Former Chair of the Board of the Santa Fe Opera Susan G. Marineau has died.

The Santa Fe Opera announced the news via social media and said she “was a visionary leader, devoted advocate and cherished friend of the Santa Fe Opera.”

Marineau worked with the company for 15 years beginning in 2011. She was the President of the Board from 2015 to 2020, and then as Chair of the Board from 2020 to 2024.

As a leader of the board, “she was guided by a belief in opera’s power to reflect the world we live in and to model the equity we strive to achieve.”

Marineau made transformative and sustained investments in advancing opportunities for women in opera and with multi-year grant programs and targeted philanthropy, the Marineaus supported female directors, conductors, designers and apprentices, ensuring women were not only invited into the room, but entrusted with shaping artistic vision and future leadership.

Through The Marineau Family Foundation Fund for Female BIPOC Apprentices and The Marineau Family Foundation Fund for Female Technical Apprentices, Marineau and her husband expanded access, mentorship and professional pathways for emerging artists and technicians, ensuring that opportunity at the Opera would be broader, fairer and more inclusive.

The foundation also developed multi-year grant programs at the Santa Fe Opera, OPERA America and San Francisco Opera, working to redress long-standing gender inequities.

Marineaus’ philanthropy  supported such creators at the Santa Fe Opera as Louisa Muller, Netia Jones, Lidiya Yankovskaya, Carolyn Kuan, Mariame Clément, Mary Birnbaum, Shawna Lucey, Victoria “Vita” Tzykun, and Mimi Jordan Sherin.