Sherrill Milnes
Co-Founder, President
Sherrill Milnes is universally acclaimed as the foremost operatic baritone of his generation. With his powerful voice, commanding stage presence and rugged handsomeness, he received the kind of adulation that is usually reserved for tenors. He sang over 650 performances at the Met, where he was honored with sixteen new productions, seven opening nights, and ten national telecasts. As a leading artist in all of the world’s great opera houses, Mr. Milnes performed and recorded with the likes of Domingo, Pavarotti, Sutherland, Sills, Horne, Price, and Tebaldi. He is the winner of three Grammy Awards, and the most recorded American singer of his time. In 2008 he received the Opera News Award for Distinguished Achievement.
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Born on January 10, 1935 in Downers Grove, Illinois, Sherrill Milnes made his critically acclaimed debut at the Metropolitan Opera on December 22, 1965 as Valentin in Faust, an auspicious night that also featured the Met debut of Montserrat Caballé. He was launched to stardom, however, in 1968, when his riveting performance as Miller in Verdi’s Luisa Miller literally stopped the show at the Met and immediately made him the dominant baritone of his time. Throughout his remarkable career, Mr. Milnes showed an affinity for Verdi, whose works formed the cornerstone of a repertoire of some 70 roles. His autobiography, American Aria: Encore, is available from Amadeus Press.
Driven by his dedication to make the vocal arts vibrant, vital and entertaining in today’s world, Mr. Milnes continues to give masterclasses, judge competitions, and mentor new generations of singers. With his wife, Maria Zouves, he co-founded and runs the Sherrill Milnes VOICE Programs: VOICExperience Foundation and the Savannah VOICE Festival, which provide training and performance opportunities for aspiring young artists while fostering new audiences for the arts.
Maria Zouves
Co-Founder, President
Maria Zouves is an educator, director, producer and writer. She is President of the Sherrill Milnes VOICE Programs − VOICExperience Foundation and the Savannah VOICE Festival – which she co-founded with her husband, Sherrill Milnes, to provide training for aspiring young artists and foster new audiences for the vocal arts. The Greek-American soprano has sung leading roles in the regional U.S., made her Carnegie Hall debut in 1997, and has recorded under the VAI label. While Maria directs most of the concerts in the VOICE Programs and co-directed the new SVF opera commission, Ching’s Alice Ryley: A Savannah Ghost Story, she most recently directed Mozart’s Don Giovanni at the Estates Theatre in Prague, where the work first premiered and co-directed Le nozze de Figaro with Sherrill Milnes in Prague and Salzburg with Prague Summer Nights. She was recently seen in the title role of the premiere of Ching’s Anna Hunter: The Spirit of Savannah.
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Ms. Zouves has directed, taught, and produced events all around the world, having worked with the International Vocal Arts Institute (IVAI) in Montreal and Puerto Rico, the International Institute of Vocal Arts (IIVA) in Chiari, Italy, and at the Savonlinna Opera Festival in Finland. From 2007 to 2011, she served as Vice President and Associate General Director of Opera Tampa, the resident opera company of the Straz Center for the Performing Arts. She has taught workshops at Southern Illinois University, Drake University and served as interim opera director at Northwestern University. A sought after clinician, particularly in career development, she has also aided young singers as a career liaison through her former feature, “A Conversation with…” in Classical Singer magazine.
Ms. Zouves has sung leading roles with the Baltimore Opera, Florentine Opera, Memphis Opera, New Jersey State Opera, Orlando Opera, and the Pittsburgh Opera. The Stuttgarter Zeitung praised her “beautiful, lyric voice” and “a not to be surpassed ‘piano’ in the high register.” Opera News has described her voice as “creamy.” This Greek-American soprano shows great versatility in opera, on concert stages, and in crossover repertoire, with a specialty in classical and popular Greek music.
Chad Sonka
Executive Director
Chad Sonka is establishing himself as a versatile American baritone, teacher, and director. Most recently, he directed and sang the role of Alidoro the world premiere of A Royal Feast by Michael Ching, a sequel to Rossini’s La Cenerentola, with the Savannah VOICE Festival. He has performed as the baritone soloist in Vaughan Williams’ Dona Nobis Pacem at Carnegie Hall with Iowa State University and Mahler’s Kindertotenlieder with Oneota Valley Community Orchestra. Previous performing credits: Tosca (Scarpia – cover) with Central City Opera; Gianni Schicchi (Marco) with Savannah Music Festival; Man of La Mancha (Don Quixote) and Carmen (Dancaïro) with Cedar Rapids Opera Theatre; The Mother of Us All (Virgil T.), The Rape of Lucretia (Junius), Faust (Wagner), Elijah (Elijah) with Manhattan School of Music; and Amahl and the Night Visitors (King Melchior) with Nevada Opera. He was the first-place winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions – Iowa District in 2017. Chad is an active voice teacher and director and currently serves on voice faculty at Iowa State University. Directing credits include multiple scenes programs, Cendrillon (Viardot), Hansel and Gretel (Humperdinck), and The Little Prince (Portman).
Jorge Parodi
Artistic Director
Internationally acclaimed conductor Jorge Parodi has worked extensively in North America, Latin America, Europe, and Asia. Recent credits include Bizet’s Les pêcheurs de perles, Rossini’s Il barbiere di Siviglia and Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro for Opera Tampa; Piazzolla’s María de Buenos Aires for New York City Opera, The Atlanta Opera and Opera Grand Rapids; Donizetti’s Lucrezia Borgia and Bellini’s I Capuleti e i Montecchi for Buenos Aires Lírica (Argentina); Britten’s The Turn of the Screw for the Castleton Festival in Virginia and The Banff Centre (Canada); Offenbach’s Les contes d’Hoffmann for Opera Orlando; Ravel’s L’enfant et les sortilèges for The Juilliard School; and the World Premiéres of Anton Coppola’s Lady Swanwhite for Opera Tampa, and John Musto’s Rhoda and the Fossil Hunt in a coproduction of On Site Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago Lyric’s Unlimited and Pittsburgh Opera-. Most recently he made his debut at Chautauqua Opera and returned to The Atlanta Opera for Rodriguez’ Frida and to Opera Tampa for Bizet’s Carmen.
Reviewed as having “the most expressive conducting hands since Stokowski” by the New York Daily News, Argentinean born Jorge Parodi has worked with such companies as the Teatro Colón in Argentina, the Volgograd Opera in Russia, the Encuentros Internacionales de Opera in Mexico, the Tokyo International Vocal Arts Academy in Japan, and the International Vocal Arts Institute in Israel. He has collaborated with such artists as Isabel Leonard, Eglise Gutierrez, Tito Capobianco, Sherrill Milnes, Aprile Millo and Rufus Wainwright and has assisted conductors Lorin Maazel and Julius Rudel.
Administrative Staff
Lani Winskye hails from St. Petersburg, Florida. She holds a BA in Theatre Arts from the University of South Florida. Mrs. Winskye was the founding Company Manager of Hat Trick Theatre Productions, where she served for over eight years before moving to attain her MFA in Theatre for Young Audiences at the University of Hawai‘i at Manoa. Her joint passions for arts education, stage management and arts administration led her to find her home with The Milnes VOICE Programs in 2014, first as a production manager, and now as VP of Operations (and sometime Stage Manager). Mrs. Winskye has stage managed in a variety of live performance genres and venues, and taught all areas of theatre and arts management to students across the US. Favorite stage management experiences include Noises Off, Waiting for Godot, Alice Ryley: A Savannah Ghost Story and Anna Hunter: The Spirit of Savannah. Additionally, she serves the arts community as a Life Coach, having completed her advanced certification in 2022.
Michael Ching is a composer, songwriter, conductor, and former arts administrator. His recent opera, Speed Dating Tonight! was commissioned and premiered by the Janiec Opera Company of the Brevard Music Center. Since its premiere in July 2013, Speed Dating Tonight! has been produced fifteen times, including professional productions at Tri-Cities Opera, Amarillo Opera, and Microscopic Opera (Pittsburgh), and universities such as UT-Austin, the University of Memphis, Ithaca College, and the University of Central Florida. His 1996 opera Buoso’s Ghost is a sequel to Gianni Schicchi It has proved lasting, with recent performances at Texas State University and the UNC-Chapel Hill. It will be performed at University of Central Florida next season. His 2010 opera, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, opera a cappella was premiered by Opera Memphis, Playhouse on the Square, and DeltaCappella. A CD featuring the original cast was released on Albany Records in 2014. Other works include Corps of Discovery, commissioned by the University of Missouri to commemorate the Lewis and Clark Expedition and several one act operas. From 1993-2010, Michael was Artistic Director of Opera Memphis, where he was also General Director for much of the period. While at Opera Memphis, he participated in the seven million dollar campaign to build the Clark Opera Memphis Center, a headquarters and rehearsal studio for the company. He is currently Music Director of Nickel City Opera in Western New York, where he recently conducted their production of The Marriage of Figaro. This fall he will conduct his new orchestral reduction of Douglas Moore’s The Ballad of Baby Doe at Amarillo Opera. Other guest conducting engagements have included companies in Honolulu, Nashville, Fargo, and New Jersey. Michael has served on the artistic staffs of the opera companies of Miami, Virginia, and Chautauqua, and was trained at the Houston Opera Studio, where he studied opera composition with Carlisle Floyd. Michael attended Duke University where his composition teacher was Robert Ward. Michael lives with family in Ames, Iowa.
Savannah VOICE Festival
Board of Directors
Sherrill Milnes
Barry R. Cohen, Co-Chairperson
Toby Hollenberg, Co-Chairperson
Maria Zouves
Kathie Anderson
Michael Ching
Daniel C. Cohen
Dr. Wesley Krulic
Mary Lysaught
Fred Negem
Jorge Parodi
Arlene Ratner
Claudia Seyle
Dr. Garry Spector
Barry Tucker
Howard Watkins
Dr. Michael Zoller
Savannah VOICE Festival
Festival Committee
Kathie Anderson
Elliott Bardsley
Daniel C. Cohen
Michael Ching
Carolyn Donovan
Helen Downing
Lesley Francis
Timothy L. Hall
Toby Hollenberg
Dan Huffer
Dr. Wesley Krulic
Diana Langer
Joe Marinelli
Jorge Parodi
Arlene & Allan Ratner
Claudia & David Seyle
Dr. Garry Spector
Dr. & Mrs. Roland Summers
Howard Watkins
Dr. Michael & Linda Zoller
VOICE Diversity Committee
Michael Ching, SVF Composer-in-Residence
Daniel C. Cohen, Festival Committee Member
Denyce Graves, mezzo soprano
Paul Gutmann, VOICE Artist
Timothy L. Hall, Festival Committee & VOICE Faculty
Toby Hollenberg, Board Co-Chair
Dr. Wesley Krulic, Board Member
Marquita Lister, Faculty & Soprano
Aysha Parks, Principal, Esther F. Garrison School for the Arts
Jean Carlos Rodriguez, Festival Artist
Chad Sonka, Executive Director
Jonathan Walker-Van Kuren, Alumni, Faculty & Guest Artist
Howard Watkins, VOICE Faculty
Lani Winskye, Vice President of Operations
Maria Zouves, President & Co-Founder