ROBERT TWETEN

Described by Opera News as conducting “brilliantly” with an “unerring sense of balance, blend, and drama,” Conductor Robert Tweten has worked extensively throughout North America and is currently the Head of Music Staff with The Santa Fe Opera, and the Music Director of Opera Studies for the New England Conservatory. Recent performances have included Turandot with Lyric Opera of Chicago, Rigoletto with Calgary Opera, Faust with San Antonio Opera, and Silent Night with Utah Opera. In 2021 he looks forward to conducting NEC’s production of Il re pastore, and returning to Utah Opera to conduct their upcoming concert, Light on the Horizon, which will be filmed for USUO On Demand streaming. Later in 2021, he will join Florentine Opera for Weill’s Mahagonny Songspiel in double bill with selected opera scenes and in 2022, he will return to Utah to conduct their production of Flight (postponed due to COVID19).

During his tenure with Santa Fe Opera, Tweten has conducted performances of Don Giovanni, Le nozze di Figaro, Katya Kabanova, The Pirates of Penzance, Ermione, the 50th Anniversary Concert, and was on the podium for two performances of the GRAMMY award winning, The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs. 

Enjoying a long relationship with Utah Opera/Symphony, this season Tweten will conduct his fourteenth production with the company. Other top American collaborations include the Lyric Opera of Chicago, where he served for many seasons as an Assistant Conductor, Kentucky Opera, Dayton Opera, Austin Lyric Opera, Tulsa Opera, Opera Birmingham, Opera Southwest, Madison Opera, El Paso Opera, and Sarasota Opera. Tweten has conducted extensively in his native Canada, with productions including Tosca and Il barbiere di Siviglia with Vancouver Opera, Lucia di Lammermoor, Rigoletto, Madama Butterfly and Fidelio with Edmonton Opera, Don Giovanni with Opera Ontario, The Gondoliers with UBC Opera, L’isola disabitata with the Canadian Opera Company, and Die Zauberflöte, Le nozze di Figaro, Pagliacci/Gianni Schicchi, Il barbiere di Siviglia, L’italiana in Algeri, and Otello with Calgary Opera. A favorite among orchestras across the US, Tweten conducted the New Mexico Philharmonic's season-opening concert in 2011, returning to lead two programs in 2013, as well frequent performances with the Santa Fe Symphony.

Tweten began his career as a piano soloist after receiving his Associate of Arts Degree from the Victoria Conservatory of Music and winning numerous competitions, including the Du Maurier Search for Stars and the Canadian National Piano Championship. After working at the Banff Center of Fine Arts, he joined the Houston Grand Opera Studio where he was on the team for the world premiere performances of the Emmy award-winning Nixon in China, and later served as a vocal coach and assistant conductor for the Canadian Opera Company and Lyric Opera of Chicago. 

Equally at home as a recitalist, collaborator, and chamber musician, he has performed with many of the industry’s most prominent singers and instrumentalists including Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, Elizabeth Futral, Catherine Malfitano, Susan Graham, Joyce DiDonato, Samuel Ramey, Thomas Hampson, Rod Gilfry, Suzanne Mentzer, Rachel Barton Pine, the Taos Chamber Music Group, and the St. Lawrence Quartet in venues such as Alice Tully Hall, Chicago’s Orchestra Hall, the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Los Angeles’ Disney Hall, Barcelona’s Gran Teatre del Liceu, Vienna’s Konzerthaus, London’s Wigmore Hall, and the Salzburg Festival. Recent performances have included Justice at the Opera with Ruth Bader Ginsburg and apprentice artists of the Santa Fe Opera, as well as recitals with Suzanne Mentzer, Rod Gilfry, and Joshua Hopkins.

In 2017, Tweten joined the New England Conservatory’s opera faculty as Music Director, where he coaches and provides musical guidance for the Graduate Opera Studies Program, and has conducted productions of Later the Same Evening, Le nozze di Figaro, and Postcard From Morocco.