Opera coach, Ensemble arts

Eileen Cornett is director of the masters program in Ensemble Arts: Vocal Accompanying at the Peabody Conservatory of Music, and is currently enjoying her fifteenth year as a principal faculty coach with Peabody’s Opera Department. She performs as a collaborative artist, opera coach, solo and orchestral pianist, music director, and conductor.

This summer, she spent four weeks as a guest artist in Taiwan, giving Masterclasses at universities and vocal societies in Taipei, Taichung, Tainan, and Kaohsiung, and performing in recitals at Tapei's National Concert Hall with soprano Gigi Chan and former Peabody student Peter Lee. She also served as a guest coach for Don Giovanni with the Creaton Opera Company in Kaohsiung.

Ms. Cornett will visit Luther College, the University of New Hampshire, and St. Olaf College this fall for collaborative piano masterclasses and recitals with clarinetist Liz Gunlogson. She will join soprano Sylvia McNair and stage director Tim Nelson of the American Opera Theatre as musical director of a Songspiel of Kurt Weill songs at Baltimore's Theatre Project in November.

Ms. Cornett has been a frequent guest coach/accompanist for the Baltimore Opera's Young Artist Program and the Annapolis Opera Company. For three years, Ms. Cornett coached and conducted the Opera Theatre program at the Fairbanks (Alaska) Summer Arts Festival; other summer faculty appointments have included the Lake Placid Institute in upstate NY, the Tanz und Gesang Studio at the Theatre and der Wien in Vienna, Austria, and the Seagle Colony Summer Vocal Program in Schroon Lake, NY, where she served for five years as Co-Director and Principal Coach.

With the National Symphony, the Baltimore Symphony, and Kennedy Center Opera Orchestras, Ms. Cornett has performed as solo and orchestral pianist for conductors Leonard Slatkin, Marin Alsop, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, Paul Gemignani, Bill Conte, and Marvin Hamlisch in concerts with Bryn Terfel, Frederica von Stade, Denyce Graves, and the late Rosemary Clooney. She joined James Levine and the Three Tenors with the Kennedy Center Opera Orchestra at their performance in the MCI Center, soloing with Luciano Pavarotti. She has served as an official accompanist for the International Marian Anderson Vocal Arts, the Annapolis Opera, and the Rosa Ponselle "All Marylanders" Competitions, and has collaborated in recital at the Kennedy Center’s Terrace Theatre, Merkin Hall, the Embassies of France and Russia, Strathmore Hall’s "Music in the Mansion" series, the Peabody Conservatory, and the University of Maryland. Eileen has accompanied master classes for Mignon Dunn, Margo Garrett, Phyllis Bryn-Julson, Cristina Deutekom, Luigi Alva, Paul Sperry, Patrice Munsel, Jennifer Lane, Louise McClelland, and Sherill Milnes, and recently shared the stage with Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice at the Kennedy Center’s Terrace Theatre in a benefit concert for the Pulmonary Hypertension Association. In Baltimore, she recently joined Irish tenor Finbar Wright in a solo recital for Mayor Martin Malley and the National Board for Irish Tourism.

Ms. Cornett is a frequent pianist/keyboardist for the Kennedy Center Ballet, Opera, and Show Orchestras, the Kennedy Center Honors orchestra, the Annapolis Symphony, Washington's National Theatre, Wolf Trap, Baltimore's Mechanic Theatre, Hippodrome, and the Lyric Opera House.

Formerly music director of the Croswell Opera House in Adrian, Michigan, her conducting credits include productions of Hansel and Gretel, Die Fledermaus, Sweeney Todd, and Bernstein's Mass. She is the originating Musical Director for NOW THIS!, a Washington based comedy group which performs totally improvised music theatre, and collaborates with The Capitol Steps, a musical political satire group.

Ms. Cornett received her Bachelor of Music in Piano Performance and her Master of Music degree in Piano Accompanying and Chamber Music from the University of Michigan, where she studied with Martin Katz and Lynne Bartholomew. She pursued additional studies with Gwendolyn Koldofsky and Jean Barr at the Music Academy of the West. She is a former faculty member of Loyola College.

Ms. Cornett and her husband, tenor Stanley Cornett, make their home in Baltimore, where they are proud parents of two girls, Lydia (14) and Emily (12).