Applied Artist
M.A., University of Wisconsin
Office: 815-753-8640
E-mail: btm2ntg@charter.net
JAMES TUCKER has been director of the Opera Workshop program at the NIU School of Music since 1994.
He began his professional career at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis and has since served in a variety of production and administrative capacities for such companies as Chicago Opera Theater, Opera for the Young, Cincinnati Opera, Central City Opera, and The Washington Opera at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. He has staged productions for the Virginia Opera Association, Madison Opera, Madison Repertory Theatre, Buffalo Theatre Ensemble, and the University of Wisconsin Opera and Theatre. His directing credits range from theater (The Tempest, Equus and Old Times) to musicals (West Side Story, Sweeney Todd, Company, She Loves Me, Quilters) and opera (L’elisir d’amore, Don Giovanni, La clemenza di Tito, The Magic Flute, Orpheus in the Underworld, L’Enfant et les Sortiléges, The Turn of the Screw, and Postcard from Morocco, among many others. He was especially privileged to direct A William Warfield Scrapbook, a tribute featuring performances by Mr. Warfield himself, for the 2001 Chicago Humanities Festival.
Mr. Tucker is the author of four opera libretti, the first three in collaboration with Lee R. Kesselman, including The Bremen Town Musicians, which has received more than 375 performances since its premiere in 1988. His most recent libretto, a new treatment of The Nightingale set to music by Canadian composer Imant Raminsh, was jointly commissioned by the Glen Ellyn Children’s Chorus, the Portland Symphonic Girl Choir and the Children’s Chorus of Washington, D.C., and received premiere productions by each of those organizations in May and June 2005. His other writing credits include singing translations published by Boosey and Hawkes, plus scripts and segments produced for Wisconsin Public Television and Radio.
Mr. Tucker holds a B.A. in Theatre from Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minnesota, and his M.A. in Arts Administration from the University of Wisconsin–Madison.