ASU School of Music, Dance and Theatre welcomes new music theater and opera professor

David Radamés Toro has two questions for his students: What are we trying to communicate? What is the clearest and most sincere way to do so?

The opera director, mime and pedagogue recently joined the Music Theatre and Opera program in Arizona State University’s School of Music, Dance and Theatre as assistant professor of opera and musical theater direction.  

“We are so pleased that David Radamés Toro is joining the faculty in the Music Theatre and Opera program,” said Heather Landes, director of the School of Music, Dance and Theatre. “David brings a wealth of stage direction experience, movement and acting knowledge, and a keen interest in developing new work and a commitment to inclusive storytelling.”

Toro said he and Brian DeMaris, professor and director of ASU’s Music Theatre and Opera program, share the same goals of preparing singers for the ever-changing operatic landscape and giving undergraduate and graduate students a wide perspective of different forms of music and theater.

Toro said he was attracted to the ASU Music Theatre and Opera program in part because of its reputation for producing new works and its significant collaborations with organizations such as Beth Morrison Projects and American Lyric Theater. Modern operas have played an important part in his career, he said, and he is eager to continue this work of expanding the operatic canon. As a Latino American director, he said he aspires to bring cultural relevance, diverse representation and a modern opera experience to the stage. Toro believes students who graduate from ASU need to be comfortable with movement and acting, and should be able to fluently perform both canonical works and new music. These skills are vital to a career in the 21st century.

“I think that it is important for voice students to participate in various forms of performance theater. A collegiate program should allow young performers to explore all of their options, and unlike many schools, ASU has the resources to allow them to do so,” Toro said. “ASU seems to be an environment in which a more open approach is encouraged and fostered.”                     

In addition to his work with singers who wish to appear onstage, Toro wants to guide students who may want to move from the stage to working behind the scenes on productions.

“I hope to be able to draw from my own experience or send them in the direction of working professionals in artistic design, administration, production and technical direction, in order to foster interest in the performing arts world off and onstage,” he said.

As a director, Toro applies his background in music and physical theater to create innovative opera productions, directing a wide variety of standard and nontraditional repertoire, with a special penchant for 21st century works.

Toro has taught classes and workshops in acting for the opera stage and physical theater, and coached singers in interpretation and audition preparation. His workshops in gestural mechanics draw from the techniques of Anne Bogart, Tadashi Suzuki, Ettiene Decroux and Marcel Marceau, with the goal of empowering singers to effectively combine musical expression and movement.

Formally trained as an opera singer, Toro later transitioned to directing while earning his graduate degrees in voice performance and pedagogy. He became interested in physical theater techniques such as Viewpoints, Suzuki actor training and mime as a graduate student when he studied with Jeanine Thompson, professor emeritus and former student of legendary mime Marcel Marceau. She became his mentor as he learned directing and movement-based theater and acting.

Whether through abstraction or realism, or from baroque to the modern era, his productions have been recognized for their sincerity and imagination.

Toro has directed 21st century works such as “Dead Man Walking,” “Three Way,” “Glory Denied” and “Flight,” as well as assisting on the world premieres of “Today It Rains,” “Dinner at Eight,” “The Shining” and “A New Kind of Fallout.” Additionally, he directed the premiere of “Rose Made Man: An Inside Out Opera” for the Cohen New Works Festival in Austin, Texas.

He has worked with Minnesota Opera, Washington National Opera, Seattle Opera, Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Cincinnati Opera, the Wexford Opera Festival, Central City Opera, Opera Saratoga, Opera Neo, Opera Colorado, Opera Idaho, Opera Parallèle and Tri-Cities Opera. He has taught movement and acting to singers at the Minnesota Opera, Opera Neo, Tri-Cities Opera, Opera Idaho, The University of Texas at Austin and Opera Steamboat.

“I appreciate that the school encourages and supports me in advancing my professional directing career,” Toro said. “I want to be a professor who has a working connection to the outside world in order to continue to hone my craft, and even more importantly, to be able to provide relevant guidance, advice and training to our students as we prepare them for the ever-evolving professional world.”

Toro holds a Doctor of Musical Arts from the University of Texas, a Master of Music and Master of Arts from Ohio State University, and a Bachelor of Music from the University of Colorado at Boulder.