Courtney Kalbacker

Courtney Kalbacker is an AGMA opera production professional who travels throughout the United States as a Stage Director, Production Manager, and Assistant Director.  She specializes in contemporary pieces and working with young singer-actors to develop characters for the operatic stage.

  Her many roles off stage include directing and production positions with UrbanArias, Lyric Opera Baltimore, Peabody Opera (Peabody Institute), Baltimore Concert Opera, Michigan Opera Theatre, Live Arts Maryland, Silver Finch Arts Collective, the Boston University Tanglewood Institute, and Oklahoma City University among others.  Ms. Kalbacker is currently the Director of the Music for the Stage program at Towson University.  Recent engagements include directing the short comedic operas Service Provider and The Whole Truth with UrbanArias,  Assistant Directing Madama Butterfly at Michigan Opera Theatre, and directing the American premiere of Errollyn Wallen's ANON for Peabody Opera.

As a passionate educator and advocate for developing singer-actors, Kalbacker originated and taught the Acting for Singers curriculum for Boston University Tanglewood Institute for five seasons, led the acting and improvisation classes at Lyric Opera Baltimore’s Opera Kids Camp, and is the designer and facilitator of a interactive presentation for school children: "What is Opera? A Team!"

UNMANNED STAGECRAFT is a two-woman operatic production team.  Polish composer Katarzyna Brochocka and American soprano Courtney Kalbacker have collaborated since 2008 creating and translating libretti as well as workshopping and performing new operas, song cycles, and pursuing other creative endeavors. Their work has been featured internationally, most recently earning critical acclaim at OperaUpClose's Flourish Competition at the King's Head Theatre [London] for their performance of excerpts from Brochocka's one-woman opera The Young Wife.
 

THE YOUNG WIFE   

[This show was produced three times in 2013: at Baltimore's ARTSCAPE, D.C.'s CAPITAL FRINGE FESTIVAL, and at the WARSAW CHAMBER OPERA, in Poland]                      

written by Katarzyna Brochocka and based on the novel by Gabriela Zapolska. Performed by Courtney Kalbacker.

Confessions of passion: the secrets of a Young Wife revealed! In 1890s Poland, a skittish Young Wife discovers an unexpected way to deal with her snippy husband, his giggling “lady-friend” and her own forbidden longings. Full of playful melodrama, the audience becomes her confidant in this delightful one-woman comic opera.

DC Theatre Scene:

"a perfect balance between storytelling and sonic expression.."

http://dctheatrescene.com/2013/07/17/the-young-wife/

For my friends in Poland:

Młoda Mężatka

Wyznania namiętności: sekrety Młodej Mężatki ujawnione!

W Polsce lat 1890tych niefrasobliwa Młoda Mężatka odkrywa niespodziewany sposób na poradzenie sobie z oschłym mężem, jego rozchichotaną przyjaciółką i własnymi zakazanymi pragnieniami. W atmosferze żartobliwego melodramatu publiczność staje się powiernikiem bohaterki, w tej uroczej monodramatycznej operze komicznej.

UNMANNED STAGECRAFT to dwuosobowa, operowa grupa producencka. Polska kompozytorka Katarzyna Brochocka oraz sopranistka Courtney Kalbacker współpracują od roku 2007 tworząc i tłumacząc libretta, a także udoskonalając i prezentując nowe opery, cykle pieśni oraz podejmując inne twórcze wyzwania. Ich praca już zyskała międzynarodowe uznanie, ostatnio podczas konkursu Flourish Competition 2012 w King's Head Theater w Londynie, zorganizowanego przez OperaUpClose i Eclectic Opera, za wykonanie fragmentów monodramatycznej opery Brochockiej zatytułowanej „Młoda Mężatka”.