The European Centre of Performing Arts (ECP-Arts) has launched its inaugural Pilot Edition 2027, a four-week residency for emerging opera singers running May 24 to June 18, 2027, in Germany and Italy.

The program is open to graduate and postgraduate singers recommended by their teachers, and places are awarded by application and recording. Répétiteurs and those pursuing opera management may also take part.

Based in Magdeburg, ECP-Arts will hold three weeks of the residency there and the closing week in Tuscany. The roughly 149 hours of training include repertoire masterclasses, individual voice coaching, Italian and German language and diction, stagecraft, and instruction in the opera industry and career building. The program ends with two public performances, including a final recital in Germany and a closing concert on June 18, 2027, at the Teatro Comunale Marchionneschi in Tuscany, which agents and casting directors are expected to attend.

The faculty includes conductors Felix Krieger of the Berliner Operngruppe, Claudio Novati, first Kapellmeister of the Staatskapelle Halle, and Svetoslav Borisov of the Anhaltisches Theater Dessau. Also on the faculty are dramatic soprano Mária Temesi; Angelo Taddeo, artistic director of the Puccini Festival; stage director William Costabile Cisco; artist manager Zenaida des Aubris; and opera-management specialist Ambra Sorrentino.

“In four weeks our participants work with leading artists, step onto public stages in Germany and Italy, and meet the agencies and casting directors who shape careers,” ECP-Arts founder Danny Matz said, per an official press release.