Richard Thompson is a performer and composer whose work encompasses jazz and Third Stream composition. Originally from Aberdeen Scotland, Thompson made his debut as a concert pianist at the Purcell Room, Queen Elizabeth Hall in London in 1984.

Thompson’s recordings include the March 2006 release Poetry Prelude, an album of original compositions on the Visionary Records label, distributed by Albany Records. Poetry Prelude includes his two song cycles: settings of the poetry of Langston Hughes, Dream Variations, and Paul Laurence Dunbar, The Shadow of Dawn. In 2006 Arabesque Records released Swing Low, Sweet Chariot, a collection of Thompson’s arrangements of well-known spirituals recorded with his New York based jazz group Mirage.

Thompson’s chamber opera, THE MASK IN THE MIRROR—a dramatization of the courtship and marriage of poet Paul Laurence Dunbar to Alice Ruth Moore—was premiered in 2012 by Trilogy Opera, based in Newark NJ, under the artistic directorship of Kevin Maynor.

Thompson earned his undergraduate degree in music from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, his graduate degree from Rutgers University in New Jersey, and a jazz diploma from Berklee College of Music in Boston. While at Rutgers University, Thompson studied jazz piano with Kenny Barron and classical piano with Theodore Lettvin.

Thompson is currently Associate Professor of Music at San Diego State University.

photo: Ken Jacques

Cameo Humes has performed with the Fort Wayne Philharmonic, the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Orchestra Sinfonica dell’International Chamber Ensemble in Italy.  His most recent engagement included a debut with Teatro alla Scala in the roles of Peter, Crab man, Mingo, and Robbins in their production of Porgy and Bess. Other operatic credits include La Clemenza di Tito, Don Giovanni, Il Barbiere di Siviglia, La Traviata,  Peter (Porgy and Bess) with Lyric Opera of Chicago, Dayton Opera and Skylight Music Theatre of Milwaukee, Crab man (Porgy and Bess) with The Princeton Festival, Nelson (Porgy and Bess) with Cincinnati Opera, and Show Boat with Houston Grand Opera. He was a tenor soloist for the world premiere of Mozart’s Requiem staged with the Cincinnati Ballet. Other recent concert performances include Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast with the Chicago Bar Association Symphony Orchestra, Handel’s Judas Maccabeus, Mozart’s Grand Mass in C minor, Haydn’s Lord Nelson Mass with the Bach Society of Dayton, and Bach’s St. John Passion and Mass in B minor. Upcoming engagements include a debut with the Richmond Symphony in Handel’s Messiah. A lover and avid performer of the Negro spiritual, he has toured Spain, France, and Ireland with the world renown American Spiritual Ensemble.

photo: Richard Crandle

Angela L. Owens

Internationally recognized for her “beauty and musicality” (The London Times), Angela L. Owens began the 2018-2019 season as guest artist with the Harborside Atrium in Jersey City, for their benefit gala. She is also a company member of Pulitzer Prize-winning composer David Lang’s Mile Long Opera in New York City.

In recent seasons, Owens has been a guest lecturer/recitalist for Columbia University’s Earl Hall and has sung performances of Wynton Marsalis’s Abyssinian Mass with the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra. Additional engagements have included appearances at The American Church in Paris, The West Village String Quartet, and a live adaptation of WQXR’s Terrence McKnight’s radio documentary, A Beautiful Symphony Of Brotherhood for New Jersey’s UPAC Auditorium.

Further performances of note include collaborations with the critically acclaimed Opera Noire of New York and composer Ricky Ian Gordon at Manhattan School of Music’s Greenfield Hall and conceptual artist Adam Pendleton’s 2017 installation for the Frieze Projects Commission on Randall’s Island.

Owens regularly premieres commissions of new works, most recently Dorothy Rudd Moore’s opera, Papa Doc, for Trilogy Opera Company and Derek Cooper’s song cycle, Of Life and Growing Up for soprano, violin and piano, where she was featured at the Composers Now Festival with Tania León.

Internationally, she has appeared at the La Folle Journeé festival in Nantes with the world renowned American Spiritual Ensemble, at the Opéra Comique in Paris France and with the Szeged Symphony Orchestra.

photo: Juan Jackson

Lindsay Patterson Abdou received her B.A. in Music from the University of California Riverside and her M.M. in Vocal Performance from California Baptist University where she served as adjunct professor of voice for seven years. Currently, she is a staff singer with the Pacific Chorale, DeAngelis Ensemble, and Education Artist with Long Beach Opera. Operatic roles include Zita in Gianni Schicchi, the Third Lady in The Magic Flute, Mistress of the Novices in Suor Angelica, The Mother in Amahl and the Night Visitors, The Mother in Frank Martins’ The Love Potion, and Leila in the Los Angeles premiere of John Adams’ I Was Looking at the Ceiling and Saw the Sky. Abdou also played the role of the Bicyclist in the Industry LA’s production of Hopscotch, a mobile opera.

photo: Natography Studios

Natalie Mann has achieved acclaim in both the opera hall and on the concert stage. A winner of the Audience Favorite Award in the David W. Scott Memorial Competition, she brings her lush and warm soprano to life in a variety of roles ranging from Mozart and Puccini to Verdi and Strauss. She is also a recent winner of the Hawaii Public Radio International Art Song competition, where she excels in her specialty of French and American repertoire.

Following her Carnegie Hall debut featuring the work of female American composers, Mann’s album Experience was released by Albany Records, with world premiere recordings composed by Lori Laitman and Richard Pearson Thomas. The reviews have been outstanding, and the album is available on Amazon and Spotify. Upon her debut with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, she has been sought after as a soloist. Mann has developed a relationship with the South Shore Orchestra and was a featured soloist on two tours through China.  Her love of modern music and keen vocal sensibility allows her to continue to debut new works across the country. Mann maintains an active schedule of both public and private performances. Learn more by visiting www.nataliemann.com.

photo: Lucie Aleks

Roland Mills, a Trinidadian American lyric tenor, has recently relocated to southern California after spending five years becoming one of Boston’s most polished and versatile singers. Mills recently made his European debut, singing the role of Rincuccio in Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi, produced by the Teatro Magnagni and accompanied by the Giuseppe Verdi Orchestra.

He has also performed roles including Lensky (Eugene Onegin), Tamino (Die Zauberflöte), Ferrando (Cosi fan tutte), Male Chorus (Rape of Lucretia), and Mac the Knife (Threepenny Opera), among others. Mills has been engaged as a young artist with the Russian Opera Workshop, OperaWorks, the Asolo Song Festival, Flagstaff in Fidenza, and the International Performing Arts Institute in Germany. When not performing, Mills manages a team of executive recruiters in Southern California.

photo: Daniel Zecker Buckley