Jerod Impichchaachaahaꞌ Tate is a classical composer, citizen of the Chickasaw Nation in Oklahoma, and is dedicated to the development of American Indian classical composition. The Washington Post selected him as one of “22 for ’22: Composers and performers to watch this year” and raved that “Tate is rare as an American Indian composer of classical music. Rarer still is his ability to effectively infuse classical music with American Indian nationalism.” Tate is a 2022 Chickasaw Hall of Fame inductee, a 2022 Distinguished Alumni Award recipient from The Cleveland Institute of Music and was appointed 2021 Cultural Ambassador for the U. S. Department of State. He is Guest Composer, conductor, and pianist for San Francisco Symphony’s Currents Program, Thunder Song: American Indian Musical Cultures, and was recently Guest Composer for Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Balcony Bar Program, Home with ETHEL and Friends, featuring his commissioned work Pisachi (Reveal) for String Quartet. His commissioned works have been performed by the National Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony and Chorus, Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, Oklahoma City Philharmonic, Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, South Dakota Symphony Orchestra, Colorado Ballet, Canterbury Voices, Dale Warland Singers, Santa Fe Desert Chorale and Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival. Recent commissions include Shell Shaker: A Chickasaw Opera for Mount Holyoke Symphony Orchestra, Ghost of the White Deer, Concerto for Bassoon and Orchestra for Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Hózhó (Navajo Strong) and Ithánali (I Know) for White Snake Opera Company. His music was recently featured on the HBO series Westworld. Tate has held Composer-in-Residence positions for Music Alive, a national residency program of the League of American Orchestras and New Music USA, First Americans Museum, the Joyce Foundation/American Composers Forum, Oklahoma City’s NewView Summer Academy, Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation and Grand Canyon Music Festival Native American Composer Apprentice Project. Tate was the founding composition instructor for the Chickasaw Summer Arts Academy and has taught composition to American Indian high school students in Minneapolis, the Hopi, Navajo, and Lummi reservations and Native students in Toronto. Tate is a three-time commissioned recipient from the American Composers Forum, a Chamber Music America’s Classical Commissioning Program recipient, a Cleveland Institute of Music Alumni Achievement Award recipient, a governor-appointed Creativity Ambassador for the State of Oklahoma and an Emmy Award-winner for his work on the Oklahoma Educational Television Authority documentary, The Science of Composing. In addition to his work based upon his Chickasaw culture, Tate has worked with the music and language of multiple tribes, such as: Choctaw, Navajo, Cherokee, Ojibway, Creek, Pechanga, Comanche, Lakota, Hopi, Tlingit, Lenape, Tongva, Shawnee, Caddo, Ute, Aleut, Shoshone, Cree, Paiute, and Salish/Kootenai. Among available recorded works are Iholbaꞌ (The Vision) for Solo Flute, Orchestra and Chorus and Tracing Mississippi, Concerto for Flute and Orchestra, recorded by the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, on the Grammy Award-winning label Azica Records. In 2021, Azica released Tate’s Lowak Shoppalaꞌ (Fire and Light) recorded by Nashville String Machine with the Chickasaw 1 Nation Children’s Chorus and Dance Troupe; vocal soloists Stephen Clark, Chelsea Owen, Meghan Vera Starling; and narrators Lynne Moroney, Wes Studi, Richard Ray Whitman. Of the album, Sequenza21 wrote, “Tate has clearly taken the Western musical tradition and found a compelling voice that integrates his native culture.” His Metropolitan Museum of Art commission, Pisachi (Reveal), is featured on ETHEL String Quartet’s album Documerica. Azica Records recently released Tate’s inaugural composition, Winter Moons, and his MoonStrike, recorded by Apollo Chamber Players. Tate earned his Bachelor of Music in Piano Performance from Northwestern University, where he studied with Dr. Donald Isaak, and his Master of Music in Piano Performance and Composition from The Cleveland Institute of Music, where he studied with Elizabeth Pastor and Dr. Donald Erb. He has performed as First Keyboard on the Broadway national tours of Les Misérables and Miss Saigon and been a guest composer/pianist and accompanist for the Colorado Ballet, Hartford Ballet, and numerous ballet and dance companies. Tate’s middle name, Impichchaachaahaꞌ, means “his high corncrib” and is his inherited traditional Chickasaw house name. A corncrib is a small hut used for the storage of corn and other vegetables. In traditional Chickasaw culture, the corncrib was built high off the ground on stilts to keep its contents safe from foraging animals. Learn more at www.jerodtate.com.

Lauded as the leading Native American soprano in today’s classical music world, Dr. Kirsten C. Kunkle is a voting citizen of the Mvskoke (Muscogee) Nation. She has been hailed as an outstanding singing actress with a voice that has been described as beautiful, ethereal, powerful, fiery, and bewitching.  Kirsten commissioned and premiered sixteen original compositions, including one of her own, based upon the poetry of her ancestor and highly-acclaimed poet of the Native American Muscogee Nation, Alexander Posey. Her recordings are collected at the Library of Congress, the National Museum of the American Indian at the Smithsonian Institution (NMAI), and the Merkel Area Museum in Merkel, Texas. Kirsten is included on the list of Classical Native American Artists and Musicians at the Smithsonian Institution’s NMAI and on the Molto Native Music list of performers.

Some of her favorite roles in the standard operatic repertoire are Agathe in Der Freischütz, the title role in Suor Angelica, Magda and the Foreign Woman in The Consul, Mimì in La bohème, Rosalinde in Die Fledermaus, Contessa in Le nozze di Figaro, Mother in Amahl and the Night Visitors, Iolanta and Brigitta in Iolanta, Zemfira in Aleko, Lisa in Pique Dame, Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni, Laetitia in The Old Maid and the Thief, the Witch in Hänsel und Gretel, and Dido in Dido and Aeneas. She has an Honorable Mention for The American Prize in Voice – Professional Art Song and Oratorio Division (Women), as well as being a two-time semi-finalist for The American Prize in Opera (Women). She made her Carnegie Hall debut in 2014, and in the same year she was the Pennsylvania District National Association of Teachers of Singing Artist Award winner.

She made her solo European debut with the Sofia Philharmonic in the role of Arabella in Johann Strauss II’s Blindekuh. She is also a NAXOS recording artist for the world premiere recording of Blindekuh, which was released in March 2020 to extraordinary reviews. Her most recent recording was debuting the role of Charlotte Corday in the world premiere of Girondines, which is a collaboration between Kirsten (libretto) and Sarah Van Sciver (music), available on all streaming services. She has created leading roles in numerous world premieres, including Shadow House, Jump the Moon, Opera Macabre: Edgar Allan Poe, By You That Made Me, Frankenstein, and Toowhopera. Recent oratorio solo work has included Carmina Burana, The Seven Last Words of Christ, Messiah, Considering Matthew Shepard, and the world premiere of Gwenyth Walker’s The Great Lakes Cantata. She has recorded extensively through the Comic Opera Guild, specializing in the works of Victor Herbert. World premieres for the 2024-2025 season include Loksi’ Shaali’ (Shell Shaker: A Chickasaw Opera) with Canterbury Voices in Oklahoma City, An American Indian Symphony with Oklahoma City Philharmonic, and Kokumfeena with City Music Cleveland, all composed by Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate.

Kirsten was featured as a composer and soloist for the Circle of Resilience concert, with Intermountain Opera Bozeman, in May, 2021. In 2022, she was commissioned and premiered her art song Reclaim the Land at Yellowstone National Park’s 150^th anniversary, which has been featured on Yellowstone Public Radio (a branch of NPR) and BBC Radio. In 2023, she was commissioned to write the monodrama for voice, piano, and violin, Witch of November in the White City for Chicago Currents: Celebrating Chicago’s Waterways, which served as her performance, dramaturgy, poetry, and composition debut with Chicago Fringe Opera. Her flute and piano work Inspiration of the Muses was premiered by lead commissioners Rose Bishop and Abbey Brewer at New Music Chicago in March, 2024. Most recently, funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts to promote Indigenous Choral Music, her historic work Mvskokvlke, Este’Cate: We are Still Here, featuring both English and Mvskoke text written by Kunkle, was commissioned and premiered by The Trey Clegg Singers in Atlanta in May, 2024. Upcoming commissions include a piano and choral work for The Toledo Choral Society and art songs contributing to the song cycle My Black Swan Songs focusing on chronic illness for mezzo-soprano Molly Noori.

Kirsten is the Co-Founder and Artistic Director of Wilmington Concert Opera, a women and minority led opera company in Wilmington, Delaware. She is a proud graduate of Bowling Green State University and University of Michigan. She is delighted to be making her PostClassical Ensemble debut featuring the works of Samuel Barber and Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate. Please visit www.kirstenckunkle.com for more information.

Heralded for his “superbly refined voice” and “laudable performances” (Washington Classical Review), Chilean born American baritone Javier Arrey has appeared in houses like The Vienna State Opera, The Metropolitan Opera, Opéra de Monte-Carlo, Palau de Les Arts, Boston Lyric Opera, Opera Nacional de Chile, Washington National Opera and San Francisco Opera. Javier Arrey has collaborated with conductors including Eun Sun Kim, Lorin Maazel, Roberto Rizzi Brignoli, James Gaffigan, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Plácido Domingo, Anthony Walker and Marco Armiliato. His leading roles include Enrico (Lucia diLammermoor), Belcore (L’Elisir D’Amore), Malatesta (Don Pasquale), Conte di Luna (Il Trovatore), Conte Almaviva (Le Nozze di Figaro), Renato (Un Ballo in Maschera), Alfio (Cavalleria Rusticana), Giovanni (Don Giovanni), Jago (Otello), Riccardo (I Puritani), Diego (El último sueño de Frida y Diego) and Rodrigo (Don Carlo). Of his debut performance as Jago in Otello at the Castleton Festival under Lorin Maazel, The Washington Post wrote that Arrey portrayed the character his as “menaced and connivingbut [Arrey] did so subtly and with a voice so lovely to listen to that his scheming seemed all the more threatening.” Praises came also from Mo. Lorin Maazel who said: “Jago was stunningly sung and acted by Javier Arrey [who] manages to give shape to the jealous demon within Otello”. Baritone Javier Arrey had the privilege and honor of performing twice in the U.S. Supreme Court for the Honorable Justices invited by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Justice Ginsburg declared: “[Arrey] has what it takes, both as a vocal artist and as a dramatic performer, to attract new audiences to opera venues, particularly youngpeople needed to ensure that opera will remain a vital part of the contemporary musical scene.” Praised by his vocal beauty, deep musicality and acting skills, one of his teachers and mentors, baritone Sherrill Milnes, declared: “A first class singer/artist is not just an individual with a great voice, it is also a person who possesses a great musical preparation and accuracy, charismatic acting skills, high discipline and a deep commitment and love for music, I see clearly all those qualities in Javier. In addition to his work on the opera stage, baritone Javier Arrey is a world-class interpreter of Lieder and concert repertoire. Recent performances include Mahler’s Lieder Eines Fahrenden Gesellen at Teatro Municipal in Chile and Dvořák’s Biblical Songs and Gypsy Songs in the Czech Republic. In 2017, Javier was given the prestigious “Congressional Medal of Honor” at the National Congress of Chile in recognition of his artistic accomplishments and his social labor to bring the Opera to populations who have no access to live performances. In 2011 Javier won the CulturArte Prize at Operalia Competition in Moscow and was a finalist at the Cardiff Singer of the World Competition (Song prize). Arrey is a graduate artist of The Washington National Opera’s Domingo-Cafritz Young Artist Program and Dolora Zajick’s Institute for Young Dramatic Voices.

Angel Gil-Ordóñez is Music Director of PostClassical Ensemble, Principal Guest Conductor of New York’s Perspectives Ensemble, and Music Director of the Georgetown University Orchestra. He also serves as lead advisor for Trinitate Philharmonia, a program in León, Mexico modeled on Venezuela’s El Sistema. He has appeared as guest conductor with the American Composers Orchestra, Opera Colorado, Pacific Symphony, Hartford Symphony, Brooklyn Philharmonic, and the Orchestra of St. Luke's. An unwavering advocate for Spanish and Latin American repertoire, Gil-Ordóñez received the Royal Order of Queen Isabella, Spain’s highest civilian decoration, for his devotion to sharing Spanish culture with the world. He has recorded nine albums for the label Naxos, including PostClassical Ensemble’s Virgil Thomson, Copland, and Revueltas CD/DVDs.

PostClassical Ensemble conducted by Angel Gil-Ordóñez

Under the leadership of Music Director Angel Gil-Ordonez, PostClassical Ensemble takes the listener on a musical journey for the heart and mind. Through depth of interpretation and skillful execution, and with an ensemble of the most distinguished musicians in the area, the music comes alive with vibrancy and richness of expression. Founded in 2003, PCE has been a pioneer in transforming the concert experience through innovative, multi-disciplinary programming built around original narratives and with collaborations across artistic mediums. Core programmatic areas showcase how Film, American Roots, Cultural Diplomacy, and Encounters enhance and inspire the musical repertoire. For more,

visit www.postclassical.com