Arizona Opera Cast Members & Creatives

Pianist, coach and chorus director Katherine Kozak has enjoyed affiliations with numerous companies throughout the United States. Her most long-standing relationship is with The Glimmerglass Festival, where she is the current Chorus Director, and in 2024 recently completed her 13th summer season. Kozak's work with the chorus can be heard on Château du Versailles Spectacles 2021 CD/DVD release of The Ghosts of Versailles, for which she also performed on celesta and piano.

A deft and vivacious chorus master, Kozak notably garnered much acclaim with the Florida Grand Opera Chorus, with whom, up until the pandemic, she prepared approximately 20 productions. Under her direction, they were critiqued as “astutely balanced and exuberant”, “[having sung] with power and majesty”, “outstanding” and “vocally flawless”.

Kozak has a repertoire of over 80 complete operatic and musical theatre scores, and has operated in nearly every music staff role. She has functioned as head coach, rehearsal pianist, recitalist, supertitle caller, recitative accompanist, assistant conductor and administrator, and this wide range of abilities has brought her to The Dallas Opera, Palm Beach Opera, Florida Grand Opera, Santa Fe Opera, The Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Opera Colorado, and Central City Opera, among others. Notable conductors she has assisted include Richard Bonynge, Joseph Colaneri, John Demain and George Manahan.

In addition to her involvement in highly-regarded Young Artist programs, she has also helped develop singers at the university level. Appointments have included Associate Coach at The Juilliard School, and Visiting Assistant Professor at the University of Miami (FL).

Kozak holds the Master of Music in Vocal Coaching and Accompanying from the University of Illinois, where she was a student of John Wustman. She has enjoyed collaborating with singers since the young age of 11, when she began accompanying and touring with the Singing Angels, based in her hometown of Cleveland, Ohio.