Artists

American tenor Gregory Turay is the recipient of several of classical music’s most coveted honors. Winner of the Richard Tucker Award, George London Foundation Award, ARIA award, and Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, Turay was hailed early in his career by the London Times as “one of the brightest natural talents to have emerged from the US in recent years.”

A chronicle of international opera and concert engagements merit Mr. Turay’s critical acclaim: San Francisco Opera debut as Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni and return as Camille de Rossillon in The Merry Widow; European debut at the Welsh National Opera as Ferrando in Cosi fan tutte; Deutsche Opera Berlin debut as Tamino in Die Zauberflote; Santa Fe Opera debut as Fenton in Der Rosenkavalier; Nemorino in L’Elisir d’Amore at the Boston Lyric Opera; Nadir in Les Pecheurs de Perles, the title role in Orfeo and Ernesto in Don Pasquale at the Opera Theatre of St. Louis; Fenton, Palino in Il Matrimonio Segreto and Zeferino in Il Viaggio a Reims at Wolf Trap Opera Festival; debut with the Cleveland Orchestra and Christoph von Dohnanyi in Berlioz’s Te Deum; Handel’s Messiah with San Francisco Symphony and Cleveland Orchestra; Mozart’s Coronation Mass at the Mostly Mozart Festival; Tanglewood Festival; Mozart’s Mass K 139 at the Salzburg Festival; Berlioz Requiem at the Edinburg Festival conducted by Don Runnicles; Nadir with the Washington Concert Opera; Lyric Opera of Chicago as Sam Kaplan in Weill’s Street Scene; and Ravinia Festival “Rising Stars” concert. Winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council auditions at the age of 21 and alumnus of the prestigious Metropolitan Opera’s Lindemann Young Artists Development Program, Mr. Turay made his Metropolitan Opera debut as Bringhella in Ariadne auf Naxos and has returned for many engagements including Don Ottavio, Camille de Rossillon, Bringhella, and Ferrando.

Angela Rice (Composer) has a long and distinguished history in the arts community. In Lexington, Kentucky, where she is based, she is a founding member of the University of Kentucky Friends of Music and the co-founder of the Ashland School of Music. She has also served as Vice President of Education for the Lexington Philharmonic, as well as holding board positions with the Lexington Opera Society and the UK Opera Workshop.

A graduate of the University of Louisville, Rice studied piano under Robert Harris, formerly of the Juilliard School, and voice under Phyllis Jenness, formerly of the University of Kentucky, and Sahar Hassan of the New England Conservatory. After settling in Lexington, Rice continued to pursue music, both performing and composing. Her mentors include Phyllis Jenness (voice) Lori White (voice) and Joseph Baber (composition). 

In 2016, Gregory Turay premiered Angela’s Eternity song cycle of poems by Emily Dickinson at Norton Center for the Arts at Centre College. Her oratorio, Thy Will Be Done made its New York debut on March 2018 at David Geffen Hall, Lincoln Center with the National Chorale, directed and conducted by Dr. Everett McCorvey. Thy Will Be Done was also recorded at the Manhattan Center in June 2018 and is soon to be released in 2019.   Angela currently serves on the Chrysalis House Board and the Kentucky Arts Council Board. Rice resides in Lexington where she continues to compose.

Daniel Arnold (Arranger) is a composer whose music has been performed in Germany, England, Portugal, and Romania, in addition to cities across the United States. Primarily a composer of solo piano music and chamber music, Daniel received his Master of Music in Composition from the University of Kentucky, where he studied with Joseph Baber. His solo piano compositions include 24 Preludes and Fugues and 16 Views of Mt. Fuji, the latter of which accompanies prints by the Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai. This year he released an album of music he wrote and performed using a digital piano, which has been compared favorably to the music of Mozart, Henry Mancini, Sufjan Stevens, and video game soundtracks.

Daniel has previously collaborated with Angela Rice and Gregory Turay on Rice’s Easter oratorio Thy Will Be Done. He currently works as a freelance composer/arranger and engraver/publisher.

Rebecca Farley, soprano, has been praised for her poise (Opera News), her “fine, flexible soprano” (Parterre Box), and her “filigree phrasing” (Scoop NZ). She received her master’s degree from The Juilliard School where she was a Kovner Fellow. Operatic credits include Gilda in Rigoletto, Pamina in Die Zauberflöte, the Controller in Jonathan Dove’s Flight, Countess in Le nozze di Figaro (conducted by James Conlon), and most recently Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte with one of the foremost Mozartian conductors, Jane Glover. 

Ms. Farley made her Carnegie Hall debut December 2016 in Bach’s Magnificat with The Cecilia Chorus of New York, an ensemble with whom she returned the next season for Bach’s Weihnachts-Oratorium. Another recent Carnegie highlight was a collaboration with Ensemble Connect for Monteverdi’s Il combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda in which she sang the role of Clorinda.  A great lover of early music, Ms. Farley has frequently appeared with Juilliard415 and toured with the ensemble internationally under the baton of esteemed Bach authority Masaaki Suzuki. 

Notable premieres include Jonathan Breit’s concert scena Der Zippelfaggotist at Carnegie Hall and Sherry Wood’s Mara: A Chamber Opera in collaboration with The Rubin Museum. Ms. Farley made her David Geffen Hall debut last year in the New York premiere of Angela Rice’s oratorio Thy Will Be Done.  She is honored to team up with Rice again to bring the words of Emily Dickinson to life.

Elizabeth Troxler is a NYC based director and choreographer with a passion to create stories full of emotion and heart, with a vision to weave together dance, singing, music, and acting in a way that enhances and heightens the experience of the theater goer.  Currently, she is directing and choreographing a new musical for NY Summerfest, Daughter of Society, which explores the emotional and intellectual journey of a woman as she breaks out of the molds that society and life experiences have placed on her into living fully as Her Self.  Elizabeth directed and produced Free To Be in NYC, providing performance opportunities for everyone from Broadway veterans to dancers from classical and modern companies around NYC to the hopeful college graduate.  She loves to combine worlds to create art, cross pollinating genres, and Elizabeth is privileged to have a working relationship with Brad Fields, the lighting designer for American Ballet Theatre.

Elizabeth began her dance training in Western Pennsylvania with Paula Scriva Jersey. She continued to study at Pittsburgh Ballet Theater, Boston Ballet, and under Vagonova Masters Irina Kolpakova & Mansur Kameletdinov of the Kirov Ballet (now Mariinsky Ballet). Later Elizabeth trained under Maureen Price with the Royal Academy of Dance where she passed all of her RAD vocational exams with Distinction (including a perfect score on Advanced 2). She was awarded the prestigious Solo Seal Award with the Royal Academy of Dance, and is now a Certified Teacher for the Royal Academy of Dance.