Special Event: An Evening with Nathan and Julie Gunn

Nathan and Julie Gunn, co-directors of Lyric Theatre @ Illinois, will share their musical journey through all kinds of singing: songs, , musical theatre, new works, and film. They’ll talk about how music and theatre shaped their thoughts as artists and teachers. There will be a lot more singing than talking! Twenty-five years of videos in about an hour.

Julie Gunn is a pianist, educator, and music Nathan Gunn is widely acclaimed for his diverse director. She has performed on many of the performing career bridging the genres of opera, world’s most prestigious recital series, musical theatre, and recital. Gunn grew up in including the Aspen Festival, Auckland’s South Bend, Indiana doing what most Midwestern Aotea Centre, Boston’s Celebrity Series, boys do: playing sports, working hard at school, Brussel’s La Monnaie, Cal Performances, the and spending time with his family. His interest in Carnegie Hall Pure Voice Series, the music became a passion during his junior year of Cincinnati Chamber Music Society, the high school when he was introduced to Mozart’s Cliburn Foundation, the , opera, Die Zauberflöte. Consumed by a desire to Melbourne’s Hamer Hall, the Krannert learn more, Nathan attended the University of Center for the Performing Arts, Lincoln Illinois (the third generation in his family to Center Great Performers, Manhattan’s Café attend the school) to study music. Carlyle, the McCallum Theater for the Performing Arts, the As a performer, Nathan is respected as an artist, Summerstage, Notre Dame’s DeBartolo musician, and singing actor. He has performed Center, the Queensland Performing Arts many of opera and musical theater’s greatest Centre, the , St. Paul’s roles on the world’s most prestigious stages. Schubert Club, San Francisco Performances, Nathan has also been seen and heard on the Sydney Opera House, Toronto’s Roy television, radio, video, and live simulcast Thomson Hall, University of Chicago performances, including the first ever Met in HD Presents, Bravo Vail!, Washington’s Vocal broadcast(), in which he sang Arts Society, the Wallis Annenberg Center in Papageno, one of his signature roles. In addition Beverly Hills, Washington National Opera, to Papageno, Nathan has reinterpreted classic London’s Wigmore Hall, the 92nd Street Y, roles such as , Figaro, and Don and the Supreme Court. Giovanni, garnering many awards, including the Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording (Billy She has been heard with William Burden, Budd) and the Metropolitan Opera’s first ever Richard Croft, Michelle De Young, Elizabeth Beverly Sills Award. Additionally, Nathan has been Futral, Isabel Leonard, Stefan Milenkovich, widely acclaimed for his ability to crossover into Kelli O’Hara, Mandy Patinkin, Patti LuPone, musical theater, including performances with the Yvonne Gonzales Redman, Alek Shrader, the New York Philharmonic in Carousel and Camelot, Pacifica and Jupiter Quartets, and her as well as a televised celebration of Stephen husband and artistic partner Nathan Gunn. Sondheim’s80th birthday. Nathan has frequently collaborated with many stars of musical theater, Co-Director of LyricTheatre@Illinois at the including Mandy Patinkin, Kelli O’Hara, Audra University of Illinois, she produces three McDonald, and . mainstage or musical theatre works a year at the Krannert Center for the Nathan believes that music is a living art form and Performing Arts. A faculty member at the must be nurtured to remain relevant. He has School of Music, she enjoys teaching singers, championed dozens of new songs, operas, and pianists, chamber musicians and songwriters, sung theater in a multitude of venues. He and conducting new works and musical recently debuted his one-man autobiographical theatre. She has given master classes at show produced and written by Hershey Felder, universities and young artists’ programs all entitled Flying Solo, which has been lauded as a over the United States and Canada, including “riveting autobiographical musical [that] is a the Aspen Festival, the Cincinnati stunner both with its touching, relatable, family- Conservatory of Music, Florida State centric narrative and Gunn’s entertaining, University, the Glimmerglass Festival, charismatic performing style (Broadway World Highlands Opera Studio, the Houston Grand review).” Nathan and Julie Gunn created their Opera Studio, the Interlochen Center for the production company, Shot in the Dark, to produce Arts, the Metropolitan Opera Guild, Opera and perform cabaret shows which entertain the Theatre St. Louis, the Ryan Young Artists’ public, and give young artists and hometown Program, the , Ravinia’s celebrities a platform to showcase their talents. Steans Institute, and Vanderbilt University. Nathan and Julie are also often seen in recital She is the founder of the Illinois School of and cabaret settings where they enjoy creating Music Academy, a program for talented pre- programs uniquely tailored to the special college chamber musicians and composers. event. This season, Nathan will perform new roles with Pittsburgh Opera, Chicago Opera Dr. Gunn enjoys working at the intersection Theater, Beth Morrison Projects and PROTOTYPE of different disciplines and collaborates with Festival, and will debut Drytown: a Living Room artists in the fields of theatre, dance, and Vaudeville with Julie Gunn. design whenever possible. She has served as a coach or conductor at Chicago Opera Nathan is a professor and Swandlund Chair at the Theater, Highlands Opera Studio, the University of Illinois where he is co-director of Metropolitan Opera Young Artist Program, Lyric Theatre @ Illinois, a comprehensive program Opera North, Opera Theater St. Louis, embracing a broad continuum of opera and Southern Methodist University, musical theatre, as well as the development of Theaterworks!, and Wolf Trap Opera. She is new works. At the Lyric Theatre @ Illinois, Nathan committed to new works and in recent developed and founded the first ever Bachelor of seasons has been part of several world Musical Arts in Lyric Theatre curriculum in the premieres, as a co-producer, a pianist, or as nation. The program is part of the School of Music a conductor: concert works by Augusta Read at the University of Illinois and housed in the Thomas, , and Harold Krannert Center for the Performing Arts. Meltzer; staged works like Polly Peachum (Scheer/Van Horn), Letters from In addition to life as a performer, educator, and Quebec to Providence in the arts advocate, Nathan is an avid patron of the Rain (Gill,) Black arts. Nathan and Julie Gunn consistently support Square (Demutsky), PRISM (Reid), The pre-college music education and sponsor local Surrogate (Macklay), Sensorium cultural events in order to secure the future of Ex (Prestini), Take Flight! (Maultby and the art form. Nathan and his family reside in Shire) and Bhutto (Fairouz), often in Champaign, Illinois. collaboration with Beth Morrison Projects and American Opera Projects. Last year, Nathan and Julie Gunn launched their new production company, Shot in the Dark Productions Inc, which made its debut at the Krannert Center in Nathan and Julie Gunn and friends: An Evening on Broadway.

This season she looks forward to the premiere of Drytown: A living room vaudeville, a production of Shot in the Dark Productions, and serving as the music director of Kander and Ebb’s Cabaret at the Krannert Center.

A member of ASCAP, she is the author of many arrangements of songs for chamber groups and orchestras. Her arrangements have been heard at Carnegie Hall, Chicago’s Symphony Center, the DeBartolo Center, Ithaca College, Interlochen, the Kennedy Center, the Krannert Center, London’s Queen Elizabeth Hall, and in Sun Valley, Idaho.