Cleveland Opera
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Cleveland Opera was Cleveland, Ohio's leading professional opera company from 1976 to 2006. It is now known as Opera Cleveland following a 2006 merger with Lyric Opera Cleveland. The newly-named company is scheduled to give its first staged productions from April 2007.
The original company was founded by David Bamberger, Carola Bamberger and John D. Heavenrich in 1976 and presented its first season that year with sold-out productions of Puccini's Madame Butterfly and Rossini's The Barber of Seville. By 1984 it had become the resident opera company at Playhouse Square Center, with performances at the State Theater. The company played an integral part in the revitalization of Cleveland's historic theater district and was a leader in the movement to make theaters accessible to the physically challenged. There was considerable overlap between the orchestra personnel of the Cleveland Opera, Cleveland Ballet, and the Ohio Chamber Orchestra, to the advantage of all three organizations.
The company was managed from March 1976 to April 2004 by David Bamberger as General Director and Carola Bamberger as Associate Director. In that period, the company presented 122 full productions of 74 works by 43 different composers spanning the history of musical theater from Monteverdi to the present. Its casts included some of opera's greatest artists. Among them were Roberta Peters, Jerome Hines, Sherrill Milnes, and (in concert) Plácido Domingo, Luciano Pavarotti, and José Carreras.
In addition to operas and operettas, Cleveland Opera presented several musical theatre favorites, such as West Side Story, Man of La Mancha and My Fair Lady. It received international attention by commissioning and presenting a world premiere opera by a noted Rock musician: Stewart Copeland of "The Police". The opera was "Holy Blood and Crescent Moon". The company was also noted for “Cleveland Opera on Tour”, an extensive education and outreach program. It was a member of OPERA America, a national organization which oversees and helps the development of opera across the North American continent.
In 2006, due to well publicized financial problems which existed in the years after 2004, Cleveland Opera merged with a small summer company, Lyric Opera Cleveland, to form the new institution.
