Ravinia 2026 Issue 1

JAMES CONLON Since his New York Philharmonic debut in , James Conlon has conducted virtually every ma- jor North American and European orchestra. A highly versatile conductor, Conlon is Conductor Laureate of Los Angeles Opera—this summer having concluded his landmark -season ten- ure leading more than performances of over works—and he was recently artistic advisor of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra ( – ) and principal conductor of Italy’s RAI National Symphony Orchestra ( – ), the rst Amer- ican to hold the position. For years ( – ) Conlon was Ravinia’s music director, a mile- stone of his now -season, -concert relation- ship with the festival that began in . During his tenure, he led complete cycles of Mahler’s symphonies and Mozart’s piano concertos, sev- eral concert and semi-staged operas, and gala performances featuring Van Cliburn, Plácido Domingo, Patti LuPone, and Jessye Norman, among many others. Conlon is Music Director Laureate of the Cincinnati May Festival—in rec- ognition of his years ( – ) as its leader, one of the longest tenures at any American clas- sical music institution—and he has also been principal conductor of the Paris Opera ( – ); general music director of the City of Co- logne, Germany ( – ), leading both the Gürzenich Orchestra and Cologne Opera; and music director of the Rotterdam Philharmonic ( – ). His extensive opera credits include over performances at the Metropolitan Op- era since his debut, as well as conducting at Teatro alla Scala, Vienna State Opera, Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Covent Garden, the Ma- riinsky eater, and Lyric Opera of Chicago. Conlon has received the Roger E. Joseph Prize from the Hebrew Union College/Jewish Insti- tute of Religion ( ), the Anti-Defamation League’s Crystal Globe Award ( ), and the Zeminsky Prize ( ) for his worldwide e orts to program and highlight composers who were silenced by the Nazi regime. His honors also include four Grammy Awards, the Medal of the American Liszt Society, the Sachs Fund Prize for his cultural contributions to Cincinnati, and the inaugural Opera News Award, as well as Italy’s Order of Merit, France’s Order of Arts and Let- ters and Legion of Honor, and Austria’s Cross of Honor for Science and Art. KATHRYN LEWEK One of the foremost coloratura sopranos of the present generation, Kathryn Lewek recently marked her th performance as the Queen of the Night in Mozart’s e Magic Flute with the Metropolitan Opera, surpassing the record for most appearances in the role with the company, and has portrayed the antiheroine with more than companies in over performances to date, most recently at London’s Royal Op- era House and the Santander Festival as well as with Berlin State Opera and the Deutsche Kam- merphilharmonie Bremen. Lewek continued to expand her powerful repertory this past season, making highly anticipated debuts in the title roles of Strauss’s Salome with Cincinnati Opera and Handel’s Alcina in concert with the Ensem- ble Artaserse in Paris, Barcelona, and Mont- pellier, as well as Elettra in Mozart’s Idomeneo at La Monnaie. Highlights of the past year also included reprising her portrayals of Juliette in Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette in concert with the Orchestre National de France and Violetta in Verdi’s La traviata with Opéra de Nice, as well as Handel’s Messiah at Carnegie Hall with the Or- atorio Society of New York. Last season, Lewek made her role debut as Juliette with Toledo Op- era and sang Delibes’s titular Lakmé for the rst time with Opéra de Nice, and she joined three productions of O enbach’s Tales of Ho mann , portraying Olympia at Dresden’s Semperoper and all four Heroines for Palm Beach Opera and the Salzburg Festival. At Rice University in Houston, she created the soprano role in Music for New Bodies by Matthew Aucoin and Peter Sellars. Further highlights of recent seasons in- clude her acclaimed debut as Gilda in Verdi’s Rigoletto at Los Angeles Opera and Cincinnati Opera, singing her rst Micaëla in Bizet’s Car- men with Nashville Opera, and her house and role debuts as Musetta in Puccini’s La bohème with Opera Colorado. Other milestone rsts in- clude her Salzburg Festival and role debuts as Ginevra in Handel’s Ariodante and Eurydice in O enbach’s Orpheus in the Underworld , Count- ess Adèle in Rossini’s Le comte Ory at Lyric Op- era of Chicago, Teresa in Berlioz’s Benvenuto Cellini at Gran Teatre del Liceu, and Cunegonde in Bernstein’s Candide for Glimmerglass Opera. Kathryn Lewek made her Ravinia and Chicago Symphony Orchestra debuts in . MILESMYKKANEN Finnish-American tenor Miles Mykkanen launched his career as a winner of the Metro- politan Opera’s La ont Competition, sub- sequently earning critical praise in debuts at the Met and the Royal Opera House at Covent Gar- den, as well as with Bavarian State Opera and the Canadian Opera Company. He has become a go-to tenor in works requiring a balance of power, lyricism, and dramatic acuity, such as Dutch National Opera’s premiere of Philip Ven- ables’s We Are the Lucky Ones and new produc- tion of Strauss’s Die Fledermaus , Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea at Festival d’Aix-en- Provence, and the North American premiere of Kaija Saariaho’s Innocence at San Francisco Opera. Mykkanen’s credits have also included Korngold’s Die tote Stadt (Bavarian State Op- era), Verdi’s Falsta (Hamburg State Opera), Bernstein’s Candide (Opéra de Lausanne, Ra- vinia, Tanglewood), Kevin Puts’s Silent Night (Minnesota Opera), Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Opera Philadelphia) and Albert Herring (Chicago Opera eater), and Mus- sorgsky’s Boris Godunov , Wagner’s Die Meis- tersinger von Nürnberg , Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos , and Berg’s Wozzeck at the Met. In con- cert, he has been featured in Handel’s Messiah with the Atlanta, Kansas City, Indianapolis, and New Jersey Symphonies, as well as the National Symphony Orchestra at e Kennedy Center. His highlights also include Ariadne auf Naxos and Janáček’s Jenůfa with Cleveland Orchestra, Or ’s Carmina burana and Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis with Atlanta Symphony, Bruckner’s Te Deum with Pittsburgh Symphony, Mohammed Fairouz’s Another Time with Detroit Symphony, and Bernstein’s West Side Story with New York Philharmonic. On more intimate stages, Myk- kanen has explored chamber music and art song with the Marlboro Music Festival, New York Festival of Song, New World Symphony, Phila- delphia Chamber Music Society, and Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. He has also sung cabaret at Joe’s Pub, Neue Galerie’s Cabaret at Café Sabarsky, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where he curated “Lavender Nights,” a live installation of queer anthems. Miles Myk- kanen made his Ravinia debut in and is making his Chicago Symphony Orchestra debut with this rst return to the festival. RAVINIAMAGAZINE • JULY 11 – JULY 19 , 2026 80 CORYWEAVER(CONLON);KATJAHENTSCHEL(MYKKANEN)