Yamaha Named "Official Piano of LA Opera"

The Yamaha CFIIIS Grand Piano

LOS ANGELES, Calif.—As it approaches its 25th anniversary season, LA Opera has partnered with Yamaha Corporation of America as "The Official Piano of LA Opera." In little more than two decades, LA Opera has become the fourth largest opera company in the United States and has garnered international acclaim for its visionary productions featuring world-class artists. With legendary tenor Plácido Domingo at the helm as the Company's Eli and Edythe Broad General Director, along with acclaimed conductor James Conlon as Richard Seaver Music Director, LA Opera brings the highest caliber of opera to the citizens of Los Angeles and beyond. Its continuing artistic growth is now fueled by a fleet of new Yamaha pianos.

Yamaha will provide more than 15 instruments, including grand and concert grand pianos, professional uprights and digital pianos. The instruments will be used on the main stage for recitals and back stage for rehearsals, as well as for outreach performances throughout Southern California that help expose the next generation of audiences to opera of the highest quality.

"LA Opera is proud to partner with Yamaha, whose long tradition of excellence matches our own highest artistic standards," said Christopher Koelsch, LA Opera's Vice President, Artistic Planning. "Opera of international quality can only be achieved when our artists work under the best possible conditions—whether in performance or in rehearsal—and we are grateful to Yamaha for helping us achieve that essential benchmark."

"As the longtime provider of pianos for the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, and San Francisco Opera, Yamaha is well acquainted with the musical needs of a world-class opera house," says David Pocock, Manager of Institutional Relations for Yamaha. "We look forward to a satisfying cycle of collaboration with LA Opera for many years to come."

Yamaha pianos will be featured alongside some of the most renowned voices of our generation in recitals at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. Most recently, soprano Renée Fleming, dubbed "The People's Diva," was heard in recital on December 2009 accompanied by Gerald Martin Moore playing Yamaha's flagship CFIIIS Concert Grand Piano.

In fewer than 25 years of existence, LA Opera has become a company of international stature that "...stands out as a newly important force in American opera" (Los Angeles Times). LA Opera created a sensation with its 1986 inaugural production of Verdi's Otello starring Plácido Domingo. Presenting benchmark productions of standard repertoire as well as new and rarely-staged operas, the Company brings prominent Los Angeles artists together with other world-renowned singers, designers, directors and conductors to create opera that attracts the attention of international audiences and critics.

In May and June 2010, LA Opera is presenting its most monumental undertaking to date, Wagner's Ring cycle (Der Ring des Nibelungen), featuring three full cycles of the four opera production. Through its celebrated multi-year Recovered Voices project, LA Opera is also the only major American opera company to regularly program the works of composers affected by the rise of the Third Reich.

For more information, write Yamaha Corporation of America, P.O. Box 6600, Buena Park, CA 90622; telephone (714) 522-9011; or e-mail infostation@yamaha.com.