Past, Present, and Puccini: Fort Worth’s Opera’s 80th Season

Fort Worth Opera General & Artistic Director Angela Turner Wilson proudly announced the company’s 80th anniversary season — a year-long celebration of the oldest opera company in Texas, with each production spotlighting a defining element of the company’s artistic legacy.

“This year is about who we are and what we’ve always done best,” said Turner Wilson. “Each production has been carefully chosen to honor the past, captivate audiences in the present, and project our legacy boldly into the future.”

The season opens with a nod to the company’s history of showcasing world-class talent for Texas audiences. In years past, local ticket holders witnessed early-career performances by future stars like Beverly Sills — and unforgettable appearances by legends like Lily Pons, who graced the Fort Worth Opera stage in 1962. This October, that tradition continues with a one-night-only concert performance by acclaimed tenor Jonathan Tetelman.

A Deutsche Grammophon recording artist and wildly popular international star, Chilean-born and New Jersey-bred Tetelman rarely finds himself back in the U.S., and almost never on stages far from the coast. This might be the only weekend the tenor spends in the U.S. this year — and Fort Worth Opera got him.

“He’s young, he’s talented, and his career is on fire,” Turner Wilson said of Tetelman. “We knew we needed to bring him to North Texas, so we jumped through every hoop to make it happen. If you’re anywhere near Fort Worth on October 10, this is a night you won’t want to miss.”

In November, the company continues their tradition of celebrating American composers with a production of minimalist icon Philip Glass’s genre-bending re-imagining of Jean Cocteau’s 1946 surrealist film, La Belle et La Bête (Beauty and the Beast).

“We’ve had our eye on this piece for a long time, but it needed the right venue,” said Turner Wilson. “With the Ridglea Theater, everything fell into place. We’re going to have live singers and a wild 18-piece orchestra with Cocteau’s strange and wonderful film on the big screen behind them. This isn’t your cartoon Beauty and the Beast with an orchestra playing along. It’s going to be something far more magical — and weird.”

In February 2026, the Opera presents Cowboys & Culture, a musical love letter to the city the company has always called home. Presented in partnership with the Amon Carter Museum of American Art during the Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo season, Cowboys & Culture is a concert event that blends operatic voices with Western-themed repertoire for a uniquely Fort Worth experience.

Finally, in April 2026 the season comes to a close with a classic that Fort Worth Opera featured in their very first season 80 years ago — Giacomo Puccini’s Madama Butterfly.

A testament to the enduring power of operatic storytelling, Madama Butterfly returns to Bass Hall in a fully staged production with sets and costumes and full orchestration provided by the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra — with Puccini’s exquisite score delivering the gut-punch counterpoint to a deeply human tale of love, honor, and a mother’s sacrifice.

“We are an opera company, with no apologies,” said Turner Wilson. “When people think of opera, they think of that classic canon: Carmen, Traviata, Bohème, Figaro, and of course, Butterfly. Each is a deeply layered, eternally relevant story, delivered through some of the most beautiful music ever written. Those stories bring people to opera, generation after generation. They brought me — and that’s a legacy I will always honor here in Fort Worth.”

Fans of the Opera can look forward to numerous other events during the season, including holiday favorites Wintersong, a free concert of seasonal music performed by the Opera’s Hattie Mae Lesley Resident Artists at First Presbyterian Church, and a new production of Amahl and the Night Visitors, presented at Stage West. The Opera hopes that both events become beloved seasonal traditions for Fort Worth families, year after year.

For more details on the 2025–26 season, and to browse and purchase available season ticket packages, please visit the Fort Worth Opera website at fwopera.org. Season ticket benefits include the best seats at reduced prices, discounts on extra tickets, free exchanges, and other surprise offerings throughout the year. For the best choice of seats, be sure to browse and purchase season tickets before single ticket sales begin in July.

Founded in 1946 by three visionary women — Eloise MacDonald Snyder, Betty Berry Spain, and Jeanne Axtell Walker — Fort Worth Opera is the oldest opera company in Texas, and one of the oldest opera companies in the United States. The organization has received local and national attention from critics and audiences alike for its artistic excellence, pioneering spirit, and long history of community-based cultural engagement. In addition to producing traditional repertoire with rising stars and inspirational young talents, the company is known throughout the operatic world as a champion of new American works.

With a dedication to the community both on and beyond the operatic stage, Fort Worth Opera proudly supports opera education through the Hattie Mae Lesley Resident Artist program and a robust statewide initiative that brings in-school performances and educational programs to 40,000 schoolchildren each year across Texas.

Fort Worth Opera is committed to producing opera of the highest possible artistic quality and integrity; to identifying and training talented young singers; to serving as a crucible for creating new American operas; to joining forces with other arts organizations in significant collaborations; and to enriching the community by stimulating cultural curiosity and creativity in people of all ages, ethnicities, and backgrounds.

Visit fwopera.org for more information.