User:Miss Caroline Lee/sandbox

Chamber Made Opera is Australia’s only arts company dedicated to the creation and presentation of contemporary chamber opera and music theatre. For more than twenty years, the company, based in Melbourne, has been an important player within Australian contemporary performing arts, bringing local and international artists together to generate cutting edge, influential and inspiring performance work.

Chamber Made Opera was formed in 1988 by theatre director and librettist Douglas Horton. Since taking up the artistic directorship in 2010, David Young has commissioned and presented 12 new Australian operas, many of which were created as part of Chamber Made Opera's innovative and very successful Living Room Opera series. The company has forged significant partnerships with the Victorian Opera, the Victorian Writers’ Centre, Bell Shakespeare, Rawcus, Malthouse Theatre, New Music Network, and the Australian Music Centre.

Chamber Made Opera works with established artists of the highest calibre, including international performers and creators; as well as providing opportunities for the most promising emerging professionals. The company is also committed to engaging the skills of performers from different disciplines and ‘non-traditional’ music and performance backgrounds.

The endeavour is wide-ranging, from contemporary classical music theatre, through to cross art 'hybrid' performance works. As a true reflection of contemporary Australian culture, this range encompasses wide stylistic and ethnic diversity in our music and music-makers.

Chamber Made Opera is a not-for-profit association incorporated in Victoria, with Australian Taxation Office endorsed Tax Concession Charity and Deductible Gift Recipient status.

Living Room Operas
Chamber Made Opera is putting the chamber back into opera, and inviting itself over to your place. From the beginning of 2010, a series of domestic-scale chamber operas have been commissioned and developed for presentation right in people’s living rooms.

The Living Room Opera Series pushes the boundaries of what we have imagined opera to be, involving artists and musicians from a wild range of styles and backgrounds. New voices as well as unexpected collaborators come together in different people’s homes. From inner-city living to suburban opulence, this series gives you a chance to sneak a peek into other people’s homes, and to experience new, radical chamber operas up very close and personal. Living Room Operas are a way of viewing performances where the audience can reach out and touch the action. Ranging from new operas to installation music and art pieces, Living Room Operas engage the audience is a way that is yet to be seen in other Melbourne art pieces. They create an intimacy that a new work can long for, and being within a home gives the pieces more heart.

In 2010 new works by young composer Alex Garsden, Rawcus Theatre Company, and the new Quiver Ensemble have been commissioned and presented in a range of domestic settings with unparalleled investment by individual donors in this creation of new music. The 2010 commissions will see re-presentations in 2011 and 2012, and are being accompanied by further new commissions. The Series represents a highly mobile and scalable model with private philanthropy embedded into the structure - the living rooms and commission fees are donated by passionate individuals. The Series will be philanthropically supported, with the ethos of encouraging new investment in new music and making productions of infinite flexibility, accessible yet of the highest quality and innovation.

Staff past and present
Douglas Horton stepped down as Artistic Director in March 2009, after 21 years. In 2010 composer David Young was appointed the role of Artistic Director.

Past staff include General Managers Stephen Armstrong and Robina Burton, and the late Jacqui Everitt, designer. In 2008 the staff were Douglas Horton (Artistic Director), Kylie Trounson (Artistic Associate), Geoffrey Williams (General Manager), Erin Adams (Administrator), Brett Kelly (Musical Associate). In September 2008 the company announced the formation of their "National Artistic Directorate", currently composed of: Robyn Archer AO (SA), Gerard Brophy (QLD), Brett Dean (VIC), Matthew Lutton (WA), Caroline Stacey (ACT).

In 2012 Chamber Made Opera's staff are: Artistic Director / CEO: David Young ; General Manager: Tim Stitz; Artistic Associate: Sarah Kriegler; Assistant to the Artistic Director: Caroline Lee; Resident Conductor: Brett Kelly; Resident Director: Margaret Cameron; Consultant (Strategy & Development): Sophie Travers; Finance Officer: Sally Goldner.

The 2012 Artistic Advisory Group consists of Robyn Archer, Gerard Brophy, Helen Cole (Bristol UK), Brett Dean, Juliana Hodkinson (Berlin, Germany) and Caroline Stacey.