Education, Audiences & Community Services
NEA Opera Honors Award

In 2008, the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) established the NEA Opera Honors to celebrate outstanding achievement and individual excellence. The awards are the highest honor the government bestows in opera, and this year they will be presented on Saturday, November 14 at the Harman Center for the Arts in Washington, D.C. OPERA America, the national nonprofit service organization, is the NEA partner in the Opera Honors program.

2009 Awardees
John Adams Frank Corsaro Marilyn Horne

Lotfi Mansouri

 Julius Rudel

John Adams
Composer

Frank Corsaro
Stage director, Librettist

Marilyn Horne
Mezzo-soprano

Lotfi Mansouri
General Director

Julius Rudel
Conductor
The 2009 awards are being given in five categories: singer, composer, advocate, conductor and director. Combining power, flexibility and musicianship, Marilyn Horne expanded the repertoire for generations of mezzo-sopranos, and through the Marilyn Horne Foundation she has helped innumerable young singers as well as the future of the vocal recital. John Adams has rewoven the fabric of opera with works such as Nixon in China and Doctor Atomic. In his unique musical language, he confronts the moral complexities of our time, and dares audiences to do the same. Lotfi Mansouri was the innovative director of two major companies, the Canadian Opera Company and San Francisco Opera, and revolutionized the art form through pioneering use of supertitles. Though he conducts throughout the world, Julius Rudel will be best remembered for taking a young company, New York City Opera, and making it into a unique and international force. Since his first venture into opera—directing Susannah at New York City Opera in 1958—Frank Corsaro has used his keen dramatic sensibilities to revivify the core repertoire and to create exciting productions of new and lesser-known works.

For more information, visit http://www.arts.gov/honors/opera.

Photo credits:
John Adams - c. 2008 Margaretta K. Mitchell
Frank Corsaro - Ellen Appel
Marilyn Horne - Marty Umans
Lotfi Mansouri - Terrence McCarthy
Julius Rudel - Greg Hark

Winter 2009 Magazine Issue
  • Letter from the President/CEO
  • New Works
  • NEA Opera Honors
  • Opera Conference 2010
  • Creative Connections with Opera.Ca
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From 42nd Street/Times Square:
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The building is on the same block as the train stop.

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