Speight Jenkins Jr. (born January 31, 1937) is a classical music critic and music administrator. He was the general director of

Seattle Opera Seattle Opera is an American opera company based in Seattle, Washington. The company's season runs from August through late May, comprising five or six operas of eight to ten performances each, often featuring double casts in major roles to all ...

from 1983 to 2014.

Early life and education

Jenkins, a native of

Dallas Dallas () is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the most populous city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of Texas metropolitan areas, most populous metropolitan area in Texas and the Metropolitan statistical area, fourth-most ...

Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...

, is the son of Speight Jenkins Sr. and Sara Baird Jenkins. His parents took him to his first opera at the age of 7, and he fell immediately in love with the art form. His B.A. degree is from the

University of Texas at Austin The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public university, public research university in Austin, Texas, United States. Founded in 1883, it is the flagship institution of the University of Texas System. With 53,082 stud ...

, and he graduated in 1961 from

Columbia Law School Columbia Law School (CLS) is the Law school in the United States, law school of Columbia University, a Private university, private Ivy League university in New York City. The school was founded in 1858 as the Columbia College Law School. The un ...

Career

Jenkins served in the U.S. Army as a member of the Judge Advocate General’s Corps, and afterwards became a music critic and journalist. He worked for seven years at ''

Opera News ''Opera News'' was an American classical music magazine. It was published from 1936 to 2023 by the Metropolitan Opera Guild—a non-profit organization, located at Lincoln Center, that was founded to promote opera and support the Metropolitan ...

'' as its news and reports editor, and later at the ''

New York Post The ''New York Post'' (''NY Post'') is an American Conservatism in the United States, conservative daily Tabloid (newspaper format), tabloid newspaper published in New York City. The ''Post'' also operates three online sites: NYPost. ...

'' from 1973 to 1981 as music critic. He has been a host for U.S. television's '' Live from the Metropolitan Opera'' and a guest speaker on the

Metropolitan Opera radio broadcasts The Metropolitan Opera radio broadcasts are a regular series of weekly broadcasts on network radio of full-length opera performances. They are transmitted live from the stage (theatre), stage of the Metropolitan Opera in New York City. The Me ...

Tenure at Seattle Opera

In the early 1980s, Jenkins was a guest lecturer at Seattle Opera for the company's production of

Richard Wagner Wilhelm Richard Wagner ( ; ; 22 May 181313 February 1883) was a German composer, theatre director, essayist, and conductor who is chiefly known for his operas (or, as some of his mature works were later known, "music dramas"). Unlike most o ...

's ''

Der Ring des Nibelungen (''The Ring of the Nibelung''), WWV 86, is a cycle of four German-language epic music dramas composed by Richard Wagner. The works are based loosely on characters from Germanic heroic legend, namely Norse legendary sagas and the . The compo ...

''. His knowledge impressed the Seattle Opera board of trustees, such that they offered him the post of general director of the company and he began his tenure in that post with the company in 1983. His contract was extended for another ten years, and in 2003, he signed another 10-year extension to his contract. At Seattle Opera he has produced two complete cycles of Wagner's Ring, the first one directed by François Rochaix and the second one by Stephen Wadsworth. He also produced new productions of the other six frequently produced Wagner operas, as well as new productions of Prokofiev's ''

War and Peace ''War and Peace'' (; pre-reform Russian: ; ) is a literary work by the Russian author Leo Tolstoy. Set during the Napoleonic Wars, the work comprises both a fictional narrative and chapters in which Tolstoy discusses history and philosophy. An ...

'', Debussy's '' Pelléas et Mélisande'', Dvorak's ''

Rusalka In Slavic folklore, the rusalka (plural: rusalki; , plural: русалки; , plural: ''rusałki'') is a female entity, often malicious toward mankind and frequently associated with water. It has counterparts in other parts of Europe, such as th ...

'', Bellini's ''

Norma Norma may refer to: * Norma (given name), a given name (including a list of people with the name) ** Norma Lizbeth Ramos, a Mexican bullying victim Astronomy *Norma (constellation) * 555 Norma, a minor asteroid * Cygnus Arm or Norma Arm, a spiral ...

'', Gluck's '' Orfeo ed Euridice'' and ''

Iphigénie en Tauride ''Iphigénie en Tauride'' (, ''Iphigenia in Tauris'') is a 1779 opera by Christoph Willibald Gluck in four acts. It was his fifth opera for the French stage. The libretto was written by Nicolas-François Guillard. With ''Iphigénie,'' Gluck too ...

'', four Strauss operas, many by Verdi and Puccini, plus several contemporary works. In 2010 Seattle Opera commissioned and gave the world premiere of '' Amelia'', by Daron Hagen. Jenkins stepped down as General Director of Seattle Opera in August 2014, and was replaced by Aidan Lang.

Other work

Jenkins has written an art book, ''Pelleas + Melisande + Chihuly'', and narrated a 4-CD commentary called ''Enjoying Wagner's Ring of the Nibelung with Speight Jenkins''. In 2011 he won an Opera Honor from the

National Endowment for the Arts The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created in 1965 as an independent agency of the feder ...

. In the same year he received an honorary doctorate from the

New England Conservatory The New England Conservatory of Music (NEC) is a Private college, private music school in Boston, Massachusetts. The conservatory is located on Huntington Avenue along Avenue of the Arts (Boston), the Avenue of the Arts near Boston Symphony Ha ...

Personal life

Jenkins and his wife, the former Linda Sands, have two children, Linda Leonie Jenkins and Speight Jenkins III.

References

Notes Other sources *Melinda Bargreen (2 August 2014)
"Speight Jenkins: Gracefully bowing out of Seattle Opera"
''The Seattle Times'' at seattletimes.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Jenkins, Speight American opera managers 1937 births Living people Classical musicians from Texas University of Texas at Austin alumni Columbia Law School alumni New York Post people Classical music radio people Journalists from Dallas