Bio

Dr. Todd Queen, Associate Professor of Voice, is Chair of the Department of Music, Theatre and Dance in the College of Liberal Arts at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, Colorado. Todd Queen became Opera Fort Collins Artistic Director in 2004, chosen as successor by OFC Founder Elizabeth Elliott. His experience as an operatic tenor has led to numerous credits as an opera stage director. Queen has recently cultivated those experiences in a new direction, that of arts administrator and international arts ambassador.   In 2009 Queen traveled to Asia with CSU leaders to forge a partnership with East China Normal University in Shanghai, where he was named Visiting Professor.  He plans a similar partnership at Hansel University in Korea in 2010.  In addition, in summer 2011 he will serve as Artistic and Stage Director of Opera Orvieto, a three-week intensive Italian musical experience. Queen previously served on faculty with Operafestival di Roma, where he taught voice and directed the Opera Workshop program. Dr. Queen’s voice students have been selected for prestigious young artist programs in the US and abroad, including Central City Opera Apprentice Program, AIMS in Austria, and Operafestival di Roma. Former students are currently attending top tier conservatories and graduate schools, including Eastman and Indiana University, and have placed in the district and regional finals of the Metropolitan Opera National Council auditions.

Todd Queen joined the CSU voice faculty in 2001 as Assistant Professor of Voice and Director of Colorado State Opera.  He previously taught at North Dakota State University, Alfred University, and Syracuse University. Dr. Queen earned the DMA and MM degrees from the prestigious Eastman School of Music after completing his undergraduate degree at Brigham Young University in Utah. He is a member of College Music Society, National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS) and a former NATS Intern, chosen as one of 12 young teachers from the US and Canada to work with renowned master teachers in an 10-day intensive seminar.  Queen is regularly invited as a guest judge and panelist for the Classical Singer Convention, most recently in Chicago and Brooklyn NY.  Todd Queen’s credits as opera director include Mozart’s Cosi fan tutte, Don Giovanni, and Le Nozze di Figaro, a double bill of Cavellaria Rusticana and Pagliacci, Verdi’s Falstaff, Puccini’s La Bohème, Lehár’s The Merry Widow, Carlisle Floyd’s Susannah, Copland’s The Tender Land, Britten’s Albert Herring, and Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Mikado and Pirates of Penzance.

Todd Queen continues an active performing career that includes faculty and guest recitals, master classes, and solo engagements with national and regional opera companies, orchestras, choruses, and concert series. His operatic roles include Eisenstein in Die Fledermaus, Don Basilio in Le Nozze di Figaro, Tamino in Die Zauberflöte, the title role Candide, Fenton in Falstaff, Steuermann in Der fliegende Holländer, Male Chorus in Rape of Lucretia, Borsa in Rigoletto, El Remendado in Carmen, and St. Brioche in Merry Widow. He has sung with Sacramento Opera, Operafestival di Roma, Opera Fort Collins, Fargo-Moorhead Opera, Lyric Artists of the West, Fort Collins Symphony Orchestra, the Fargo-Moorhead Symphony and the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra. Orchestral engagements include tenor soloist in Carmina Burana with Cheyenne Symphony and tenor soloist in Messiah with Larimer Chorale. His oratorio roles include Lucas in Haydn’s The Seasons, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, the Evangelist in Bach’s St. John Passion, Uriel in Haydn’s Creation, Handel’s Messiah, Mozart’s Requiem, Beethoven Symphony #9, and Bach’s Magnificat. He has been a guest soloist with The Larimer Chorale, Colorado Repertory Singers, Utah Valley Chorus and Orchestra, Southwest Symphony and Chorus, Alpine Chorale, Longmont Symphony and Chorale, Cheyenne Symphony, Grand Forks Symphony Orchestra, and the Rochester Oratorio Society.