Berkshire Opera
Life has a soundtrack.

Berkshire Opera Company was founded in 1985 by Rex Hearn to fill a conspicuous gap in the summer performing arts offerings in the Berkshires. While symphonic and chamber music, theater, and dance were offered at various cultural venues, Berkshire Opera was first to bring professional, fully staged opera to the Berkshires and continues today to be the only professional opera company performing in Massachusetts during the summer. Mr. Hearn, a transplanted Englishman, originally envisioned Berkshire Opera Company as an American Glyndebourne so during the first year, the fledgling company experimented with an early curtain time and a lengthy picnic break following the opera’s first act. A few rainy evenings and the lack of suitable picnic grounds, however, soon led to the adoption of a traditional performance schedule.

Berkshire Opera Company’s first home was in the now demolished chapel of The Cranwell Resort in Lenox. Its first production was Handel’s Acis and Galatea, which featured Berkshire resident Maureen O’Flynn who has since gone on to become an internationally acclaimed soprano. During its first 16 years, the company wandered the Berkshires seeking a permanent home yet regularly presented two fully staged operas during July and August often augmenting these productions with special events, performances, and concerts during the early summer and fall. For its first seven seasons, their repertoire consisted of comic operas primarily from the Baroque or Classical periods. In 1992, Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia was presented to broad audience and critical acclaim. In its review of the production, The New York Times said, “…just up the road from Tanglewood, the Berkshire Opera Company performs miracles.”

In 1997 the company moved to the professional theater of the Koussevitzky Arts Center on the scenic campus of Berkshire Community College. While still affording the intimate listening experience for which Berkshire Opera had become known, the theater provided first-rate facilities for opera production. The 1998 season saw the company increase its offerings to four ambitious productions and included the critically acclaimed performances of Gian Carlo Menotti’s The Consul. Berkshire Opera’s production was recorded on the Newport Classic label immediately following the final performance — the first commercial recording ever made of The Consul.

The 1999 season marked another milestone for Berkshire Opera when the company presented the world premiere of Summer, an original opera composed by noted American Stephen Paulus. Summer, which is set in the Berkshires, is based upon the novel of the same name by Berkshire resident Edith Wharton and was commissioned by BOC together with the Edith Wharton Restoration. Berkshire Opera’s presentation of the world premiere of Summer formed the centerpiece of “The Summer of Summer”, a unique and exciting collaboration of numerous Berkshire cultural organizations including The Boston Symphony at Tanglewood, Shakespeare & Company, The Clark Art Museum, the Edith Wharton Restoration, and the Berkshire Athenaeum. BOC also launched its Resident Artist Program, an intensive training program for singers and pianists. The program provides young artists with the opportunity to perform full-length operas and participate in a curriculum of musical and vocal coachings, master classes and acting and movement classes with world-renowned artists.

On September 21, 2000, Berkshire Opera Company purchased the historic Mahaiwe Theatre in Great Barrington, Massachusetts and launched at $15 million capital campaign to restore the Mahaiwe to its original 1905 grandeur. In the summer of 2002 Berkshire Opera presented its first opera in the Mahaiwe, Benjamin Britten’s haunting Turn of the Screw. The events of September 11, 2001 and the subsequent economic downturn, however, severely impacted restoration efforts, and in January 2003 they sold the Mahaiwe Theatre to the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center, a newly formed not-for-profit organization dedicated to the Theatre’s restoration. Since January 2003, Berkshire Opera has been based in Pittsfield, MA, and we remain dedicated to bringing the finest opera performances and outreach activities to the Berkshire community. In 2007, Berkshire Opera offered its first performances in the newly renovated Colonial Theatre, marking a wonderful new milestone in the company’s history. The company now enjoys performing at both the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center and the Colonial Theatre, two beautiful venues that enable Berkshire Opera to continue its fine performance legacy.