Mozart Revealed: A Mozart scenes program

George R. Miller is an opera director. He creates sensorially rich, emotionally precise worlds that reckon with history, power, body, and voice through sound, text, image, and action. As both a director and producer, Miller is dedicated to platforming and reimagining canonical repertoire as well as championing and developing newly created works. With a background in music composition and visual art, his multidisciplinary, site responsive approach seeks to bring new life to classical forms. His productions have been called “stunning” (LA Dance Chronicle), “superbly directed” (San Francisco Classical Voice), “coalescing into one undeniable impact” (San Francisco Classical Voice).

Professional highlights include directorial work presented at Opera Philadelphia, REDCAT, Opera Saratoga, Long Beach Opera, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, Amant Foundation, Pioneer Works, The Berggruen Institute, Pageant, and Wild Up, among others.

This season, George made both his European and Carnegie Hall debuts. At Carnegie, he staged a pairing of Symphony No. 3 by Philip Glass and the world premiere of Cloud Variations by poet J. Mae Barizo, marking their second collaboration, this time with The Knights Orchestra in Zankel Hall. In Europe, he directed writer, musician, and performance artist Johanna Hedva in a new work at Berlin’s Hebbel am Ufer (HAU2) as part of Creamcake Festival; they will further develop the piece as artists-in-residence at the Mahler & LeWitt Studios in Spoleto, Italy—the former art studios of Anna Mahler and Sol LeWitt.

He has been a regular guest artist with the opera program at the University of California Los Angeles, where he served as associate director for a new production of Britten’s The Turn of the Screw and is currently directing a fully staged evening of Mozart scenes with the UCLA Philharmonia Orchestra in the Herb Alpert School of Music’s Schoenberg Hall. In April he will direct soprano Kerrigan Bigelow (Metropolitan Opera Laffont Competition Regional Finalist) in her M.M. recital at The Juilliard School’s Rosemary and Meredith Willson Theater, presenting a staged performance of La Voix Humaine by Francis Poulenc and Jean Cocteau with Juilliard DMA pianist Amber Scherer.

Recently, George opened Long Beach Opera’s season to high acclaim with the world premiere of ISOLA, a monodrama by composer Alyssa Weinberg and poet J. Mae Barizo, featuring soprano Ariadne Greif and dancer–choreographer Julia Eichten. He is currently developing a new production of Schubert’s Winterreise with bass-baritone William Socolof, a staging of Kaija Saariaho’s Quatre Instants with soprano Nicoletta Berry, and an adaptation of Sieben Frühe Lieder by Alban Berg with composer-performers Eliza Bagg and Rohan Chander, which premiered at REDCAT’s 2024 NOW Festival. Of that production, LA Dance Review noted, “Every detail seemed carefully staged, from the slide of Bagg’s hand against her skin to her gaze shifting in and out of focus, lending purpose and clarity to each moment.”

In spring 2025, George joined the Manhattan School of Music as a guest director to lead Handel’s Rinaldo with the Graduate Vocal Arts Division, resetting the absurd baroque comedy as a WWE wrestling match. Voce Di Mache, the notorious online blog critic of NYC student productions, wrote: “Miller’s work doesn’t speak, it screams… No wonder the young cast and young audience enjoy it so much.”

Throughout his training, George worked with companies and presenters across the U.S. and abroad, including the American Repertory Theater, American Modern Opera Company (AMOC), Beth Morrison Projects, Brooklyn Museum, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Philadelphia Orchestra, Ravinia Festival & Great Performances (PBS), Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, and Savvy Contemporary (Berlin). He has been a guest speaker at Vanderbilt University, Manhattan School of Music, The New School, and Coaxial Arts Foundation

After pursuing studies at the Hartt and Manhattan Schools of Music on full scholarship, Ms. Hak apprenticed as coach/pianist with the Merola Opera Program. She then joined the Lindeman Young Artist development Program and the Metropolitan Opera music staff as one of its youngest members. During her tenure at the Met, she worked as assistant conductor and coach with Maestros James Levine, Jun Märkl, Sebastian Weigl, Plácido Domingo, Bruno Campanella, Carlo Rizzi, Patrick Summers, Edo de Waart, and Julius Rudel, among others.

In 2000 she was invited by Plácido Domingo to join Los Angeles Opera’s music staff, where she worked with Maestros Plácido Domingo, Kent Nagano, John DeMain, Richard Armstrong, Roderick Brydon and others. She also traveled with the company to the Savonlinna Music Festival in Finland. In addition, she served as Music Director with LA Opera Connects on various productions.

Ms. Hak has been in demand as coach/rehearsal pianist both nationally and internationally in companies such as the Metropolitan Opera, Seattle Opera, Spoleto Festival, Pine Mountain Music Festival, Ojai Music Festival, The New Israeli Opera, Semperoper Dresden, and Ruhrtriennale Festival of the Arts in Germany. As a coach, she’s worked with such notable singers as Renée Fleming, Plácido Domingo, Bryn Terfel, Cecilia Bartoli. Joyce DiDonato, Dmitri Hvorostovsky, Simon Keenleyside, Suzanne Mentzer, Kurt Moll, Patricia Racette, Carol Vaness, Deborah Voigt, among others.

As a pianist, she collaborated on recitals with Bryn Terfel, Alexandra Deshorties, Michelle DeYoung, Mariusz Kwiecień, Sondra Radvanovsky and Alfred Walker in venues such as Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, Ordway Center for the Performing Arts in St. Paul, Hill Auditorium in Ann Arbor, Merkin Concert Hall, Lincoln Theater of Miami, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Sala Teatro La Fenice, New York’s Town Hall, the Tilles Center of Long Island.

Adding to her extensive experience as an international coach and pianist, Ms. Hak has recently begun a new chapter in her successful career as a conductor. Since 2004 she has been on faculty working with Opera UCLA, where she has conducted various productions and scenes, including a world-premiere of the opera Quake by Kay Rhie and a production of L’elisir d’amore. She also assistant conducted masterclasses and concerts in Germany and the Czech Republic and served as assistant conductor to Mo.

Steven Sloane on productions of Tosca and Falstaff with the Malmö Opera company in Sweden. She recently made her Long Beach Opera debut as Music Director for their new innovative production of The Recital in which film festival meets live performance. This season, she conducts The Turn of the Screw at UCLA and Nico Muhly’s Dark Sisters at the Manhattan School of Music, a work she recently conducted at the Cleveland Institute of Music. This summer, she will conduct Die Zauberflöte at the Trentino Music Festival in Italy.

Oliver Chan is a conductor, pianist, harpsichordist, and organist. He earned Bachelor of Arts and Master of Music degrees in piano performance at the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music, where he studied with Walter Ponce. He then received a Master of Music degree in orchestral conducting at the Bob Cole Conservatory of Music of Cal State Long Beach, where he studied with Johannes Müller Stosch. Chan currently pursues his doctoral degree in orchestral conducting at UCLA with Neal Stulberg. Other conducting teachers have included Dean Anderson, Jacob Sustaita, Edward Dolbashian, Andreas Mitisek, Mark Gibson, Neil Varon, and Kenneth Kiesler. Chan is currently music director of the Los Angeles-based opera company Opera Italia and staff accompanist at UCLA and Santa Monica College. In November 2025, he served as assistant conductor of Opera UCLA’s production of Benjamin Britten’s “The Turn of the Screw.”