Peter Kazaras, served as the inaugural director of Opera UCLA from 2007 to 2024 and as the inaugural Susan G. and Mitchel D. Covel, M.D., chair at the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music from 2016 to 2021. A stage director, teacher, and librettist, he was also artistic director of the Seattle Opera Young Artists Program from 2006 to 2013.
In his career as a performer, Kazaras received worldwide acclaim as an operatic tenor, performing at the Metropolitan Opera, Teatro alla Scala, Deutsche Staatsoper Berlin, Houston Grand Opera, San Francisco Opera, Seattle Opera, and Weiner Staatsoper, to name a few. He premiered several new works, including The Ghosts of Versailles at the Metropolitan Opera, A Quiet Place and New Year at Houston Grand Opera, and Thérèse Raquin at The Dallas Opera, Opéra de Montréal, and San Diego Opera.
Last season, Mr. Kazaras returned to the stage as Mr. Maraczek in She Loves Me at Opera Saratoga as well as The Duke in Long Beach Opera’s production of Library of Maps: An Opera in Many Parts. This season, he will return to Washington National Opera to direct Le nozze di Figaro before making his débuts at Palm Beach Opera for La bohème and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music for Cendrillon.