NEA Launches National Opera Awards
By Anne Midgette
Think of American art forms, and opera doesn't typically spring to mind. But now the federal government is setting out to change that.
Yesterday the National Endowment for the Arts announced the four winners of the first annual NEA Opera Honors, the first new program of national arts awards since the Jazz Masters awards were established in 1982. The first opera honorees are the great soprano Leontyne Price, conductor James Levine (who has led the Metropolitan Opera for 32 years), composer Carlisle Floyd ("Susannah") and administrator Richard Gaddes, who will retire this year from the Santa Fe Opera. Each will receive $25,000 in a ceremony on Oct. 31 at the Harman Center for the Arts in Washington, since the Washington National Opera is the NEA's partner for this first presentation.
Read more about this at the Washington Post website:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/13/AR2008051302755.html
