Thomas Muraco

IN MEMORIAM
(1949-2024)

Read MSM’s remembrance of Thomas Muraco.

College Faculty:
Vocal Arts: Collaborative Piano; Related Studies in Vocal Arts: French Diction, Recitative, Vocal Coaching

Thomas Muraco has been described as “simply one of the finest collaborative artists before the public today” by the Boston Globe. Known for his technical virtuosity, he has been praised for his interpretations of Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, Chopin, Brahms, Wolf, Debussy, Rachmaninoff, and Poulenc, and given premieres of William Schuman and George Perle. He has partnered such singers as Adele Addison, John Aler, Martina Arroyo, Arleen Augér, John Cheek, Phyllis Curtin, Mary Dunleavy, Faith Esham, Maureen Forrester, Denyce Graves, Ben Heppner, Henry Herford, Ying Huang, Sumi Jo, Susanne Mentzer, Chris Merritt, Roberta Peters, Hermann Prey, Twyla Robinson, Jennie Tourel, Benita Valente, and Dolora Zajick, and instrumentalists John Graham, Robert Mann, Arnold Steinhardt, Zara Nelsova, Ransom Wilson, Peter Winograd, and the American and Shanghai String Quartets. Mr. Muraco has recorded on the Serenus, CRI, and Musical Heritage labels and, most recently, released a Brahms Liederabend on CBC Records with contralto Maureen Forrester.

Mr. Muraco has trained pianists in the art of accompanying and coaching, as well as singers, at Manhattan School of Music since 1993. He has also taught at the Cleveland Institute of Music and State University of New York at Stony Brook and given master classes at the Aspen and Banff Music Festivals and the St. Louis Conservatory. Influential teachers in his own training include Brooks Smith at the Eastman School of Music, from which he graduated with distinction, Jeaneane Dowis, and conductors John Nelson and David Gilbert.

Mr. Muraco has been chairman of the jury of De Vive Voix in Vivonne, France, where in 2008 he performed Die Winterreise. He has conducted Lakmé in Tel Aviv for the International Vocal Arts Institute; La Cenerentola with Opera San José as his debut in 2002; and Die Zauberflöte and Idomeneo at Opera McGill. He made his debut at Tri-Cities Opera in April 2015 conducting Faust to critical acclaim. At Manhattan School of Music, he has conducted Opera Repertoire Ensemble productions of Die Zauberflöte, Rigoletto, Falstaff, Lucia, Faust, Hänsel und Gretel, I Capuleti e I Montecchi, Lakmé, La Bohème, La Traviata, Carmen, Madama Butterfly, Don Giovanni, Dialogues des Carmélites, Il Tabarro, and Gianni Schicchi. In April 2016, the Opera Repertoire Ensemble will present Luisa Miller.

Mr. Muraco had the honor of assisting in the preparation of performances and a recording of La Bohème under the direction of Leonard Bernstein. He assisted in preparing both operatic and symphonic repertoire for John Nelson for performances of the Verdi Requiem at Carnegie Hall and Entführung aus dem Serailwith L’Ensemble Orchestral de Paris, and for James Conlon with the Cincinnati Symphony.

As the Studienleiter-Kapellmeister at the Theater Bremen in 2008, he conducted performances of Nabucco. In 2009 he performed with tenor Ben Heppner at La Scala, Dortmund Konzerthaus, Opéra National de Paris, Berlin Philharmonie, and the Barbican Centre in London. In the summer of 2012 in Siena Mr. Muraco conducted both Händel’s Orlando and Puccini’s Suor Angelica. In the summer of 2013 he coached at the Santa Fe Opera, the Banff Centre, and Opera Advantage in New York State. He is on the Advisory Board of the Art Song Preservation Society of New York.