YOUR 2027 FOOSA FACULTY & STAFF

The Grammy Award-winning mezzo-soprano Kelley O'Conner is one of the most compelling vocal artists of her generationShe is known for a commanding intensity on stage, a velvet vocal tone, and the ability to create sheer magic in her interpretations. O’Connor performs and inhabits a broad selection of repertoire, from Beethoven, Mahler, and Brahms to Dessner, Corigliano, and Adams; she is sought after by many of today’s most accomplished composers. She performs with leading orchestras and conductors around the world, with preeminent artists in recitals and chamber music, and with highly acclaimed opera companies in the U.S. and abroad.

In the 2026–2027 season, O’Connor gives the world premiere of a new song cycle by Gonzalo Grau with the New York Philharmonic under the baton of Gustavo Dudamel. She sings Beethoven 9 with the Aspen Festival Orchestra and the Baltimore and Pacific Symphonies. Other highlights include Bach’s St. Matthew Passion with the Kalamazoo Symphony; Handel’s Messiah with the New Jersey Symphony; Bernstein’s Songfest with the Kansas City Symphony; Mahler’s Songs of a Wayfarer with the Fort Worth Symphony; and John Adams’ El Niño with the Gulbenkian Orchestra. Chamber and recital highlights include performances at Chamber Music Napa, Chamber Music in the Chilterns, and Garth Newel.

Recently, O’Connor premiered an extended version of Thomas Adès’s America (A Prophecy) in her debut with the Gewandhausorchester under Andris Nelsons; gave the world premiere of Christopher Theofanidis’s Siddhartha, She at the Aspen Music Festival; performed Mahler’s Second Symphony with the Kansas City Symphony Orchestra and his Third Symphony with the San Francisco Symphony; John Adams’s El Niño with the Houston Symphony; and a gala performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with the New York Philharmonic to celebrate the opening of the newly renovated David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center.

In demand by many of the most heralded composers of the modern day, Kelley O’Connor has recently premiered works by John Corigliano, Kareem Roustom, Joby Talbot, and Bryce Dessner. John Adams wrote the title role of The Gospel According to the Other Mary for O’Connor, and she has performed the work, both in concert and in the Peter Sellars fully staged production, under the batons of John Adams, Gustavo Dudamel, Grant Gershon, Gianandrea Noseda, Sir Simon Rattle, and David Robertson. She continues to be the eminent living interpreter of Peter Lieberson’s Neruda Songs, having performed this moving set of songs with orchestras around the world. She also created the role of Federico García Lorca in Osvaldo Golijov’s Ainadamar, for which she has received unanimous critical acclaim.

Operatic highlights include her Seattle Opera debut as Anna in a concert version of Berlioz’s Les Troyens, the title role of Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia presented by Boston Lyric Opera in a new production by Broadway theater director Sarna Lapine, Carmen with Los Angeles Opera, Donizetti’s Anna Bolena at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, Madama Butterfly in a new production by Lillian Groag at the Boston Lyric Opera and at the Cincinnati Opera, Berlioz’s Béatrice et Bénédict at Opera Boston, Falstaff with the Santa Fe Opera, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Lyric Opera of Chicago and the Canadian Opera Company.

For her debut with the Atlanta Symphony in Ainadamar, Kelley O’Connor joined Robert Spano for performances and a Grammy® Award-winning Deutsche Grammophon recording.  Her recording catalogue also includes Mahler’s Third Symphony with Jaap van Zweden and the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Lieberson’s Neruda Songs and Michael Kurth’s Everything Lasts Forever with Robert Spano and the Atlanta Symphony, Adams’ The Gospel According to the Other Mary with Gustavo Dudamel and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with Franz Welser-Möst and the Cleveland Orchestra. O’Connor’s newest recording, a collaboration with pianist and composer Robert Spano, is “Songs of Orpheus,” a series of song cycles by Edvard Grieg, Claude Debussy, George Crumb, and Spano himself, on Sono Luminus (August 2025).

Dr. Okunev-Briggs is a Russian–born Australian soprano. She earned her Bachelor's degree in piano performance from the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. Dr. Briggs then attained a Master’s in vocal performance from the Newcastle Conservatorium and a Doctor of Musical Arts from Sydney University and the Royal Northern College of Music, UK.

Her research is focused on the training and development of young opera singers. Her published thesis on tertiary opera training is available online.

Dr. Briggs was an Australian finalist in the Covent Garden Young Artist Scholarship, Lady Fairfax NY Scholarship, and Australian National Aria Award. Maria was the winner of the Australian MIETTA recital award in 2008 and received her prize from Maestro Richard Bonynge AC CBE. Dr. Briggs collaborated with Dr. Peter Klimo, piano, and won 1st Prize in the Doug Davis competition in 2023. View their award winning performance.

 Dr. Briggs was privileged to train with Anthea Moller, Amanda Thane, Glen Winslade, Barry Ryan, Anke Hoeppner-Ryan, Andrew Green, Sharolyn Kimmorley and Anthony Legge, Sir John Tomlinson CBE and Vladimir Chernov.

 Dr. Briggs has sung with Opera Australia, Pacific Opera, Lyric Opera Weimar and Glyndebourne Opera Festival, UK. Maria is well known as a superb recitalist and champion of contemporary repertoire. She has recorded new Australian works for voice and small ensemble with ABC Classic FM radio. She has sung in numerous live radio broadcasts as part of the ABC “Sunday Live” series. Dr. Briggs made her television debut in 2010 in the film I Spry – The Rise and Fall of a Master Spy, ABC Television, playing the role of a Russian singer (Hugo Weaving – presenter). Dr. Briggs’ selected performances can be viewed on her website: www.mariabriggssoprano.com

Maria is the artistic director of the “Marianna Ensemble” – a cross-disciplinary quartet that performs her original compositions, jazz, and world music. Marianna Ensemble is a featured act of the Blue Pie Records label. Their album is available on iTunes, Spotify, and all other major platforms. Hear the album and find out more about Marianna Ensemble.

Dr. Briggs is a featured author of the Classical Singer Magazine. Her recent articles about the opera industry and education can be viewed here. Dr. Briggs was also one of the authors in the September 2026 American Speech-Language-Hearing Association journal research paper titled The Impact of Crohn's Disease on a Classical Singer: Vocal Fold Function, Voice Production, and Implications for Quality of Life.

Dr. Briggs joined the Fresno State music department in August of 2016 as Assistant Professor of Voice. She now lives in Fresno with her husband Matthew and two sons. Since coming on board Maria performed major works with Fresno State Symphony orchestra, including Richard Strauss’s Four Last Songs, Tchaikowsky’s Tatiana in Eugene Onegin and Butterfly in the department’s production of Madama Butterfly, Puccini. Maria also gave a number of solo recitals and directed the department opera productions of Strauss’ “Die Fledermaus” and Humperdinck’s “Hansel and Gretel”. Dr. Briggs got tenured and promoted to Associate Professor in 2020. Dr. Briggs made her American opera debut in 2017, performing the role of Tsarevna in Rimsky Korsakov’s Kashchey the Immortal, Island City Opera.

Her American concert performances included soprano solo in Mozart Requiem, Bach’s St John’s Passion, Beethoven’s Symphony no. 9, Orff’s Carmina Burana, and other major choral works. Dr. Briggs is a creator and director of the Fresno State Art Song Festival. The cross-cultural event runs every February and includes performances and masterclasses by international guest faculty, a composition competition, a poetry competition, lectures, discussions, and vocal student showcase prizes.

 Dr. Briggs' 2022 album "Winter Evening" on Centaur Records explores romantic Russian art song and can be streamed on all platforms.

Dr. Cari Earnhart serves as the Director of Choral Activities at California State University, Fresno, where she conducts the Concert Choir, Chamber Singers, Masterworks Chorus, and teaches undergraduate and graduate conducting.

Dr. Earnhart combines careers as conductor, teacher, and singer.

In 2022, under her direction, the Fresno State Concert Choir was selected to perform at the California All-State Music Educators Conference (CASMEC), and in April 2017, the Fresno State Chamber Singers were invited to perform at the Library of Congress to honor the 21st US Poet Laureate, Juan Felipe Herrera. Her choirs maintain an active performing profile. In addition to her teaching responsibilities, she is in high demand as an adjudicator, clinician, guest conductor, and presenter. Earnhart has worked with choirs in the US and abroad. As a conductor abroad, she served as Director of Choral Activities at the American University of Sharjah and conductor of Nassim al Saba, an Arabic choral music ensemble. She made guest conducting appearances with the Budapesti Vándor Kórus in Budapest, Hungary; served as Maestro of Ensemble Vocale Tempus Floridum and as Maestro Collaboratore of Coro dell’ Accademia del Diletto and Coro Polofonico del Caricentro, all in Florence. She worked as musical director for Speech Bubbles theater group, based in Istanbul from 2010-2013, and as guest conductor for the Istanbul International Chamber Choir. Earnhart was the first female Conductor of the UNT Men’s Chorus and served as Assistant Conductor of Schola Cantorum of Texas in Ft. Worth. In addition, she has conducted honor choirs and served as a clinician for choral festivals in Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Kansas, Minnesota, Nevada, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas, and Vancouver, Canada. She has presented workshops on Arabic choral music, vocal pedagogy/epidemiology, conducting, and community building at state, national, and international conferences. In Fall 2022, she was selected to present her research at the International Federation of Choral Music (IFCM)/Singers EXchange conference in Lisbon, Portugal.  Earnhart has served on the choral faculty of the Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute since 2018, serving as the Institute Chorus conductor in 2021. From 2016-2020, she served on the ACDA Western Region Board as R & R Repertoire Specific Chair, as Conference Chair for the 2022 Western Region Conference in Long Beach, CA, the 2024 Western Region Conference in Pasadena, CA, and for the 2026 Western Region Conference scheduled in March 2026 in San Jose, CA. She currently serves as President-Elect of the Western Region of the American Choral Directors Association. Earnhart also currently serves as Education and Student Outreach Director on the California Choral Directors Association (CCDA) Board, formerly serving as the CCDA Central Region Representative, and is Past President of the Fresno Madera County Music Educators Association (FMCMEA) Board of Directors.

An accomplished vocalist, Earnhart has appeared as a guest artist with university, professional, and community choirs throughout the country and overseas. She began her professional singing career in New York City and has performed in the US, Europe, and the Middle East. Earnhart has performed with several professional choirs, including: Coro Cameristico Fiorentino (Florence, Italy), New World Voices (Dallas, TX), the New York Virtuoso Singers, The Choral Pickup (Seattle, WA and Atlanta, GA), and Conspirare (Austin, TX).

Earnhart holds a DMA in Choral Conducting with related field studies in Vocal Pedagogy from the University of North Texas in Denton, Texas, an MM in Vocal Performance and Pedagogy, and a BM in Vocal Performance from Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, OK. She has taught at the American University of Sharjah (UAE), the University of North Texas, BT Müzik Evi (Istanbul), Oklahoma Panhandle State University, Oklahoma State University, and in the Texas public schools.

Anthony Price Radford is Professor of Voice and Opera at California State University, Fresno, where he serves as the Coordinator for the Voice Performance degree and is the director of the Fresno State Opera Theatre.

His interests are in vocal pedagogy and in fostering ties between communities and opera at educational and cultural institutions. His varied performing career spans thirty years in top professional choirs, as a young artist apprentice for opera companies, as a children’s opera performer for large opera companies and community organizations, and as a solo recitalist in concert across the U.S. and Canada. At Fresno State, he teaches voice, opera, vocal pedagogy, and vocal literature and is the founder of The Center for Children’s Opera at Fresno State. He coordinates the Fresno State Opera Theatre, an ensemble that has, in the last few years, toured the Central Valley, presented fully staged productions of Madama Butterfly, Die Fledermaus, La Boheme, Carmen, Amahl and the Night Visitors, Elixir of Love, Albert Herring, and hosted the Fresno Opera and Orchestra Academy staging Cavalleria Rusticana and Pagliacci. In 2014, at Fresno State, he directed the world premiere of Evan Mack and Joshua McGuire’s The Secret of Luca. In 2016 received a grant from the Central Valley Community Foundation to commission a new opera work from Mack and McGuire titled Lucinda y las Flores de la Nochebuena. Dr. Radford and his students at Fresno State produced this opera for children and toured it in Fresno County for over 3000 school children. The opera today receives multiple performances across the country every holiday season, including the San Francisco Opera Guild and Opera in the Heights, Houston.

His teaching has taken him to Germany, Great Britain, Canada, and across the U.S and he is a published author and presenter at many international and national conferences. He is a regular adjudicator with the National Association of Teachers of Singing as well as Classical Singer. He served as the Review Editor for the Opera Journal and as part of the Board of Directors of the National Opera Association as Research Chair. His reviews of performances and scholarly works appear regularly in the Journal and online, as well as in the New York Singing Teachers Association VoicePrints. His review of the Roscoe, a new American opera, was published in “Bootlegger of the Soul: The literary legacy of William Kennedy” (2018) by the State University of New York University Press, a festschrift to Pulitzer Prize-winning author William Kennedy.

Originally from Toronto, Canada, he holds a B.A. in Political Science from York University and a Master of Music degree from the New England Conservatory of Music.  He was an Othmer Fellow at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, where he earned a Doctor of Musical Arts degree.  Dr. Radford’s studies also took him to the Britten-Pears School in Aldeburgh, England, where he appeared in opera roles at the Aldeburgh Festival and the Snape Maltings.  His inspiration for teaching comes from his work with Cornelius Reid, and he is currently a voice student of Ellen Shade. Previous teachers include Ariel Bybee, Carol Forte, and William Shomos. In his spare time, he reads historical fiction, learns Welsh, and plays with his children and dogs.