Our Team

GENERAL DIRECTOR & CEO SHAWNA LUCEY

Shawna Lucey is an acclaimed American theater and opera director, whose work has been seen at The Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco Opera, and other major houses around the world. Her legacy production of Tosca launched San Francisco Opera’s 99th season in 2021. It was followed in 2022 by her centennial celebration ground-breaking legacy production of La traviata, hailed by the San Francisco Chronicle as “A beautiful new Traviata meant to last for decades. Magnificent.”

Lucey made her directorial debut with Opera San José in 2018 with La traviata, brilliantly staged with skill and imagination, offering a compelling contemporary viewpoint. In 2023 she will launch OSJ’s season with a new production of Gounod’s Romeo & Juliet. Her directorial work has been seen across the US, from The Met to Dallas Opera, Opera Theatre of St. Louis, Santa Fe Opera, and many others. She also boasts an international reputation, staging works in Spain, Russia, and Germany, at the Gran Teatre del Liceu, the Bolshoi Theater, and Schauspiel Hannover, among many others, and has assisted esteemed directors, including Stephen Lawless, Lee Blakeley, John Caird, Peter Schumann, and Francesca Zambello.

In addition to opera, Lucey steps outside the canon into theatre and musicals, staging works such as Gilbert & Sullivan’s rollicking The Pirates of Penzance, which Broadway World lauded for its “contemporary flair, dousing the classic with a touch of modern Monty Python alongside  Carol Burnett  Show moments. A true contemporary comic delight faithful to the original Gilbert and Sullivan intent.”

Lucey holds BAs in Theater and Italian from the University of Texas at Austin and received her MFA in Directing & Movement from the Boris Shchukin Theatre Institute of the Vakhtangov Theater in Moscow and will receive her Master of Science in Non-Profit Management from Columbia University in 2023. She has also served as an adjunct professor in Speech and Theater at the Borough of Manhattan Community College, encouraging the next generation of artists while teaching courses on acting, design, stage management, and directing. She serves on the Board of Directors of Team San José as well as the Board of the Theatre Preservation Fund in San José. Her second passion, nail art, can be viewed on her Instagram page @29flames

For more information visit: www.shawnalucey.com

MUSIC DIRECTOR JOSEPH MARCHESO

Joseph Marcheso is the Music Director and Principal Conductor of Opera San José where he has led the Company in over 25 productions. Since his appointment in 2014, Mo. Marcheso has dedicated his career to raising the Company’s artistic stature and reputation in partnership with longtime principal collaborator Khori Dastoor. Mo. Marcheso’s musical leadership has been an essential element in elevating Opera San José to a nationally recognized company by raising the orchestra to newfound prominence through a series of high-profile, critically acclaimed productions, among them the world premiere of Mark Weiser’s Where Angels Fear to Tread, the West Coast premiere of Puts’ and Campbell’s Silent Night and a new co-production of Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer’s Moby-Dick. This fall, Mo. Marcheso will lead the company’s return to in-person performances at the California Theatre with both a new production of Dido & Aeneas, and the long awaited return of Carmen.

Marcheso’s commitment to education and expansion of opportunity – as well as to the originating mission of Opera San José– led to his creation of the position of Resident Conductor. This initiative, which gives emerging professionals the opportunity to conduct rehearsals and performances of a full season of operas while working alongside a variety of conductors and artists, has become the most comprehensive professional opera conducting program in the United States.

Mo. Marcheso also serves on the conducting staff of the San Francisco Opera, and has collaborated with many of the world’s leading conductors and singers on works that are their specialty. He has covered and rehearsed among other operas, Der Ring, Die Meistersinger (Wagner) Elektra (Strauss), Les Troyens (Berlioz), Billy Budd (Britten), Nixon in China (Adams) and Jenufa (Janacek) as well as the world premieres of The Gospel of Mary Magdalene (Adamo), Dolores Claiborne, (Picker), Dream of the Red Chamber (Sheng) and Girls of the Golden West (Adams)

Mr. Marcheso is a graduate of Dartmouth College and a resident of Berkeley, California where he lives with his beloved husband and 2 year old son. Special subjects include Winnie the Pooh and the Real Housewives of NYC, Beverly Hills and Atlanta.

More information is available at https://www.josephmarcheso.com/