Opera Glasses, s04e08 – COC: Under New Leadership

A new general director can change the feel of an opera company long before their first programmed season arrives. We’re joined by Ian Derrer, newly arrived in Toronto and stepping into leadership at the Canadian Opera Company, to talk about the path that brought him here and what he’s listening for as he gets to know the COC from the inside.

Ian shares how growing up around rehearsals turned into a career that moved from singing ambitions to backstage work, stage management and ultimately opera administration at major institutions. We dig into what opera leadership really looks like day-to-day: solving immediate problems, planning multiple seasons years in advance, and keeping artists and staff supported while the organization also has to fundraise, market and build public trust.

We also spotlight what’s coming up, including the world premiere of Empire of Wild and why new opera is both exhilarating and high risk, with creative teams building the work in real time and fewer safety nets when something goes sideways. From beloved standard repertoire to personal bucket-list titles, Ian gives a candid look at how taste, feasibility and community impact collide in season planning. 

Finally, we tackle the big question: what makes the Canadian Opera Company a national opera company, and what responsibility comes with that label across Canada’s opera ecosystem.

All episodes of The Opera Glasses podcast are hosted by the editor of Opera Canada, currently Michael Jones after Elizabeth Bowman hosted seasons 1 and 2. Follow Opera Canada on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and Visit OperaCanada.ca for all of your Canadian Opera news and reviews. 

Transcript

Introducing Ian Derrer

SPEAKER_00 0:06

Hello, and welcome to the Upper Glasses Podcast, the official podcast of Upper Canada magazine. I'm Michael Jones, your host, and this is an extra special episode of Upper Glasses. It is our eighth for season four, and we typically don't interview one during the summer. But this seems like a really ideal opportunity to welcome the new general director at the Canadian Opera Company, Ian Dare, both to his new role and to Canada. Ian joins us having spent the last number of years as general director at Dallas Opera. And he has he officially moved to Canada about three weeks ago. So welcome to Canada, Ian, and welcome to the Opera Classes podcast.

SPEAKER_01 0:53

Thank you so much, Michael. I'm so thrilled to be here. I really appreciate the invitation to participate.

SPEAKER_00 0:59

Well, I think it will be really interesting for our listeners, even those who are across the country, to have an opportunity to meet you because there's always a lot of questions when a company that designs enough to the OC goes through a search process. And everyone that I've spoken to is very excited that you are coming here. So I'm I'm I'm I'm anxious to meet you myself and to hear what's in store. Um, but why don't we just start by having you tell us a little bit about yourself, your background, and how you ended up here?

Ian's Background: "Born in an Opera House"

SPEAKER_01 1:33

Well, uh I I kind of feel like I was born in an opera house in a lot of ways. Um from a very early age, uh, opera was always in my family. Uh my parents were amateur singers. And uh I grew up outside of Charlotte, North Carolina, and both of them sang in the opera courts. And so they had a, you know, fostering a love for singing early on. And I was often taken to rehearsals as a kid to uh, you know, probably just sit in the room and and and be a good boy. But at the end of the day, I was absorbing and absorbing a great deal of opera. Eventually I was in the children's chorus, eventually I was in as a super uh and uh began uh an interest in singing in the chorus myself uh when I was about 15, 16 years old. I started taking private voice lessons uh because I was so uh enamored with it, and I thought, oh well, maybe this will be what I want to do when I grow up is be an opera singer. And that really carried me for quite a while. Um, went to college and uh in in Dallas, Texas, at Southern Methodist University, and I was uh uh had every intention on being uh an opera singer, so I got a degree in voice, studied with a wonderful uh tenor uh who was in his late 70s at that time, named Thomas Hayward. And uh he had been a longtime professor at SMU and uh kind of a wonderful career at the Met uh in the 50s. At any rate, I I really just kind of kept going through thinking I was going to be an opera singer uh until I realized how fascinating working backstage was. And part of my um uh work study uh that I had a scholarship was to be the uh assistant for the opera department. And that opened up a whole new world for me. And I ended up doing an internship uh at the Dallas Opera in my last year at SMU, uh, which really opened up a lot of the doors for me. My um uh my teacher uh at that time was uh very, very helpful in getting me into uh the Dallas Opera as far as just introducing me to the artistic administrator, a man named Jonathan Pell, who uh said, Well, of course you could be an intern, but uh we have a kind of an unusual situation right now. The director for our upcoming show, uh which was Elektra by Ricard Strauss, um, has had to cancel uh at the last minute for a variety of reasons, which I can't get into right now. But a different director, one who is here right now, John Copley, is uh directing Il Trovatore. He's agreed to stay on and uh direct Electra. However, we don't have an assistant for him. And would you be John's assistant? And I had no idea what any of that meant. Uh so I said yes. And and that was uh the beginning of me branching out into production. And I ended up going to Santa Fe opera that summer. It was 30 years ago, 1996. And that was my first professional job outside of graduating with a degree in voice that I never used. I was I was absolutely uh smitten by working backstage, and I became a stage manager, I became an assistant director, did a lot of that freelance for for quite some time. Thought that was that was it. I was just gonna be uh a director or something along those lines. And then my career kind of changed again because I was uh getting my master's degree, this time at Northwestern University in in Evanston, which is just north of Chicago. And I was I was to be, I was doing an elective class in Lee. Uh I was getting a directing degree, but I needed an elective class, and I thought, well, I can sing one German art song, and that's fine. Uh well, I happened to be singing on a day in which the professor uh was sick and couldn't be there, so he designated his wife to be the professor that day, and that was uh Min Yun Dun, uh mezzosoprano. And uh Min Yun heard me sing in this class and said, Why are you directing? You need to be singing. And so I kept going back and forth uh in this world of uh should I be a director, should I be a singer, what should I be doing?

Working at Bigger Companies and the Move to Management

SPEAKER_01 6:22

Ultimately it all settled down. I made a decision that administration was really a natural fit for me. I was at New York City Opera as an intern that eventually turned into a uh a full-time job uh as uh head of uh well, it was the rehearsal department. I was doing the daily schedule, and I was also taking care of all the musical cuts. And at that time, City Opera was uh doing, I think, 16 operas in a year. They'd do eight in the fall and had a hiatus for the ballet, and they'd come back and do another eight. So it was a huge amount of opera, uh, and just the volume that I was dealing with taught me a lot when hurrying. Then I ended up doing essentially the same job a few years later at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, and I stayed there for uh eight and a half years, worked my way up to head of the rehearsal department, which is like company management, and then eventually director of production. I was I was so, so enjoying that. Uh, but I also really always had kind of another pull towards wanting to have a little more artistic say. Uh, you know, the production side of things was very exciting, but I also knew that, you know, I had a background in voice, I had a great appreciation for singing, and I always kind of dreamed of being able to help with casting. So that opportunity came to me uh vis-a-vis the Dallas Opera, where I had uh uh, you know, first had my my big break through the an internship in Dallas Opera, and then coming back in 2014 as artistic administrator. That was uh kind of a uh a roller coaster two years as artistic administrator. I then got another opportunity in 2016 uh to lead a small company in uh uh Louisville, Kentucky called Kentucky Opera. It's the State Opera of Kentucky. And I was invited to be the CEO there, and I loved that set of responsibilities. And it was a mighty company for its size, what it what it could do, you know, a modest budget uh compared to the Lyric Opera of Chicago for sure, or Dallas Opera. But it was an opportunity for me to really get my hands in doing everything. When you're working for a smaller company and you're the head of a smaller company, you do a lot. And so that was a uh a real opportunity for me to learn firsthand about fundraising, firsthand about marketing. So I did that for two years before Dallas, uh, another opportunity came back uh from Dallas, and this time to lead the company that I had left. And so I went to uh Dallas in 2018 as general director, and I was there for eight years.

SPEAKER_00 9:22

In many ways, Dallas has been your home throughout various stages of your career between school and interning and having a student there in the middle and and there are three distinct chapters for sure in Dallas.

SPEAKER_01 9:35

When I was uh a student at Southern Methodist University, they were performing at uh Fair Park, uh, which is uh uh uh kind of a notorious venue for opera. It was the home of the Dallas Opera for for all of those early years when it uh, you know, with Maria Collas and Nicola Rosinho and the whole early years of Dallas Opera. But as a venue, it certainly uh had a lot to be desired. And that was uh something that was front and foremost for uh the board of the Dallas Opera for decades. And so when I went back, uh it was after they had opened a brand new opera house called the Windspeare Opera House, and that is in the Dallas Arts District. And coincidentally, the Windspear is very similar in a lot of ways to the Four Seasons Performing Arts Center. In fact, they uh have the same acoustician. Dallas had this brand new opera house, and then when I came to Toronto, uh I was struck by how similar uh the venues are, not only from the acoustic standpoint, they're both just stunningly uh you know geared for great acoustics for a live live performance, but the footprint of the uh auditorium, uh the number of seats, all of that kind of stuff. Uh so in a way it felt very familiar.

SPEAKER_00 10:57

Why

What Interested Ian with the Position at the COC

SPEAKER_00 10:58

why Toronto? Why did why did this opportunity interest you when you saw when you heard about it?

SPEAKER_01 11:04

Well, I it's a company I've certainly known about for a long time. And it has always been mentioned with the highest regard uh throughout the industry. Uh I knew people that have worked here either as directors or singers, and some of the staff as well that I've known throughout the years. Um and I knew that it really seemed to be on this artistic high. Uh it really uh had had grown in its artistic levels. Um I, in fact, even in my earliest years uh as a in, you know, working backstage as a production assistant andor stage manager, worked with Richard Bradshaw at the Santa Fe Opera. And so I I remember with great fondness, Richard. And and so uh those kinds of things just just all come together, and you think to yourself, aha, uh, this is something I need to give a very, very serious consideration. Then you come to realize how lucky the company is with the facilities that it has, not only the Four Season Center, but also the rehearsal facility it has in the 227 Front Street property, which is it's exquisite and it's it's uh absolutely charming. Uh it I mean, and and charming for old buildings also means it's got a lot of work that needs to be done to it. But you know, I'm I'm getting old. I have work that needs to be done to me too. So we just have to uh commit to work together on that. But the uh the the company itself uh really uh just continues to unfold and welcome me, uh, which I was I was so excited about because this company has um, I mean, I mentioned the reputation, but you get here and you realize that not only do you have a great deal of people that have experience, but there's also wonderful expertise. And so yeah, you don't often get expertise and experience that overlap, but uh COC seems to be very rich with that. And that's a a real, real delight to be able to come into a situation that there's pride of place in this company, but the the uh the city itself is is proud of the Canadian opera company.

SPEAKER_00 13:18

And what what do you think you bring to the role that's unique for you? What why you? What's what's special?

SPEAKER_01 13:27

Well, I think uh as a as a general director, uh what's unique about me is that I've I've kind of hit many different jobs in an opera house, you know, uh from performing, you know, that and and you know, I didn't have a uh an A-level house career by any stretch of the means, but I I certainly did perform a lot, and I know what it's like to be on the stage, and I know what it's like to go through the challenges that a singer goes through, whether it's just, you know, the battling allergies or battling uh you know, not feeling well, all the things that just creep up and and affect the the way you perform. Then later in life you begin to realize uh, you know, as a stage manager, you're working on one opera at a time. And when you're in administration, you maybe of course you have to deal with the uh challenges that are presenting themselves to you today, uh, whether it's a sick cast member or uh you know part of a set that isn't functioning the way it should be, or maybe that set hasn't arrived yet from wherever it's supposed to be. But all of these things kind of come together uh for your daily problems, but you're also planning many years out. So you are thinking about today, but you're also thinking about three, four, five years in advance. Add to that then later the responsibilities of the general director, and you have to do all of that now. You're not calling the show, you're not creating the schedules anymore, but you're overseeing that, you're kind of steering the ship. But you're also then uh responsible for all the mechanisms that are gonna help pay how do you market, how do you how do you line up the money uh that you need to in advance, or at least start discussions about it, and offer a fair amount of inspiration along the way, because if I'm not inspired by it, the artistic director Roberto is not inspired about it, we're gonna have a hard time rallying support. Um so those are the kinds of things that you know it's been an evolution in my own career that have at least given me experience through the many tasks that you need to bring operatives. And I I I never went out thinking I needed to accrue all these different skills, but it just happened. And I think it's made me fairly uniquely positioned. Also having the benefit of having spent some incredible times at some very, very remarkable institutions and opera companies and working under some leaders. Um, when I was at Santa Fe Opera many seasons, I worked under John Crosby, who was the founder. He was also a conductor, but he was the founder and general director of the company. And later in Chicago under Phil Mason, uh, and some of his last few years at Lyric Opera of Chicago. In in New York City Opera, I was there in the last year or so with Paul Kellogg's uh time as general director. So I I felt very lucky that I had uh great colleagues uh that were mentors along the way.

SPEAKER_00 16:39

You talked about the fact that opera seasons are planned often years in advance. So

What Should COC Audiences Be Excited About in 2026/27?

SPEAKER_00 16:46

the 26-27 season for the Canadian Opera Company, which will start in September, was not one that you had that much hand in planning, I would imagine. So I think what what might be interesting for you to tell us is what of the season, what are we doing this season that's particularly exciting to you as someone who came into a season in many ways like audiences do?

SPEAKER_01 17:14

Well, absolutely. And and you know, it's it's true, Michael. I mean, I inherited uh the planning, and and that actually is true for the ensuing season after the the 26-27 season as well. My footprint won't be felt in the COC programming for several years. By the same token, I've left programming in Dallas that my successor there is has inherited as well. And that's just the nature of the way things happen uh in this. Uh but I I think for me, uh there's always a great excitement around the world premiere. Uh and so Empire of Wild uh is that was a new story for me. So I read the uh book and I'm very excited to see how that translates to the stage. I've been very lucky in my life to participate and and help produce uh many world premieres. There's there's nothing quite like that in an opera company. It always kind of pushes people to their boundaries in some ways, but at the same time, you are dealing with the creationist bringing all these things together. I mean, opera in so many ways is problematic, you know. I mean there are you would you would think, how are we bringing all of these things together and it's not you know a collision? And uh all the different um kind of uh variables that can happen uh when when you have a new work. Uh the the composer is Ian Houston, and and you know, the work that he is doing uh with the librettist, with the uh the whole team to kind of bring this together, that is an evolution. And those those things will continue to evolve over the next several months. And you are you are working with a lot of people that are gonna be coming into a room very soon together and going through all of this for the very first time. So you're gonna learn a lot and you're gonna you're gonna uh get inspired a lot, you're gonna get frustrated. Every new uh production goes through that, whether it's because of uh the challenges of realizing a set for the first time or uh dealing with the costumes being made, all of those things, even on a an opera that has been well established and a new production of you know Lava One, for example, you still it's fraught with challenges because it's a new production. When you add to that, that everybody has to learn this role. And you add to that the risk that then you have of, you know, there literally is only one cast that knows this in the world. Uh, so you have to think of understudies, you have to think of uh all the backup plans so that you have those in place uh for world premiere. It sounds fraught, but it's actually one of the most exciting times of any opera company is to work together for uh that world premiere moment.

SPEAKER_00 20:18

So when we think of standard opera rap as opposed to to the new work, you you were in the rehearsal room as a child. What's the first opera that you remember?

SPEAKER_01 20:31

I remember being seated in the auditorium uh, and I think I was around three years old, while my parents were on stage uh in the the magic flute. And uh the magic flute later in life, I I realized that uh I couldn't remember offhand any of the singers, obviously, in the production, but I learned later that uh the woman singing the role of the Queen of the Night was actually somebody that I knew. I told her this story, and I said, So you realize you're partially responsible because your voice is the one that I remember from my childhood as Queen of the Night. And uh her name was Jana Rolandi, and and she was a wonderful soprano, and and she uh was the wife of Sir Andrew Davis. Uh and uh I loved telling her that story because I had I had never put those things together, and by that time we had become uh good friends.

SPEAKER_00 21:35

Other favorites?

SPEAKER_01 21:37

Oh boy. Well, I

Ian's Favourites from the Standard Rep

SPEAKER_01 21:39

the the standard repertoire is is certainly uh all all there, Verdi Puccini. I I think it has to do with my early time in in Santa Fe, but I do have quite an uh affection for Ricard Strauss. That first season when I was in Santa Fe, uh we did Daphne by Strauss. And that that's not one you get to hear every day. So it was it was a wonderful opportunity. And just, you know, being in Santa Fe at that time where it was just like that was what you did. You every year there was going to be a Strauss opera, and you got to experience that. So I I fell in love with Strauss very, very quickly. Electra and Zalome, clearly operas that I uh I've produced in several companies. So it's it's those are our go-to's for me. But those those big titles are um certainly something that you can't have a steady diet of. Uh either, either they're too rich in in many ways for an opera company to have too much of it. But I do like them a lot.

SPEAKER_00 22:37

Now I asked this question, and I'll tell you this story in advance. I met Alexander Niefe when he just became general director at the COC. And he was speaking then about an opera that the COC had never done that was on his absolute wish list. He desperately wanted to do it at the COC. Are there things that are there wish list pieces, bucket list pieces that you really want to do?

SPEAKER_01 23:06

There are. There are many. Um, I mean, uh going back to uh Strauss for a second, I mean, De Fraueneschatten is certainly a piece that I would love to do. I've only done it once and I would love to do it again. Parse of all is one that I've done once that I would I would love to do again. Uh Troyen, I've never done Trojan. Um I I love Berlios. Uh that is something that it would be uh incredibly exciting for me. Uh War and Peace is another opera that uh I would love to do at some point in my life. Um for me, I I guess I also want to make sure that we're doing something that's gonna be exciting to Canadian. And I really want to respond to the things that are the pulse of what is exciting to not only the COC brands, but also the Canadian uh in general. There there should be ways that we can activate the the operatic ecosystem, as it were, uh to get behind some excitement for different projects in Canada.

SPEAKER_00 24:10

That's

What Does It Mean to be a National Opera Company?

SPEAKER_00 24:11

an interesting when you talk about the Canadian opera company, uh because I've been in this role now for a couple of years, I've had the opportunity to ask this question a couple of times. Um, Tahu Matheson, who's the director of music for Opera Australia, and Tim O'Leary, who I'm sure you know as the general director at Washington National Opera. I asked both of them what it means to be a national opera company. Opera by its very nature, it sits, it's a big art form. It sits in a theater, so it's very associated with the city, the place where it is being performed. And so in your mind, what makes something a national opera company as a person who's now leading the Canadian opera company?

SPEAKER_01 25:04

I'm glad you asked that because it's it's a question I've been asking myself too. And and uh to kind of go back to one of your earlier questions of you know, what what drew me to this position? It certainly was uh this added responsibility of not only doing the best opera that I can for this this company, which happens, you know, majority of the opera happens in the Four Seasons uh uh Center for the Performing Arts, but there is there is a necessity that what we're doing should be broader than those walls. In my opinion, I think it's setting examples, uh, but it's also creating capital. And I think what what I hope we can do is by creating opera and by inspiring people to come to opera, we invite people to see how they can make that in their own communities and see how they can benefit from the performing arts in their own communities. Opera is the art one that brings all the others together under one roof. And I I think if we can create a little excitement and splendor in in a different community, for example, and give them uh inspiration to figure out what they can do to bring their community together through the music, then we're doing something the different pathways that opera presents. So as a spectator, you know, people come to the opera and they are they're drawn to the music sometimes, sometimes they're drawn to the costumes, sometimes they're drawn to the stories being told, uh, sometimes they're turned off by the stories because they don't understand them, or they're they're in a language that uh doesn't uh uh translate to them or they can't read the supertitles well, something along those lines. But people are coming to the opera generally for a handful of different things, and those are the same on-rips into the community, and I think that that is something that has always been an inspiring part of what opera can do in the community, it can bring people together. So much of the joy that I get from opera is not in the actual performance, but it's in the build-up to it, it's in the rehearsal, it's in the discussions of what can we do to connect to the community, what can we do to connect to the businesses, what can we do to connect to our stories outward as well as bringing people into the building. So I think there's a inherent responsibility as a national opera company to make sure that those pathways are clear and make sure that that we can lift the art form up uh by what we're doing and being a resource to others.

SPEAKER_00 27:51

Thank you. That's that's a really good answer. What's interesting to me is that you, Tim and Ta, who have all answered that question very differently.

Canadian Artists and Building the Future

SPEAKER_00 28:00

I know that you know Canadian artists, that you you certainly um your production of The Little Prince in Dallas last year actually had three or four of our emerging younger singers in um it was Canadians were very well represented in Your Little Prince last year. They were. They were.

SPEAKER_01 28:20

And and uh we also had um uh Joyce El Kuri was uh in in our dialogues of the Carmelites in Dallas, and um I mean Joshua Hopkins has been there, and then Tien Dupuy uh made his debut last year as well. I mean, what can I say? There's some fantastic singing coming out of Canada.

SPEAKER_00 28:38

Who are some of the Canadian artists that you find really interesting or really exciting that you'd like to work with?

SPEAKER_01 28:45

Well, I I think uh any of the ones that I've uh have just named. Um I'm also uh so interested in uh Emily D'Angelo, who uh uh, you know, uh an alumni uh uh and and her career just seems to be skyrocketing. So uh certainly a uh uh an artist of incredible caliber. Um I also uh when I was in Chicago worked uh with Gerald Finley, and uh I mean, just you know, uh one of the most elegant and uh uh exquisite artists. So uh that's that's always uh something in the back of my mind of finding pathways uh for for him as well. There are, and then when you start thinking about the uh levels of the legacies of great singers uh Ben Hapner, who uh uh, you know, I I actually have never worked with Ben Hapner, but I mean clearly uh a legend of Canadian talent. He did the world premiere of Jay Keggy's uh movie Dick, uh which was in Dallas, and that was before my time, unfortunately. But uh there were there were just so many different connections to great singing uh uh between the Canadian Opera Company and the Dallas as well. John Vickers had a long career in Dallas, uh coincidentally, of all of all people. So um but back to the artists that uh you know are are uh exciting me today. I think the ones that I mentioned are are really front of mind.

SPEAKER_00 30:19

Good. Well, in the season you have coming, there's a lot of of wonderful Canadian talent on your stage. In fact, this is uh I was just thinking about the careers of some of the Canadian sopranos that are appearing at the COC next season. You have you have people all the way up in we'll say experience to Tracy Dahl, who's coming back to do Despina again, the COC in the fall, and Adrian Pazanka, who's singing in the turn of the screw, all the way down to Emily Roca, who just left the honorable studio. Just left the studio and is singing Adina for your Elixir of Love this year. So I think you'll have a really exciting time to hear some Canadian artists this year.

SPEAKER_01 31:07

Well, that's that's that's one of my favorite parts of my job is uh hearing new singers. And uh and some sometimes you feel like you you've discovered a diamond in the rough, which is always a great investment. And other times you just you you think, how have I not heard this voice on major stages yet? And uh for me, that's gonna be uh a year ahead of me of just really great discovery and and uh looking forward to auditions, looking forward to visiting other uh performances and companies. But also, you know, we have this wonderful ensemble uh here, which is uh I have not had the pleasure of hearing all of them do their audition repertoire or anything like that, but that'll happen in due course. And so that's that's another uh great, great thing that I look forward to. But it it's not just about the singers, it's uh it's also about the creatives. And you know, there's such an uh uh incredible legacy of great directors and designers that have come out of uh Canadian Opera Company. So that's that's another uh part of the the future that I really, really look forward to exploring and uh finding uh the next generation of great directors and designers and and really making sure that we're bringing back the ones that we love.

Life in Toronto and Final Thoughts

SPEAKER_00 32:26

Well, we should probably close, but I'd also like people to learn a bit about you as a person. So I'm going to ask if you're comfortable sharing, how has your move to Toronto been? Where are you located? What are you enjoying about being here in this city now?

SPEAKER_01 32:43

Well, I love it. I mean, the city is magnificent. Uh, it is so uh well, it's vibrant. You know, you you come onto this the the subway or or off the subway and and and you're always encountering a great deal of of wonderful activity and it's it's diversity and it's uh there's just a richness in the city that feels like a uh a very, very uh happening place. That that aside, uh, I think it's also very beautiful. And so I live uh uh kind of in the the the Bloor Bay area and I have a wonderful view of the city that I just I I love looking at and seeing the lake. And now keep in mind this is what it's July. So I mean the weather is is it's highly cooperative. I I I know it's gonna take a turn, uh, but I I think you know, just to calm people's expectations, I did survive many years in Chicago with in less than warm weather. So I'm I'm not I'm not going into it un unknowingly. The thing that I love about it too is the the food. I I I just am so enjoying walking around, exploring the different neighborhoods and different restaurants, and uh really taking taking me out of my comfort zone in some ways to really just be able to have uh something new around the corner. So it's it's a wonderful city, and uh uh I'm truly, truly loving being a part of it.

SPEAKER_00 34:08

Well, thank you for sharing that, Ian, and thank you for joining us on the Opera Glasses podcast. I'm sure it's been great for all of our listeners to meet you. It's been really wonderful for me to meet you. One of the things that I heard after your appointment from a number of people said, Oh, he's just such a wonderful guy, that it was really, I was really looking forward to meeting with you today. So thank you so much for joining us. The 26-27 season at the Canadian Opera Company starts this September with alternating performances of La Traviata, inclusifandurde. You can find out more information, of course, at coc.ca. This has been the Opera Glasses podcast, the end of season four, but come back to us in the fall for a brand new season five. We have lots of exciting plans for it. And thank you again, Ian, for joining us for today.

SPEAKER_01 35:05

Thank you, Michael.

SPEAKER_00 35:06

It's been wonderful meeting you. Thank you to our listeners for joining us as well.