati’s College-Conservatory of Music’s “Alumnus of the Year” award in 1989, Olsen also received the first ever “Alumnus of the Year” award from the University of Utah College of Fine Arts in 2010.
A sought after clinician and adjudicator, Stanford Olsen has been a frequent judge for the Metropolitan Opera’s National Council Auditions. He has given masterclasses to students at most of the country’s significant universities and conservatories, including CCM, Curtis, Eastman, Oberlin, Manhattan School of Music, Rice University, University of Illinois, University of Houston, USC, and dozens of others. He has also worked with the apprentices at the Tanglewood Festival, Opera Theater of St. Louis, Santa Fe Opera, Ravinia Festival, Cleveland Art Song Institute, the Aspen Music Festival, the Utah Opera, and the Metropolitan’s Lindemann Young Artist Program.
Olsen’s students are frequent participants in the highly competitive apprentice programs at Central City, St. Louis, Santa Fe, Wolftrap, and Merola. His students include Grammy and Emmy award winners; Metropolitan Opera, George London Foundation, Marilyn Horne Foundation, and Richard Tucker foundation grant winners; and artists regularly heard at such venues as the Met, San Francisco Opera, Chicago Lyric Opera, Covent Garden, Frankfurt Opera, Nederlandse Oper, and others throughout Europe and the U.S. In addition to his duties at the University of Michigan, Olsen spends his summers as a principal vocal instructor at the prestigious Castelton Festival, under the direction of Loren Maazel.
Stephen Lusmann
Associate Professor of Voice
lusmann@umich.edu
734-763-2157
Professor Stephen Lusmann (baritone) has sung leading roles with major opera houses including the Oper der Stadt Bonn, Opera de Monte Carlo, Stadttheater Luzern, Washington Opera, Cincinnati Opera, Opera Company of Philadelphia, Boston Lyric Opera, Glimmerglass Opera, Opera Carolina, Opera Columbus, Anchorage Opera, Utah Opera, Opera Birmingham, Connecticut Grand Opera, Dayton Opera, Artpark, and tours with the New York City Opera under important conductors and directors including Leonard Slatkin, Christopher Keene, Bertrand de Billy, Franco Zefferelli, Gian Carlo Menotti, and Gian Carlo del Monaco. As an active concert soloist he has performed at Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall in Lincoln Center, the Anchorage Festival of Music, Chautauqua Institute, and with numerous symphony orchestras such as the Buffalo Philharmonic, Sinfonieorchester Luzern, West Virginia Symphony, Little Orchestra Society of New York, and the Canton Symphony.
On recording he may be heard in Richard Strauss' opera Der Friedenstag recorded at Carnegie Hall on the Koch International label, Operngala recorded at the Konzerthaus Luzern, Switzerland on Tonstudio AMOS, and on E. E. CUMMINGS: An American Circus songs by Logan Skelton recorded on the Centaur Records label.
Until his appointment at Michigan, he maintained a private voice studio in New York City and Princeton, New Jersey. Mr. Lusmann taught at the Lawrenceville School in New Jersey and at the West Virginia Governor's School for the Arts at Fairmont State College. In addition he is currently a member of the Voice Faculty at the Seagle Music Colony, the oldest continuous summer vocal training program in the United States.
His students are having great success performing professionally in opera, concert, musical theater, and young artist programs throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe. They are also winning prestigious vocal competitions and are members of university voice faculties.
Freda Herseth
Arthur F. Thurnau Professor of Voice
breda@umich.edu
734-764-5589
Office: 3027 Moore
Freda Herseth (mezzo-soprano) has sung critically acclaimed leading roles in opera throughout Germany. She has performed with orchestras and chamber ensembles throughout Europe, Russia and Israel, including the La Scala Opera Orchestra conducted by Riccardo Muti in the world premiere of Richard Wernick's . . . and a time for peace, the Israel Sinfonietta, the Stuttgart State Theater Orchestra in the world premiere of William Bolcom's Songs of Innocence and of Experience, the Frankfurt Radio Orchestra, New York New Music Ensemble, the Haifa Symphony Orchestra, and The Folger Consort of Washington, D.C.
Well known for her work in contemporary music, Professor Herseth has premiered many works written especially for her. She has performed at the Vienna Festival, Warsaw Autumn Festival, Festival d'Automne at the Bastille Opera in Paris, Steirischer Herbst in Graz, and with the American Music Theater Festival of Philadelphia. Ms. Herseth has been the recipient of numerous awards, including a stipend from the Richard Wagner Society in Bayreuth.
Ms. Herseth has recorded for CRI, Gasparo, South German Radio and Television, Hessen Radio (Frankfurt), Bavarian Radio (Munich), ORF Austrian Radio and Television, RAI Italian Radio, and Northeastern Records. She was recently honored at the Voice Foundation Annual International Symposium in Philadelphia with the award of the Van Lawrence Fellowship for research and excellence in the field of vocal pedagogy.
Ms. Herseth studied with Jan DeGaetani at the Eastman School of Music.
Caroline Helton
Assistant Professor of Voice
chelton@umich.edu
734-615-3728
Caroline Helton, soprano, joined the voice faculty at the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre and Dance in the fall of 2000, after completing her doctoral work at that institution in 1998. An artist who enjoys the entire gamut of classical singing, from opera and oratorio to recital and chamber music, she has been described as displaying “masterful” artistry and a “clear, bell-like soprano.” In January of this year, Dr. Helton performed a program called “Voices of the Holocaust” live on Chicago’s classical music radio station WFMT with pianist Kathryn Goodson that featured music by Jewish composers whose lives were affected by World War II, and which will be available on iTunes on the Block M record label this fall. This year she has also appeared as Zerlina in Arbor Opera Theatre’s production of Don Giovanni, as well as with the Michigan Chamber Players, performing with fellow faculty members Martin Katz, Yehonatan Berick and Richard Aaron. She has appeared numerous times with the Bach Dancing and Dynamite Society, a dynamic and innovative chamber group founded by pianist Jeff Sykes and flutist Stephanie Jutt in Madison, Wisconsin. New music is an important area of interest for Dr. Helton, and she has appeared performing Joseph Schwantner's Wild Angels of the Open Hills with the Brave New Works Ensemble, as well as premiering Three Spanish Songs by Matthew Tommasini with the University of Michigan Symphony Band conducted by Michael Haithcock, who commissioned the work. She has also had the pleasure of premiering works by Vítezslava Kapralova (with fellow U of M professor Timothy Cheek, pianist), Andre Myers, Tom Schnauber and Gabriel Gould
Timothy Cheek
Associate Professor of Voice
tcheek@umich.edu
734-764-2509
Education
B.Mus., Oberlin College
M.Mus., Univ. of Texas-Austin
M.Mus., D.M.A., Univ. of Michigan
Timothy Cheek has served opera internships at the Teatro Comunale in Florence, Italy, and at the National Theatre in Prague. His performances as a collaborative pianist have taken him to twelve countries, and have been heard on world-wide broadcasts, PBS, and Austrian television. Highlights of his work include engagements at the Ravinia Festival's Steans Institute, the Santa Fe Opera, the International Institute for Chamber Music in Munich, the Mozart Opera Studies Institute in Austria, the Israel Vocal Arts Institute in Tel Aviv, and recitals in Hong Kong and at the American Academy in Rome. Professor Cheek has held several grants, including an Olivetti Foundation Grant to perform in Italy, a Fulbright award, and an IREX grant to conduct research in the Czech Republic which led to his book Singing in Czech: A Guide to Czech Lyric Diction and Vocal Repertoire published by Scarecrow Press. and National Endowment for the Humanities grant.
