Ted Puffer, 75, Multitalented Opera Maestro: - October 29, 2003
Ted Puffer, a polymathic producer of operas - and opera companies - died October 22 in Nevada, where he had founded the state opera company 35 years before. He had retired to New York City (if giving voice lessons to singers at the Metropolitan Opera and being on the teaching staff at the Manhattan School of Music can be called retirement).
Called "Johnny Operaseed" by some cultured wags, Puffer founded at least three opera companies in a career that encompassed piano, voice, conducting, directing, producing, and working on virtually every aspect of opera.
His wife, Deena, herself a translator of librettos and an all-around opera wrangler, once described him as "at least a quadruple threat."
He was famed for his insistence on performing many operas in English - "the vernacular"- rather than in their original languages. "For too long, opera has been a status event where patrons could sleep," he once said. "I want people to come to the opera because they like it."
He was eager to go before audiences from an early age. At 14, he soloed on piano with the Eastman Symphony in Rochester, N.Y. During college at the Eastman School of Music, he took up singing as well, and after graduation came to New York and toured with the Robert Shaw Chorale, accompanying and singing in the chorus. He then joined the Boston Opera as a leading tenor, conductor, and director; he seemed always a jack-of-all-trades.
While in Boston he met Deena, then a student at the New England Conservatory. For their first date they worked on a translation of Strauss's "Die Fledermaus." It was the beginning of a collaboration that would last for 43 years and produce widely performed translations of many operas, including Lehar's "The Merry Widow" and Shostakovich's "The Nose," as well as the American premiers of Tchaikovsky's "Joan of Arc" and Busoni's "Doktor Faust."
Two daughters and three opera companies would result from their union as well.
It was while on a Boston Opera tour stop in Milwaukee (of all places) that Puffer founded the Boston Comic Opera, in response to a proposal by a local entrepreneur. After a couple of performances, the company followed Puffer back to Boston, where it survived for several years.
The birth of the couple's first daughter sparked a search for less peripatetic employment, and Puffer landed in the music department at Utah State University. Opera was not a part of the Logan, Utah, landscape, but for Puffer it represented an opportunity to found a second company. The Utah Opera did not long survive after he moved to the University of Nevada at Reno, in 1967.
That same year, he founded the Nevada Opera, where he remained as director of everything for 27 years. His tenure was remembered as much for his good humor as for the three major productions the company mounted each year. He was quick to note that even though the locals pronounced the name of a neighboring town "VURDeye," it was in fact named after the Italian composer of "Rigoletto," "Aida," and "Il Trovatore."
The internationally renowned Verdi mezzo-soprano Dolora Zajick, a student of Puffer's in Nevada and later in New York, credited him with making opera popular in Reno "without any dumbing-down to reach the masses." She was the most famous of the many professional singers he developed over the decades.
In addition to his work in Nevada, he produced recordings of songs by Charles Ives and the world-premier recording of Scott Joplin's "Treemonisha," on which he was solo pianist and choral director.
Despite his active support of per forming opera in the vernacular, Puffer at first opposed the use of supertitles, which he characterized as "Opera on training wheels." He eventually relented.
He refused to regard opera as anything but entertainment. An avid baseball fan, he was fond of quoting Willie Stargell's remark: "It's supposed to be fun; the man says 'Play ball' not 'Work ball,' you know." Puffer said he wanted his opera company to play music. And he had this message for his audiences: "Leave the costumes to us. You don't have to dress up."
Merle Edward Puffer
Born October 15, 1928, in Rochester; died October 22 in Reno of cancer; survived by his wife, Deena, and daughter, Monica Harte of Brooklyn, who is also a classical singer.
Ted Puffer, a polymathic producer of operas - and opera companies - died October 22 in Nevada, where he had founded the state opera company 35 years before. He had retired to New York City (if giving voice lessons to singers at the Metropolitan Opera and being on the teaching staff at the Manhattan School of Music can be called retirement).
Called "Johnny Operaseed" by some cultured wags, Puffer founded at least three opera companies in a career that encompassed piano, voice, conducting, directing, producing, and working on virtually every aspect of opera.
His wife, Deena, herself a translator of librettos and an all-around opera wrangler, once described him as "at least a quadruple threat."
He was famed for his insistence on performing many operas in English - "the vernacular"- rather than in their original languages. "For too long, opera has been a status event where patrons could sleep," he once said. "I want people to come to the opera because they like it."
He was eager to go before audiences from an early age. At 14, he soloed on piano with the Eastman Symphony in Rochester, N.Y. During college at the Eastman School of Music, he took up singing as well, and after graduation came to New York and toured with the Robert Shaw Chorale, accompanying and singing in the chorus. He then joined the Boston Opera as a leading tenor, conductor, and director; he seemed always a jack-of-all-trades.
While in Boston he met Deena, then a student at the New England Conservatory. For their first date they worked on a translation of Strauss's "Die Fledermaus." It was the beginning of a collaboration that would last for 43 years and produce widely performed translations of many operas, including Lehar's "The Merry Widow" and Shostakovich's "The Nose," as well as the American premiers of Tchaikovsky's "Joan of Arc" and Busoni's "Doktor Faust."
Two daughters and three opera companies would result from their union as well.
It was while on a Boston Opera tour stop in Milwaukee (of all places) that Puffer founded the Boston Comic Opera, in response to a proposal by a local entrepreneur. After a couple of performances, the company followed Puffer back to Boston, where it survived for several years.
The birth of the couple's first daughter sparked a search for less peripatetic employment, and Puffer landed in the music department at Utah State University. Opera was not a part of the Logan, Utah, landscape, but for Puffer it represented an opportunity to found a second company. The Utah Opera did not long survive after he moved to the University of Nevada at Reno, in 1967.
That same year, he founded the Nevada Opera, where he remained as director of everything for 27 years. His tenure was remembered as much for his good humor as for the three major productions the company mounted each year. He was quick to note that even though the locals pronounced the name of a neighboring town "VURDeye," it was in fact named after the Italian composer of "Rigoletto," "Aida," and "Il Trovatore."
The internationally renowned Verdi mezzo-soprano Dolora Zajick, a student of Puffer's in Nevada and later in New York, credited him with making opera popular in Reno "without any dumbing-down to reach the masses." She was the most famous of the many professional singers he developed over the decades.
In addition to his work in Nevada, he produced recordings of songs by Charles Ives and the world-premier recording of Scott Joplin's "Treemonisha," on which he was solo pianist and choral director.
Despite his active support of per forming opera in the vernacular, Puffer at first opposed the use of supertitles, which he characterized as "Opera on training wheels." He eventually relented.
He refused to regard opera as anything but entertainment. An avid baseball fan, he was fond of quoting Willie Stargell's remark: "It's supposed to be fun; the man says 'Play ball' not 'Work ball,' you know." Puffer said he wanted his opera company to play music. And he had this message for his audiences: "Leave the costumes to us. You don't have to dress up."
Merle Edward Puffer
Born October 15, 1928, in Rochester; died October 22 in Reno of cancer; survived by his wife, Deena, and daughter, Monica Harte of Brooklyn, who is also a classical singer.
Ted Puffer, 75, Multitalented Opera Maestro: - October 29, 2003
Ted Puffer, a polymathic producer of operas - and opera companies - died October 22 in Nevada, where he had founded the state opera company 35 years before. He had retired to New York City (if giving voice lessons to singers at the Metropolitan Opera and being on the teaching staff at the Manhattan School of Music can be called retirement).
Called "Johnny Operaseed" by some cultured wags, Puffer founded at least three opera companies in a career that encompassed piano, voice, conducting, directing, producing, and working on virtually every aspect of opera.
His wife, Deena, herself a translator of librettos and an all-around opera wrangler, once described him as "at least a quadruple threat."
He was famed for his insistence on performing many operas in English - "the vernacular"- rather than in their original languages. "For too long, opera has been a status event where patrons could sleep," he once said. "I want people to come to the opera because they like it."
He was eager to go before audiences from an early age. At 14, he soloed on piano with the Eastman Symphony in Rochester, N.Y. During college at the Eastman School of Music, he took up singing as well, and after graduation came to New York and toured with the Robert Shaw Chorale, accompanying and singing in the chorus. He then joined the Boston Opera as a leading tenor, conductor, and director; he seemed always a jack-of-all-trades.
While in Boston he met Deena, then a student at the New England Conservatory. For their first date they worked on a translation of Strauss's "Die Fledermaus." It was the beginning of a collaboration that would last for 43 years and produce widely performed translations of many operas, including Lehar's "The Merry Widow" and Shostakovich's "The Nose," as well as the American premiers of Tchaikovsky's "Joan of Arc" and Busoni's "Doktor Faust."
Two daughters and three opera companies would result from their union as well.
It was while on a Boston Opera tour stop in Milwaukee (of all places) that Puffer founded the Boston Comic Opera, in response to a proposal by a local entrepreneur. After a couple of performances, the company followed Puffer back to Boston, where it survived for several years.
The birth of the couple's first daughter sparked a search for less peripatetic employment, and Puffer landed in the music department at Utah State University. Opera was not a part of the Logan, Utah, landscape, but for Puffer it represented an opportunity to found a second company. The Utah Opera did not long survive after he moved to the University of Nevada at Reno, in 1967.
That same year, he founded the Nevada Opera, where he remained as director of everything for 27 years. His tenure was remembered as much for his good humor as for the three major productions the company mounted each year. He was quick to note that even though the locals pronounced the name of a neighboring town "VURDeye," it was in fact named after the Italian composer of "Rigoletto," "Aida," and "Il Trovatore."
The internationally renowned Verdi mezzo-soprano Dolora Zajick, a student of Puffer's in Nevada and later in New York, credited him with making opera popular in Reno "without any dumbing-down to reach the masses." She was the most famous of the many professional singers he developed over the decades.
In addition to his work in Nevada, he produced recordings of songs by Charles Ives and the world-premier recording of Scott Joplin's "Treemonisha," on which he was solo pianist and choral director.
Despite his active support of per forming opera in the vernacular, Puffer at first opposed the use of supertitles, which he characterized as "Opera on training wheels." He eventually relented.
He refused to regard opera as anything but entertainment. An avid baseball fan, he was fond of quoting Willie Stargell's remark: "It's supposed to be fun; the man says 'Play ball' not 'Work ball,' you know." Puffer said he wanted his opera company to play music. And he had this message for his audiences: "Leave the costumes to us. You don't have to dress up."
Merle Edward Puffer
Born October 15, 1928, in Rochester; died October 22 in Reno of cancer; survived by his wife, Deena, and daughter, Monica Harte of Brooklyn, who is also a classical singer.
Ted Puffer, a polymathic producer of operas - and opera companies - died October 22 in Nevada, where he had founded the state opera company 35 years before. He had retired to New York City (if giving voice lessons to singers at the Metropolitan Opera and being on the teaching staff at the Manhattan School of Music can be called retirement).
Called "Johnny Operaseed" by some cultured wags, Puffer founded at least three opera companies in a career that encompassed piano, voice, conducting, directing, producing, and working on virtually every aspect of opera.
His wife, Deena, herself a translator of librettos and an all-around opera wrangler, once described him as "at least a quadruple threat."
He was famed for his insistence on performing many operas in English - "the vernacular"- rather than in their original languages. "For too long, opera has been a status event where patrons could sleep," he once said. "I want people to come to the opera because they like it."
He was eager to go before audiences from an early age. At 14, he soloed on piano with the Eastman Symphony in Rochester, N.Y. During college at the Eastman School of Music, he took up singing as well, and after graduation came to New York and toured with the Robert Shaw Chorale, accompanying and singing in the chorus. He then joined the Boston Opera as a leading tenor, conductor, and director; he seemed always a jack-of-all-trades.
While in Boston he met Deena, then a student at the New England Conservatory. For their first date they worked on a translation of Strauss's "Die Fledermaus." It was the beginning of a collaboration that would last for 43 years and produce widely performed translations of many operas, including Lehar's "The Merry Widow" and Shostakovich's "The Nose," as well as the American premiers of Tchaikovsky's "Joan of Arc" and Busoni's "Doktor Faust."
Two daughters and three opera companies would result from their union as well.
It was while on a Boston Opera tour stop in Milwaukee (of all places) that Puffer founded the Boston Comic Opera, in response to a proposal by a local entrepreneur. After a couple of performances, the company followed Puffer back to Boston, where it survived for several years.
The birth of the couple's first daughter sparked a search for less peripatetic employment, and Puffer landed in the music department at Utah State University. Opera was not a part of the Logan, Utah, landscape, but for Puffer it represented an opportunity to found a second company. The Utah Opera did not long survive after he moved to the University of Nevada at Reno, in 1967.
That same year, he founded the Nevada Opera, where he remained as director of everything for 27 years. His tenure was remembered as much for his good humor as for the three major productions the company mounted each year. He was quick to note that even though the locals pronounced the name of a neighboring town "VURDeye," it was in fact named after the Italian composer of "Rigoletto," "Aida," and "Il Trovatore."
The internationally renowned Verdi mezzo-soprano Dolora Zajick, a student of Puffer's in Nevada and later in New York, credited him with making opera popular in Reno "without any dumbing-down to reach the masses." She was the most famous of the many professional singers he developed over the decades.
In addition to his work in Nevada, he produced recordings of songs by Charles Ives and the world-premier recording of Scott Joplin's "Treemonisha," on which he was solo pianist and choral director.
Despite his active support of per forming opera in the vernacular, Puffer at first opposed the use of supertitles, which he characterized as "Opera on training wheels." He eventually relented.
He refused to regard opera as anything but entertainment. An avid baseball fan, he was fond of quoting Willie Stargell's remark: "It's supposed to be fun; the man says 'Play ball' not 'Work ball,' you know." Puffer said he wanted his opera company to play music. And he had this message for his audiences: "Leave the costumes to us. You don't have to dress up."
Merle Edward Puffer
Born October 15, 1928, in Rochester; died October 22 in Reno of cancer; survived by his wife, Deena, and daughter, Monica Harte of Brooklyn, who is also a classical singer.
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