Capobiarico, Tito

Capobiarico, Tito, Argentine-born American opera director and administrator; b. La Plata, Aug. 28, 1931. He received training in law and philosophy in La Plata and in music at the Univ. of Buenos Aires. In 1953 he launched his career as an opera director with a production of Pagliacci in La Plata. Moving to Buenos Aires, he was technical director at the Teatro Colón (1958–62) and general director of the Teatro Argentino (1959–61); subsequently was artistic director of the Cincinnati Opera Festival (1961–65) and the Cincinnati Opera (1962–65). In 1966 he began staging operas at the N.Y.C. Opera, where he was resident stage director from 1967. In 1975 he organized the Las Palmas Festival in the Canary Islands. He also became artistic director of the San Diego Opera in 1975, serving as its general director from 1977. In 1983 he became general director of the Pittsburgh Opera, and in 1997 he was made its artistic director. He was prof, of acting and interpretation at the Academy of Vocal Arts in Philadelphia (1962–68); in 1967 he founded the American Opera Center at the Juilliard School of Music in N.Y., serving as its director until 1969. He was director of opera studies and festival stage director at the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara (from 1983), and prof, of acting, staging, and interpretation at the Graduate School of Music at Yale Univ. (from 1983). In many of his operatic stagings, he collaborated with his wife, the choreographer Elena Denda.

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire