The Opera Residency certificate program, the first of its kind for Operanauts, is a 4-week residency for an aspiring opera artist from Congo (DRC). It includes weekly voice lessons with Joy Bechtler and rehearsals with piano accompanist Kathy Shanklin, an excursion into New York City to see an opera performance and tour the Metropolitan Opera, as well as campus visits at music schools and libraries in New Jersey.
Instead of shutting down the residency program during the height of the global pandemic in mid-March, Operanauts’ board opted to extend it for another 4 weeks.
Samuel Niaty, lyric baritone and cellist with the Orchestre Symphonique Kimbanguist, was the 2020 Opera Artist Resident. He arrived in New Jersey with the goal of preparing opera arias for auditions. By the end of the additional 4 weeks of the residency, Samuel had made considerable progress towards his professional goals.
During the extra residency time, Operanauts added over a dozen sessions of virtual keyboard lessons with Cecelia Reilly, a piano and music composition teaching artist who has been a vital part of Operanauts’ programs since 2013, as well as opera diction coachings and a mock audition with Dr. Akiko Hosaki, Lead Coach for Productions & Preparations.
The 8-week program culminated on April 25th when Samuel Niaty and Kathy Shanklin, piano accompanist, performed a concert of opera arias and songs on Facebook Live from Operanauts’ music studio. So far, there have been over 1,700 views of the event.
As part of his program, Samuel chose to include original arrangements of sacred songs that his mother taught him as a boy. The songs are in Kikongo, a language spoken in the Congo Centrale province. At the conclusion of the residency, Dr. Craig Levesque, Music Director, engraved and published the collection of 3 Sacred Songs for Samuel to take back with him.