Vivienne Winther is Artistic Director of Stopera, the ACT's chamber opera company, and has played a leading role in the production and performance of more than twenty notable opera and concert events for the company since 1997. She is also Artistic Director of Music For Everyone, the ACT’s community music organisation and a part-time lecturer in piano at the ANU School of Music. She began her professional career as an opera repetiteur with Canberra Opera until moving to Hong Kong where she was Chief Repetiteur for the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts Graduate Opera School, assisting conductor Carlo Felice Cillario. Vivienne has accompanied and coached singers from Opera Australia, Victorian State Opera, ChamberMade Opera, Beijing Central Opera, and Cologne Opera. In November 2005, Vivienne was named The Canberra Times Artist of the Year, for her uncompromising vision and achievement in gaining national and international recognition for opera in the ACT.
Vivienne Winther began her professional career as an opera repetiteur with Canberra Opera and as an accompanist at the Canberra School of Music in the studio of Ron Maconaghie until moving to Hong Kong in 1985. At the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts, she was Chief Repetiteur for the Graduate Opera School, assisting guest conductor Carlo Felice Cillario in major productions for the Academy, studio accompanist and coach for the Head of Vocal Studies, Dr Margreta Elkins, and a piano lecturer in the Keyboard Department. On returning to Canberra in 1993, she became a part-time lecturer in the Keyboard Department of the ANU School of Music, and Artistic Director of Stopera in 1997. Vivienne has also been Artistic Director of the ACT community arts organisation, Music For Everyone, since 2002. Vivienne has played a major role in the production of professional opera and music theatre in Canberra since 1996, her projects including Heinrich Heine - I fool of fortune (CIA & Stopera), The Threepenny Opera (CIA & Stopera), Nel amor confido and The Secret Marriage (Conbrio), and the Stopera productions 2 Shots, distressing the Diva, Ariodante, The Cook, the Fox and the Bride, September Songs, The Pet Shop and The Medium, Viva Verdi!, The Country Philosopher and cantata.
As a pianist and harpsichordist, Vivienne has appeared in concert for the Dante Alighieri Society, the Goethe Institut, the ACT Lieder Society, the National Gallery of Australia, the Pro Musica Society, the Sydney Schubert Society, the Canberra Bach Ensemble and as a recording artist for ABC Classic FM. Vivienne has accompanied and coached singers from Opera Australia, Victorian State Opera, Chamber Made Opera, Beijing Central Opera, Macau Festival Opera, Lyon Opera and Cologne Opera. Concert appearances this year include pianist for two National Multicultural Festival events, Stopera’s Tutto Italiano and the recital European Masters with Rebecca Collins at the National Gallery of Australia. She was also harpsichordist for the Canberra International Chamber Music Festival concert by Stopera and the Haydn Bande of Bach’s Coffee Cantata.
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