The Jette Parker Artists (JPA) bring the 2025/26 Season to a close at noon on Sunday 26 July 2026 with their annual summer performance. Accompanied by the Orchestra of Welsh National Opera, this celebratory event will see the star conductors, singers, répétiteurs and directors of the future present a range of repertoire on the Royal Opera House’s Main Stage.
Having honed their craft on productions across the Season, this special summer performance gives the cohort the opportunity to step into major roles, on and off-stage, and showcase their artistic development. It marks a milestone for both the second-year artists completing the JPA Programme and those continuing into the 2026/27 Season.
For this year’s performance, Talia Stern directs scenes from Stravinsky’s moral fable The Rake’s Progress, Leoncavallo’s rarely performed La bohème, Bellini’s moving I Capuleti e i Montecchi and Léhar’s operetta Die Lustige Witwe. Bizet’s lesser-known opéra comique Djamileh will also feature in the programme. Singers involved include sopranos Hannah Edmunds and Marianna Hovanisyan, mezzo-sopranos Jingwen Cai and Ellen Pearson, tenors Emmanuel Fonoti-Fuimaono, Giorgi Guliashvili and Emyr Lloyd Jones, baritones Sam Hird and Siphe Kwani and bass-baritone Ossian Huskinson.
In the pit, the Orchestra of the Welsh National Opera is conducted by Richard Farnes and Peggy Wu while ballet conductor Giovanni Fanizza conducts Tchaikovsky’s The Sleeping Beauty Overture.
Director Talia Stern said:
“Directing this year’s Summer Performance has been a wonderful opportunity to bring together an extraordinary group of artists whose work has been spread across so many productions throughout the Season. This performance celebrates not only the breadth of repertoire that defines the Jette Parker Artists Programme, but also the versatility and imagination of its performers, as they move between six very different operatic worlds. I hope audiences will enjoy discovering fresh connections between these works and experience both beloved masterpieces and rarely performed gems through a new and playful theatrical lens.”
This performance celebrates the inception of a young artists programme at the Royal Ballet and Opera, founded 25 years ago when David Gowland, Artistic Director of the Jette Parker Artist Programme, was invited to curate a residency programme for emerging opera artists. The forthcoming 2026/27 Season will mark a quarter of a century of discovering, nurturing and training the next generation of global talent.
Applications for singers to join the Jette Parker Artists Programme for the 2027/28-2028/29 Seasons will open on Wednesday 8 July 2026. Application information is available here.
Future opportunities for ballet conductors, opera conductors and répétiteurs will also be advertised when available. Please see here for further details.
The Jette Parker Artists Programme has been generously supported by Oak Foundation since 2004. Through its grant-making, Oak Foundation contributes to a safer, fairer and more sustainable world.
