Press
Chicago’s 50 Players 2023
New City Magazine
2023
“Since moving to Chicago in 2017, Enyart has garnered universal praise in the local classical music realm, and is bringing further attention to Chicago as her reputation flourishes nationally”
La Scala di Seta
Opera Santa Barbara
2022
“. . .frenzied comic energy and the polished operatic experience.”
Beowulf
Third Eye Theatre Ensemble
2022
“Conductor Alexandra Enyart led the musicians with confidence and poise, her gestural fluidity and clarity helping to keep everything together.”
“The music is expertly executed by the small orchestra conducted by Alexandra Enyart.”
As One
The Atlanta Opera
2022
“The string quartet under Alexandra Enyart’s baton encapsulated the rapport of the work. Kaminsky’s elaborate score helps drive the importance of the text which this group of musicians carried out nicely.”
As One
Opera Santa Barbara
2022
"I'm trans, and when I came out, I thought I may never work again. I really thought thought that was going to be it," said Enyart.
She's now been a part of six As One productions. She said it’s amazing to be involved in art which means so much to her personally.
The Infinite Energy of Ada Lovelace
Third Eye Theatre Ensemble
2021
“Alexandra Enyart, One of Chicago’s Greatest Operatic Gifts”
Witness
Third Eye Theatre Ensemble
2020
“Solo singer with banjo is hardly the first thing your mind conjures up when thinking of opera,
yet this was a fascinating story told with unstinting honesty.”
As One
Australian Contemporary Opera Co.
2020
“Visiting American conductor Alexandra Enyart is a very welcome guest as she makes her Australian conducting debut. Highly experienced with As One, Enyart keeps the relatively unfamiliar music flowing with calm confidence and insightful musicianship.”
"she led the string quartet with an assured hand through Kaminsky’s score"
“Conductor Alexandra Enyart gave brisk and pulsating rhythm to the score”
“Like Hannah, Enyart left her town to make for herself a new life and is now music director of Chicago’s Thompson Street Opera as well as guest conducting for other companies in the city. The specifics of Hannah’s tale might ring true to her but reviews of As One also praise the way it speaks to more universal experiences and Enyart says that ‘in a lot of ways it’s a coming-of-age story and a finding-yourself story stacked on top of each other’”.
I will fly like a bird
Thompson Street Opera Company
2019
“Enyart led the quartet through the piece with great aplomb. Always a terrific talent and a sensitive musician, Enyart’s art becomes more burnished with every outing. She is freer in her body than ever, and her invitations to the players at entrance points even clearer and more specific of tone. Chicago must follow and celebrate the career of this young conductor, and selfishly hope her burgeoning talent does not take her to other climes anytime soon.”
“Music director Alexandra Enyart and the musicians were excellent advocates for Plant’s compelling score. Enyart led the six-player “orchestra” (clarinet, piano and string quartet) in a taut, flowing performance that brought out the lyricism as well as dramatic bite of Plant’s music.”
Breaking the Mold: Gender Identity
Orchestra Enigmatic
2019
"Alexandra Enyart provided mellifluous and rhythmic leadership..."
-Arts Louisville
Stitch
Third Eye Theater Ensemble
2019
“the piece, directed by Rose Freeman and conducted by Alexandra Enyart, is a dancing, acting, singing tour de force for the cast of two sopranos and a mezzo.”
-Chicago Reader
The Hat: Arendt Meets Heidegger
& The Man Who Woke Up
Thompson Street Opera Company
2019
"Music Director Alexandra Enyart once again pulls off the miracle of storytelling the nuances of a contemporary opera score by insisting on championing the imperatives while working in a very intimate space. This is perhaps the hardest work in storefront opera, because decisions must be made afresh in any instant, while serving the score on the stand and balancing the sound between the singers and the very present orchestra".
-Chicago Theater Review
"Alex Enyart led the chamber ensemble in tight, intricate, and polished readings"
-Chicago Classical Review
Chicago’s Choir for Trans Singers
Chicago Magazine
3/28/19
“In the world of choral singing, ResonaTe upends long-held notions of vocal range and how it maps onto a binary conception of gender. Choirs that perform repertoire solely for tenors and basses, for example, are usually designated men’s choirs; the same goes for women’s choirs with soprano and alto membership. But for a singer experiencing dissonance between their gender and the imposed gendering of their voice, what was once an act of joy can become complicated or dysphoric. That’s to say nothing of those whose voices may be changing altogether, settling into a new register.”
-Chicago Magazine
Every Second is an Honor
New City Magazine
3/1/19
“The roster of opera conductors was once made up almost entirely of heterosexual, white men of a certain age. But the profession is climbing toward greater equilibrium. LGBTQ+ musicians, people of color, women and younger conductors are stepping up on the podium and speaking our shared tales with all the strength of their understanding and personality. The transgender community is only beginning to have a seat at the table: if you Google the words trans, orchestra and conductor, the first results will be for Trans-Siberian Orchestra. Enter Alexandra Enyart, a trans woman, orchestral and opera conductor who is taking Chicago’s classical music community by storm.”
-New City Magazine
Out of the Closet
and
Onto the Podium
Opera Box Score
1/30/19
“The OBS crew go ‘Inside the Huddle’ with Alexandra Enyart. An orchestra and opera conductor, Alex serves as Music Director for Thompson Street Opera Company where she chartered “Faulty Systems”, an annual program in which activists and artists come together to present on underrepresented communities or ideas through music, speech, poetry, dance and other mediums.”
When Adonis Calls
Thompson Street Opera Company
2018
“Enough cannot be said of the superior musical direction and conducting of Alexandra Enyart. In only a short time in Chicago, she has shot to prominence in the storefront opera scene. Perched on a stool in a corner of the stage, Enyart was always present, but never obtrusive. It takes a special ear to breathe with a singer from the podium; This is not a skill that every conductor, even many who are quite successful, have in their arsenal. Enyart seems to know when a singer is going to breathe, and how much intake is needed in that slip of a moment, almost before the singer knows themselves. The audience could live fully in the world of the play, because Enyart championed her orchestra as another member of the cast, everyone breathing in, and letting go, together.”
-Chicago Theatre Review
“With the confident leadership of one of Chicago’s hardest working conductors, Alex Enyart, Thompson Street Opera Company has produced a highly recommendable chamber work which should appeal to the city’s growing audience for new opera and the gay male community alike.”
-Opera Box Score, Oliver Camacho
“Alexandra Enyart led a remarkably polished ensemble of instrumentalists. She drew locked-in but expressive unison lines between singers and players, and expressive rubato that gave string players room for their intricate lines without bogging down the singers’ melodic arc.”
-Chicago Classical Review
Patience and Sarah
Third Eye Ensemble
2018
“Well executed by a clearly amazing cast and orchestra, Patience & Sarah is certainly a timely and worthy story to be told.”
-Chicagoland Musical Theater, Sheri Flanders and Josh Flanders
“The soaring, silvery sopranos and sweetly shy smiles of Diana Stoic as Patience and Liana Gineitis as Sarah highlight Third Eye Theatre Ensemble's intimate production, which features a fine chamber orchestra conducted by Alexandra Enyart”
-Chicago Reader, Albert Williams
“Conductor Alexandra Enyart, who helmed the ensemble in Chicago Fringe Opera’s As One last season, again demonstrated why she is a podium talent to watch. She directed the lean ensemble with finesse, control, and technical grace…”
Chicago Classical Review, Hannah Edgar
"The obstacles they(Patience and Sarah) overcome in their pursuit of happiness beckoned to lyricist Wende Persons and composer Paula M. Kimper in 1998. The results were the opera now celebrating its 20th anniversary production under the auspices of Third Eye Theatre Ensemble."
-Windy City Times
As One
Chicago Fringe Opera Company
2017
"Alexandra has been very good at putting a very personal expression to what we've been working on and making it personal for each of us… and approach this with as much context and understanding of the reality of experience as we could."
-Windy City Times, Jonathon Wilson
“Figuring out how to accept yourself as transgender is really hard. You don’t feel right but you have no way of dealing with those feelings, especially if you are growing up in a small town where nobody else thinks or feels the way you do. I really connected with that aspect of Hannah.”
-Chicago Tribune, Alexandra Enyart
“Kaminsky’s pulsing, post-minimalist score, capably played by the new music string quartet Zafa Collective under conductor Alexandra Enyart (she and co-librettist Reed are both transgender), traces Hannah’s inner and outer odyssey through a series of 16 songs… The video projections identify but do not interpret specific locales along Hannah’s journey.”
-Chicago Tribune, John von Rhein
“Conductor Alexandra Enyart led the music with confidence and flexible pacing that was always in synch with the singers.”
-Chicago Classical Review
“Alexandra Enyart ... performed throughout the evening with sensitivity towards the singers and a unified sound”
-Schmopera, Michael Calderone
Episode #101: Doing the Work with Alex Enyart
Doing the Work with Matthan Black
Nov 9th 2017
“This week we have conductor Alex Enyart on the podcast! Alex is a recent transplant to Chicago by way of Kentucky and, along with friend-of-the-show Claire DiVizio, is one of the powerhouses behind Thompson Street Opera Company. ”
Uncle Alex
Faulty Systems II
2017
“Enyart developed a partnership with Adler University, which offers graduate degrees in programs for social change, to present the first Chicago Faulty Systems, which she hopes will become an annual event. All proceeds from the event will benefit the Council on American Islamic Relations of Chicago.”
-WFMT, Stephen Raskauskas
The Man Who Woke Up
Thompson Street Opera Company
2016
“The Man Who Woke Up is the opening production of Thompson Street Opera's summer season and not to be missed.”
-Broadway World, Keith Waits
Not for the Faint of Heart
Three Intense(ly Awesome)
Short Works
Thompson Street Opera Company
2016
“Conducted by Alexander Enyart, accompanied by Ethan McCollum and directed by Katie Nix, I believe that this little tale of love, with a little more spit and polish, could be even more fun.”
-Arts-Louisville, Annette Skaggs