Inside Vancouver Opera

Inside Vancouver Opera is a unique backstage glimpse into the world of Vancouver Opera. Join us as we chat with opera experts, artists, Vancouver Opera staff and others to explore the world of opera on and off the stage. This podcast offers an insider’s glimpse into the artistry, experiences, and perspectives of the talent involved in taking breathtaking opera productions from the page to the stage. Find out more at VancouverOpera.ca

Inside Vancouver Opera is a arts podcast hosted by Vancouver Opera, with 108 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80.

Vancouver Opera hosts Inside Vancouver Opera, a arts show with 108 episodes published.

Our AI reads these to draft pitches. Use them as grounding for a pitch that cites a real guest and a specific topic.

• 

  Inside Vancouver Opera

  Marion Newman on The Work of Being a Good Person

  Sep 29, 202640 min

  Marion Newman is a mezzo-soprano, a teacher, and the voice you hear on CBC's Saturday Afternoon at the Opera . Kwagiulth and Stó:lō, born in Bella Coola and raised in Sooke, she spent more than twenty years in Toronto before coming home to teach voice at the University of Victoria, where she once studied piano. Recorded in her office at UVic, this conversation moves from a piano lesson in a castle tower to a rehearsal at the Orpheum, where the late Bramwell Tovey stopped to ask her how she wanted to sing his music. Marion talks about the "quiet choir" of family who made her a musician, a childhood homeschooled on Vancouver Island, why leaders need to learn how to apologize and mean it, why she no longer capitalizes the word reconciliation, and the name she carries: Nege'ga, she who is like a mountain. Marion served as a senior advisor on Vancouver Opera's report on Indigenous mentorship in opera, co-authored by Ashley Daniel Foot and Asitha Tennekoon, out later this fall. Midway through, host Ashley Daniel Foot asks her what an institution owes people after it asks them to talk. Chapter markers (from the recording) 00:00 — "Stop talking. Just pay us." 02:50 — Ancestors, and where the fight comes from 04:18 — Welcome 05:57 — The first music: potlatch, the kitchen radio, and a grandparents' piano 10:11 — Mary Jackson and the tower room at Craigdarroch 12:17 — From pianist to singer 14:06 — The quiet choir, and being homeschooled 17:56 — Teaching where she once studied 20:28 — Bramwell Tovey: "How would you like to do this?" 23:17 — What an institution owes the people it asks to talk 27:48 — The problem with the repertoire 29:31 — On the word "reconciliation" 32:02 — Ancestors, Nulis, and the big house 38:28 — Nege'ga: she who is like a mountain

  ListenShow Notes
• 

  Inside Vancouver Opera

  Jean Orr & Joshua Beamish: Canada's First Giselle

  Sep 5, 202620 min

  In February 1948, an eighteen-year-old Jean Orr danced Giselle in Ottawa — the first full production this country had ever seen, with a full orchestra in the pit. She went on to the Royal Winnipeg Ballet, and decades later became a founder and the first president of Ballet BC. Ashley Daniel Foot sat down with her in her West Vancouver living room, alongside Joshua Beamish, who has just founded Ballet Vancouver and opens its first season this month. Jean describes choosing to die by the sword rather than of a heart attack, because at eighteen she wanted to die dramatically. She remembers touring Nova Scotia with no backdrop and running around the outside of the theatre mid-performance. And she explains, almost in passing, the night she put her mortgage-free house up as collateral so a choreographer would be paid and the show could go on. Josh had never heard any of it. You can hear him find out. Ballet Vancouver's Balanchine's Apollo & Other Works plays the Vancouver Playhouse September 11 and 12, with pre-show talks before all three performances. The season closes with @giselle, May 13–15, 2027. balletvancouver.com Chapters 00:00 — Two people, forty years apart 01:04 — Highland dancing on the prairies 01:34 — A land grant, a motorcycle, and the Qu'Appelle Valley 02:04 — "My absolute lifesaver of life" 03:00 — Josh starts tap dancing at two 04:00 — Nesta Toumine and the Ballets Russes 04:47 — Ottawa, February 1948 06:35 — Nobody called it the first — until Toronto did 07:16 — "I wanted to die dramatically" 08:49 — Josh hears the story for the first time 10:33 — Winnipeg, no bus fare, and Pincher Creek 12:54 — Building Ballet BC with David Y. H. Lui 14:30 — The car raffle, and the house 16:12 — The 2026 equivalent 17:13 — Is dance the most fragile art? 17:45 — Balanchine's Apollo, and Heather Ogden comes home 19:08 — Seventy-eight years apart Guests Jean Orr — dancer; founder and first president of Ballet BC Joshua Beamish — choreographer; founder and Artistic Director, Ballet Vancouver

  ListenShow Notes
• 

  Inside Vancouver Opera

  The Hidden Art of Stage Management

  Aug 28, 202625 min

  Stage Manager Theresa Tsang celebrates 30 seasons with Vancouver Opera. Every performance you have ever seen at Vancouver Opera, every blackout, every curtain, every entrance, every burst of light exactly on the downbeat happened because one voice on a headset in the dark said a single word, ‘go.’ She says it hundreds of times a night. She has said it for 30 seasons across almost 100 productions. The orchestra follows the conductor, everyone else in the building follows her. Today we are joined by Stage Manager, Theresa Tsang. Full Article Episode Credits: Theresa Sang - Stage Manager, Vancouver Opera Ashley Daniel Foot - Host & Creator, Inside Vancouver Opera Mack McGillivray - Producer, Inside Vancouver Opera

  ListenShow Notes
• 

  Inside Vancouver Opera

  Stanis Smith: The Mother Art

  Aug 17, 202618 min

  Stanis Smith has spent his career designing the spaces people move through — airports, terminals, thresholds. This September, he becomes Board Chair of Vancouver Opera. He's also a clarinettist who self-produced a chamber music album of Brahms and Nino Rota. He's the person who will tell you, with complete conviction, that Frank Lloyd Wright was wrong: the mother art isn't architecture. It's opera. In this episode, Ash Foot sits down with Stanis to talk about standing-room tickets at Covent Garden, what it takes to convert a first-time opera-goer into a lifelong addict, and why he built a 50-piece art program into the bones of the new $4.2 billion Terminal 6 at JFK. They also discuss Vancouver Opera's upcoming season, the state of the art form in 2026, and the Vancouver Cultural Precinct — an initiative that could transform the city's performing arts landscape within a decade. A conversation about art, architecture, and what happens when someone walks into a room and feels something they weren't expecting.

  ListenShow Notes
• 

  Inside Vancouver Opera

  Jonelle Sills & Her Mother Desiree | A Mother's Day Conversation

  May 9, 202623 min

  Soprano Jonelle Sills came into the world already steeped in music — her mother Desiree sang through her entire pregnancy. In this Mother's Day conversation, the two of them sit down together for the first time to talk about gospel choirs and opera stages, about coming to Canada with nothing, about the voice Jonelle wanted to keep only for herself, and about what it means to watch someone you love become who they were always going to be. Bring a tissue.

  ListenShow Notes

Recent guests on Inside Vancouver Opera. Study who booked and why before you pitch.

Based on semantic analysis of episode topics and host coverage, this show is a strong guest fit for executives in:

Industry fit is computed by PitchCentric using vector embeddings of the show's episode catalog.