Palm Beach Opera Reveals 2025 Season Resident Artist Roster And Program Director

After reviewing over 1,000 applicants from across the country and abroad, Palm Beach Opera is excited to announce the roster of 15 resident artists who will train with the company for the next five months. Throughout their 2025 Season residency, the artists will appear on the PBO mainstage in supporting roles, perform in concerts and community engagement activities, and receive mentorship from an esteemed guest faculty.

Home to one of the leading training centers for emerging artists in the industry, Palm Beach Opera is proud to offer competitive artist training opportunities for singers at several key stages of their careers. The three-tiered training initiative includes PBO Studio, a free eight-month program for high school students, and two paid professional residencies-the Bailey Apprentice Artist Program, designed for recent conservatory graduates, and the Young Artist Program, offered to singers on the verge of launching careers as principal artists.

During their five months with PBO, the Young Artists and Bailey Apprentice Artists focus full-time on their artistic growth with frequent concert performances and daily coaching with a world-class guest and resident faculty. Young Artists also appear on the mainstage in supporting roles and cover leading roles. Bailey Apprentice Artists serve as the pillars of PBO's community engagement performances, while also covering and performing mainstage supporting roles and providing leadership to the Chorus.

Palm Beach Opera has built an impressive track-record of success in identifying and training the next generation of singers. Earlier this fall, two recent PBO resident artist alumni - soprano Kathleen O'Mara and mezzo-soprano Meridian Prall - were named winners of the Operalia Competition, considered the most prestigious international competition in opera, founded by Plácido Domingo in 1993 and held in a different city worldwide each year. O'Mara and Prall join the three previous PBO resident artists who were named winners of the Operalia Competition in 2022 - tenors Duke Kim and Anthony Ciaramitaro, and mezzo-soprano Maire Therese Carmack. The company has also produced three National Grand Finals winners of the Metropolitan Opera's Laffont Competition in the past four years, and several recent PBO graduates have continued their careers in the programs of the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, San Francisco Opera, Los Angeles Opera, Washington National Opera, Opéra national de Paris, Deutsche Oper Berlin, and Wiener Staatsoper.

The artists selected to join the company's 2025 Season Young Artist Program are soprano Lauren Carroll (Bettendorf, IA); soprano Alexis Seminario (Levittown, NY); mezzo-soprano Ashlyn Brown (Palm Springs, CA); tenor Randy Ho (Denver, CO); baritone Bernardo Medeiros (Tulsa, OK); and bass-baritone Dylan Gregg (Salisbury, MD). Seminario and Brown will be returning to the company after previous PBO residencies.

The artists selected to join the company's 2025 Season Bailey Apprentice Artist Program are soprano

Maggie Kinabrew (Hartford, CT); soprano Saane Halaholo (Redwood City, CA); mezzo-soprano Allison Fahey (Sebastian, FL); mezzo-soprano Margaret Macaira Shannon (Austin, TX); tenor Matthew Cerillo (Freehold, NJ); tenor Ajit Persaud (Georgetown, Guyana); baritone Mario Manzo (Mesa, AZ); bass-baritone Ben Strong (Indiana, PA); and pianist Connor Buckley (Hagerstown, MD). Kinabrew and Persaud are returning to PBO for a second season.

Each artist benefits from a rigorous individualized curriculum of vocal, musical, linguistic, and dramatic instruction through guest residencies with luminaries in the field. The 2025 Season faculty will include voice teachers Stephen King, Michael Paul, and Nova Thomas; acting coaches Paul Curran and Nic Muni; diction coaches Nicolò Sbuelz (Italian), Bénédicte Jourdois (French), Marianne Barrett (German), and Ksenia Leletkina (Russian), Anna Betka (Czech), and Roberto Berrocal (Spanish); and explorations of the Great American Songbook repertoire with Craig Terry and Billy Stritch. The Young Artists and Bailey Apprentice Artists also coach with PBO's Ari Rifkin Music Director David Stern, participate in masterclasses with visiting artists, and work daily with PBO's distinguished resident music staff, including PBO's Associate Conductor and Chorus Master Greg Ritchey and vocal coaches Shelby Rhoades, Anna Betka, and Valeria Polunina.

The company's artist training initiatives are now under the leadership of Joanna Latini, who began as the new Director of Resident Artist Programs in September, filling a vacancy created when the company's longtime Director of Artistic Administration James Barbato was promoted to General Director. Latini joins the company from Houston Grand Opera, where she was serving as administrator of their esteemed young artist program, the Butler Studio. She was previously Company Manager at the Aspen Music Festival. Before pursuing arts administration, Latini was an accomplished soprano and a PBO Young Artist in the 2018-19 season, when she covered Violetta in "La traviata," covered Donna Elvira in "Don Giovanni," and sang Sally/Ida in "Die Fledermaus." Among her other performance credits, she has sung with Santa Fe Opera, Wolf Trap Opera, and the Glimmerglass Festival, and she was a National Semifinalist in the Metropolitan Opera auditions. She was recently selected as a participant in the 2025 cohort of Opera America's Leadership Intensive, a yearlong program for rising leaders in opera administration.

According to General Director James Barbato, "We are thrilled to welcome Joanna Latini back to Palm Beach Opera as our new Director of Resident Artist Programs. She was a standout as a singer in our program, and she has quickly distinguished herself as an exceptionally talented arts leader in this next chapter of her career. Under her guidance and mentorship, I know that our artists will flourish and the success of our program will reach even greater heights. The strength and impact of our artist training initiatives have been a point of pride for our community, and we remain forever grateful to the Cornelia T. Bailey Foundation for their enduring generosity in sponsoring our Apprentice Artist Program, and to all of our individual artist sponsors whose commitment to our mission makes these important programs possible."

Joanna Latini added, "It brings me immense joy to step into the role of Director of Resident Artist Programs at Palm Beach Opera. Our programs have long served as vital platforms for developing the next generation of opera talent, and their impact is felt worldwide. During my tenure as a Young Artist here, I developed into a true professional singer through the comprehensive training and opportunities offered. The faculty members we employ to train our artists are not only world class, but are also compelling leaders in their individual areas of expertise. Truly, the depth of training we provide in five months is unparalleled. I am honored to lead such a dynamic program and look forward to nurturing the future stars of opera. We will continue to build a program that inspires, educates, and transforms emerging artists, ensuring a bright future for this beautiful art form, all right here in Palm Beach."

To open the season, the Bailey Apprentice Artists will participate in two cross-disciplinary collaborations highlighting Spanish-language repertoire, appearing on the Boca Raton Museum of Art's Music in the Museum Series on November 17 at 3:00pm with a program inspired by the museum's "Splendor and Passion: Baroque Spain and Its Empire exhibit," followed by an appearance on the Norton Museum's Art After Dark Series on November 22 at 7:30pm in connection with the opening of the "Sorolla and the Sea" exhibit. Tickets are available through the respective presenting museums.

Later in the fall, each resident artist will be featured in an exciting showcase of opera's most riveting scenes, "Opera Up-Close: Unveiling the Dramatic Process" at Palm Beach Opera's Cornelia T. Bailey Opera Center on December 14 at 7:00pm. Tickets are $100 and include a pre-performance reception, valet parking, and a post-performance toast with the cast.

The resident artists will also be featured in the company's acclaimed Lunch & Learn events throughout the season, when they will sing highlights from each of the 2025 mainstage productions as part of engaging presentations about the background and story of the operas. This popular series takes place at the National Croquet Center, with Lunch & Learns for "Roméo et Juliette" on January 16, "La traviata" on February 13, and "The Marriage of Figaro" on March 27. For more information and to purchase tickets, please visit pbopera.org.

Additional resident artist concerts will soon be announced, including Great American Songbook concerts and a Salon Series of art song.

Palm Beach Opera is dedicated to producing live opera at an international standard of excellence, enriching the lives of the communities it serves with a diverse offering of educational programs, and training the next generation of opera stars. Founded in 1961, the fully professional Palm Beach Opera presents main-stage performances at the Kravis Center for the Performing Arts in West Palm Beach and is a proud member of OPERA America and the Cultural Council of Palm Beach County.

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