Soprano Tamara Wilson in the Santa Fe Opera’s Tristan und Isolde. Conductor James Gaffigan and Wilson, whose contributions were highlights during Tristan, will return in 2025 for Richard Wagner’s Die Walküre
Soprano Tamara Wilson in the Santa Fe Opera’s Tristan und Isolde. Conductor James Gaffigan and Wilson, whose contributions were highlights during Tristan, will return in 2025 for Richard Wagner’s Die Walküre. Curtis Brown/Courtesy Santa Fe Opera
Soprano Tamara Wilson in the Santa Fe Opera’s Tristan und Isolde. Conductor James Gaffigan and Wilson, whose contributions were highlights during Tristan, will return in 2025 for Richard Wagner’s Die Walküre
Curtis Brown/Courtesy Santa Fe Opera
Soprano Tamara Wilson in the Santa Fe Opera’s Tristan und Isolde. Conductor James Gaffigan and Wilson, whose contributions were highlights during Tristan, will return in 2025 for Richard Wagner’s Die Walküre. Curtis Brown/Courtesy Santa Fe Opera
Curtis Brown/Courtesy Santa Fe Opera
Sophie Bevan and Adrianna Forbes-Dorant in Garsington Opera’s The Turn of the Screw. The performance is programmed for the Santa Fe Opera in 2025.
John Snelling/Courtesy Santa Fe Opera
Soprano Tamara Wilson will be Santa Fe Opera's first Brünnhilde in the 2025 season.
The Santa Fe Opera’s 2025 season will include its first-ever staging of an opera from Richard Wagner’s epic Ring Cycle — Die Walküre — which is scheduled to open July 26, 2025, for a five-performance run.
“It’s one of the greatest pieces of music ever written, especially for the orchestra,” Santa Fe Opera General Director Robert K. Meya said in announcing the season. “It’s a big risk, and I hope it resonates in the same way with audiences as our Tristan und Isolde did in 2022.”
Conductor James Gaffigan and soprano Tamara Wilson, whose contributions were highlights during Tristan, return for Die Walküre. As Brünnhilde, Wilson will be joined in the cast by Vida Mikneviciute (Sieglinde), Sarah Saturnino (Fricka), Jamez McCorkle (Siegmund) and Ryan Speedo Green (Wotan).
British stage director Melly Still makes her debut with the production. Meya described her as “a fascinating person who fell in love with the environment here and that has inspired her approach,” adding “she’s been on our short list for a number of years.”
More mainstream works by Giacomo Puccini, Wolfgang Amadéus Mozart, Giuseppe Verdi and Benjamin Britten compose the rest of the repertory.
The 2025 season opens June 27, 2025, with a new production of La Bohème, replacing the quirky 2019 version that is being jettisoned after one presentation. “We wanted to do something traditional and beautiful, which this is, and the costumes will be absolutely gorgeous,” Meya said. “We believe we play a big role in introducing people to opera, so visual appeal was very much a key factor.”
Conductor Iván López-Reynoso, who led 2022’s memorable The Barber of Seville, and director James Robinson, whose equally impressive staging of M. Butterfly debuted in the same season, return for the new Bohème.
Sylvia D’Eramo, the Micaela in SFO’s 2022 Carmen, will be Mimì, while Long Long, Simon Mechlinski and Emily Pogorelc are making their company debuts as Rodolfo, Marcello and Musetta, respectively. In a piece of luxury casting, Kevin Burdette, the Gumby-like Doctor Bartolo in The Barber of Seville, portrays Benoit and Alcindoro.
Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro, conducted by SFO Music Director Harry Bicket, joins the repertory June 28, 2025. Technically, it’s a revival of the company’s 2021 staging, but with a twist — director Laurent Pelly was unable to travel to Santa Fe due to visa complications, so an assistant served as the onsite director with Pelly participating from Paris via rehearsal videos.
“Not many people were able to see it in 2021 due to pandemic seating restrictions,” Meya said. “We’re very much looking forward to having Laurent here in person and seeing his vision for the piece. It’s really a premiere for him.”
Rigoletto, last performed here in 2015, receives seven performances as a co-production with the Irish National Opera and the Netherlands’ Opera Zuid.
Conductor Carlo Montanaro, director Julien Chavaz, scenic designer Jamie Vartan and baritone Gerardo Bullón all make their Santa Fe debuts with the production. “Chavaz was Laurent Pelly’s assistant for Candide here in 2018, and he now runs the Magdeburg Theater [in Germany],” said Meya. “He’s a 40-something-year-old guy with a big international career now.” Montanaro is a specialist in the Italian repertory, while Bullón is a Spanish baritone whom Meya credits David Lomelí, the company’s chief artistic adviser, with discovering.
Gilda will be performed by Elena Villalón, Nannetta in SFO’s 2022 Falstaff and Sheila in The Righteous here this summer. Tenor and former apprentice Duke Kim returns as the Duke of Mantua.
The Turn of the Screw was programmed for 2025 in part for logistical reasons — “We were trying to find the right balance in terms of the load on the organization, and it provides organic relief to the orchestra, especially,” said Meya — and in part as an homage to former SFO General Director Richard Gaddes, a major Britten fan who died in December 2023.
While it’s a chamber opera with a six-person cast and a 13-member orchestra, The Turn of the Screw has enough emotional impact to work well in larger theaters. Gemma New will be the conductor, with Louisa Muller, who is staging this summer’s La Traviata, as the director. It receives four performances, starting July 19.
The physical production comes from England’s Garsington Festival, where Muller directed its well-received premiere in 2019. Opera Today called it “a must-see production” with “eerily thought-provoking direction,” while The Guardian described it as “a beautiful, unsettling piece of theater,” and The Times concurred, saying it was “a hauntingly great show.”
There’s also a new twist for the opera’s apprentice scenes programs near the end of the season. The first will be in the traditional format of staged scenes with piano accompaniment, while the second will be a concert-style event with the singers and opera orchestra onstage.
