Marion Roose Pullin Arizona Opera Studio
In residence all season, Studio Artists can be seen performing on both our main stage and throughout Arizona. The Studio also provides well-rounded, personalized instruction that propels each artist to the next level. These opportunities help bridge the gap between academic studies and a professional career.
Arizona Opera’s Marion Roose Pullin Opera Studio is made possible through the support of: A gift in honor of Mario Manetti, Drs. Tom and Ginger Collier, Marlu Allan & Scott Stallard*, Ron & Kay McDougall, Roma Wittcoff, The Joseph And Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation, Dimitri & Suzanne Haniotis, Anonymous, Linda Englander, Matt & Ann Melsheimer, Dr. Katherine Philippakis, Dr. Juliana Osinchuk, Dr. Judith G. Wolf-SPARK Founder, Les & Suzanne Hayt, and Eunice Feinberg.
2026/27 Studio Artists
Francesca Herrera, soprano
2nd Year Studio Artist
Sponsored by Ron & Kay McDougall
Soprano Francesca Herrera is a Marion Roose Pullin Opera Studio Artist with Arizona Opera. At the start of the 2025/26 Season, she made her house debut as Luisa in Héctor Armienta’s Zorro. In spring 2026, she returned as Clorinda in La Cenerentola. This summer Herrera joins Central City Opera as an Apprentice Artist covering with a performance of Barbarina in The Marriage of Figaro.
Herrera was a 2025 Studio Artist with Wolf Trap Opera, where she covered the roles of Susanna in The Marriage of Figaro and Frasquita in Carmen. She won the 2025 Tommy Trotter Memorial Scholarship in the Opera Guild for Atlanta Scholarship Competition and placed first in the Great Lakes Region of the National Association of Teachers of Singing Student Auditions.
Rosario Armas, mezzo soprano
1st Year Studio Artist
Sponsored by Drs. Tom and Ginger Collier
New York–based Mexican mezzo-soprano Rosario Armas, originally from Tlaxcala, Mexico, earned her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from the Manhattan School of Music and recently completed her Master of Musical Arts degree at the Yale School of Music, where she was also awarded the Smriti Deb Memorial Prize for Outstanding Singer.
Her operatic highlights include the title role in La tragédie de Carmen, Baba the Turk in The Rake’s Progress, Anita in La Navarraise, Mrs. Grose in The Turn of the Screw, Cherubino in The Marriage of Figaro, and Dorabella in Così fan tutte. She has also performed selections from Carmen in concert with the Washington National Opera Orchestra in Washington, D.C. Armas is the recipient of the Judith Raskin Scholarship and the International Advisory Board Scholarship.
Cameron Howard, tenor
1st Year Studio Artist
Sponsored in part by Linda Englander, sponsored in part by Dr. Juliana Osinchuk
Tenor Cameron Howard is a versatile singer whose passion for storytelling stretches across all genres. He was most recently seen as Adolfo Pirelli in Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street in a monumental collaboration between the departments of opera and musical theatre at the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music (CCM). Previous CCM credits include Il Podestà in Mozart’s The Secret Gardener, and the role of Frank in a workshop of Laura Kaminsky’s The Post Office, in collaboration with Opera Fusion: New Works. In 2025, he made his professional debut as a Frank R Brownell III Apprentice Artist with Des Moines Metro Opera, performing in the ensembles of Wagner’s Der fliegende Holländer and Janáček’s The Cunning Little Vixen. He returns to DMMO in 2026, covering the role of Lennie Small in Floyd’s Of Mice and Men and performing as the Tenor Voice in Szymanowski’s King Roger. He holds a Master of Music from CCM, and a Bachelor of Music from the University of Kentucky.
Jason Edelstein, baritone
1st Year Studio Artist
Sponsored by Roma Wittcoff
Jason Edelstein is a baritone from Paramus, NJ. This summer, Edelstein joins The Opera Theatre of Saint Louis as a 2026 Gerdine Young Artist covering roles in both Roméo & Juliette and The Pirates of Penzance. After OTSL he returns to the Aspen Music Festival and School as a Renée Fleming Artist singing Demetrius in A Midsummer Night’s Dream and covering Papageno in The Magic Flute. Edelstein spent summer 2025 in Aspen as a Renée Fleming Artist singing Schaunard in La Bohème and covering Abinaswar in the World Premiere of Siddhartha, She. He spent the 2025/26 Season as a Jan Miller Studio Artist with Pensacola Opera singing the roles of Charlie in Three Decembers, Barone Douphol (Germont cover) in La Traviata, and Ike Skidmore (Curly cover) in Oklahoma!.
Jose Olivares, bass baritone
1st Year Studio Artist
Sponsored by Marlu Allan
José Olivares previously served as the 2025/26 Bass-Baritone Young Artist with Fort Worth Opera this past Fall/Spring where he sang the roles of Ludovic in Belle et la bete and Yakuside in Puccini’s Madam Butterfly. Olivares also performed roles with Finger Lakes Opera as Simone in Gianni Schicchi and Count Ceprano in Rigoletto. During his time as a resident artist with Lyric Opera of Kansas City during the 2023/24 Season, he covered the role of Alfio in Cavalleria rusticana and performed Duke in Roméo & Juliette. Other past roles have included Horace in Hello, Dolly!, Pandolfe in Cinderella, and Holborn in The Manchurian Candidate at Seagle Festival, Dulcamara in The Elixir of Love, Colline in La Bohème at Opera Magnífico, Farfarello in The Love for Three Oranges at Des Moines Metro Opera and Theseus in Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream with Opera Theatre of Saint Louis. Olivares holds a Masters from the University of Oklahoma and Bachelors from East Texas A&M University. This summer, Olivares will be performing as Senator Potter’s Assistant/French Priest in Fellow Travelers at Glimmerglass Festival.
Guzal Isametdinova, pianist
1st Year Studio Artist
Uzbekistani pianist Guzal Isametdinova has cultivated her passion for music from a very early age. She has performed internationally as a soloist and chamber musician. She is a prizewinner of competitions across the U.S., Europe, and Asia, and has appeared at venues including Carnegie Hall, the National Gallery of Art, and Wheeler Opera House. In the Fall 2025, she became a winner of Concerto Competition at University of Maryland and will perform with their Symphony Orchestra in the upcoming season.
As an opera rehearsal pianist, she played for productions such as La Bohéme, Don Giovanni, The Marriage of Figaro, Albert Herring, Aleko, Florencia en el Amazonas, Cosí fan tutte and Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor and others. She performed a continuo part for operas such as The Marriage of Figaro, Cosí fan tutte and The Secret Gardener. She served as a music director for three newly commissioned chamber operas TWA by Justina Chen, The Fishwife by Ashi Day and The Alchemist by Christian De Gre Cardenas.
Sydney Roslin, stage director
1st Year Studio Artist
Sponsored by Dr. Judith G. Wolf-SPARK Founder
Manhattan-based director, writer, and performer Sydney Roslin is constantly crossing genres and state lines in the pursuit of complex, dynamic storytelling. Recent directing credits include Mozart’s Così fan tutte at Opera Neo in San Diego and Centro Cultural Tijuana in Tijuana, Mexico; Handel’s Rodelinda at Opera Neo; Dear Brain, from Heart at NYC’s Green Room 42; and Handel’s Il trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno at Opera Neo, which was called “absolutely brilliant” by the San Diego Union-Tribune. Assistant directing credits include Gounod’s Roméo & Juliette at Minnesota Opera and Mozart’s The Secret Gardener in a co-production between Opera Neo and the Hungarian State Opera.
If you are passionate about continuing the traditions of opera for the next generation, this is your opportunity!
For more information about supporting this program, or to inquire about sponsoring an apprentice, please contact the Development Department at development@azopera.org.