BIO
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Staufenbiel: Tenor
Staufenbiel: Director
Staufenbiel: Opera
Brian Staufenbiel, (Director) is the head of the Opera Program at the University of California, Santa Cruz. His directing credits includes Bizet’s Carmen; Donizetti’s The Elixir of Love; Menotti’s The Medium; Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi; Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro, Die Zauberfl öte, and Don Giovanni; Weill’s Street Scene; and Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream for which he was awarded the fi rst prize in the National Opera Association Opera competition in New York in 2007.
Staufenbiel has also directed at the Seoul Contemporary Opera Company the Korean premiere of David Jones’ opera Bardos and the reprise of Chan Hae Lee’s latest opera Back to the Origin. He has also been guest director in the Sherbrooke Summer Music Festival, where he directed works by Ravel and Honegger. He returned to the festival in Summer 2007 to direct and perform in the semi-staged version of Handel’s Jephtha.
In 2007, Staufenbiel also directed the world premiere performance of the fi nal version of Lou Harrison’s opera Young Caesar with San Francisco’s Ensemble Parallèle.
In February, Staufenbiel directed the world premiere of The Dawn Makers by Allen Shearer at Herbst Hall in San Francisco. He will join Ensemble Parallèle in January 2010 to direct the West Coast premiere of John Rea’s reorchestration of Berg’s Wozzeck to be performed at the Yerba Buena Center in San Francisco in January 2010.
Staufenbiel is also part of the voice faculty at UCSC. As a tenor, he has sung the leading roles in Rossini’s L’Italiana in Algeri, Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia, Poulenc’s Les mamelles de Tirésias, Ravel’s L’enfant et les sortilèges, Weill’s Mahagonny, and Mechem’s Tartuffe. Staufenbiel has appeared at the Boston Early Music Festival, the Rochester Bach Festival in New York State, and sings frequently throughout the Bay Area.
In addition to live performances, Staufenbiel has recorded for Musical Heritage Society; Koch International Classics; Mode Records; Helicon Records music by Alessandro Stradella; Heinrich Schütz; Lou Harrison; and Paul Bowles. His most recent recording includes the world premiere recordings of tenor arias from Lou Harrison’s opera Young Caesar and the Mass for the Feast of Saint Cecilia (Kleos records).
The Staufenbiel/ Scharron Duo has performed from coast to coast Argento’s Letters from Composers, set as a one-man opera. The duo recently completed a CD recording of works by Britten, Argento and Adler (commissioned< work). Staufenbiel holds a doctorate degree in vocal performance and literature from the Eastman School of Music.