About the Initiative
The Rites of Spring Music Festival, in collaboration with Stony Brook University Opera, has launched a new initiative titled Talents for Change: Music, Management, and Community, to provide professional development and financial support for young artists and managers at the beginning of their careers.
Talents for Change offers opportunities such as concerts, community events, roles in theatrical productions, workshops, coaching, and international networking. Young talents have the chance to develop their skills, exercise leadership and management abilities, improve performance endurance, and expand their repertoire.
Talents for Change is part of a broader movement that uses the performing arts to promote change in production, moving beyond traditional forms and embracing new stories, smaller spaces, sustainable practices, and accessible formats to engage a wider audience.
In 2026, Talents for Change nominated three Ambassadors for Change:
Michaela Larsen, mezzo soprano, stage director & vocal coach
Sunmi Han, pianist, music coordinator & educator
Michael Owen Doods, pianist, music coordinator, educator
They will receive financial support for two years and will be given opportunities for professional development through specific activities of the Rites of Spring Music Festival, in order to develop their artistic, entrepreneurial, and adaptive skills.
Talents for Change offers opportunities such as concerts, community events, roles in theatrical productions, workshops, coaching, and international networking. Young talents have the chance to develop their skills, exercise leadership and management abilities, improve performance endurance, and expand their repertoire.
Talents for Change is part of a broader movement that uses the performing arts to promote change in production, moving beyond traditional forms and embracing new stories, smaller spaces, sustainable practices, and accessible formats to engage a wider audience.
In 2026, Talents for Change nominated three Ambassadors for Change:
Michaela Larsen, mezzo soprano, stage director & vocal coach
Sunmi Han, pianist, music coordinator & educator
Michael Owen Doods, pianist, music coordinator, educator
They will receive financial support for two years and will be given opportunities for professional development through specific activities of the Rites of Spring Music Festival, in order to develop their artistic, entrepreneurial, and adaptive skills.
2026 Activities
Our 2026 Talents for Change Ambassadors
Sunmi Han
pianist, music coordinator & educator Marked by poetic lyricism in solo performance and vibrant imagination in chamber music collaborations, pianist Sunmi Han has appeared in major venues across Europe, the U.S., and Asia—including Munich’s Herkulessaal and Prague’s Smetana Hall—and has performed as soloist with the North Czech Philharmonic, Karlovy Vary Symphony, Kharkiv Philharmonic, Moravian Symphony, and Seoul Philharmonic. A devoted chamber musician, she has collaborated with artists such as Arnaud Sussmann, Jörg Widmann, Colin Carr, Denis Várjon, Matthew Lipman, Nicholas Mann, Alan Kay, Pauline Sachse, and members of the Emerson Quartet. An alumna of The Juilliard School, she also holds degrees from Tel Aviv University and the Hochschule für Musik und Theater München, and is currently completing her DMA at Stony Brook University. Upcoming projects include Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations, Copland’s Piano Variations, and Charles Ives’s Varied Air and Variations.
|
Michaela Larsen
mezzo soprano, stage director & vocal coach Heralded by the Brooklyn Discovery as “visually and vocally another bright ray,” mezzo soprano Michaela Larsen has a voice that is “plangent [and] coupled with excellent stagecraft.” Her impeccable technique and regal stage presence ground her as an artist, providing a rich foundation for creative exploration and daring, inspiring, and spell-binding storytelling. She leaves no stone unturned when it comes to repertoire–equally at home in and vocally suited to Baroque, Contemporary, and Romantic repertoire, and with a crystallized intelligence and devoted attention to every last detail on the score’s pages that is proven through her honest, nuanced, and bold delivery. The 2025-2026 season will see several role debuts: Dido (Purcell’s Dido & Aeneas), Santuzza (Mascagni’s Cavalleria Rusticana), and La Zelatrice (Puccini’s Suor Angelica).
Operatic credits include: Cherubino (Le Nozze di Figaro) with Chautauqua Opera Conservatory, Sunnyside Opera, Stony Brook Opera, and Vienna Summer Music Festival; Hermia (Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream) with Chicago Summer Opera; the title role in Gustav Holst’s Sāvitri; Jean in Jules Massenet’s Le portrait de Manon, Venus in John Blow’s Venus and Adonis; and Nancy in Benjamin Britten’s Albert Herring with Stony Brook Opera. Ms. Larsen shines especially brightly in new works, appearing in Michael Ching’s Notes on Viardot, a whimsical historical account of the illustrious singer/composer Pauline Viardot. Ms. Larsen portrayed the diva with Music OnSite in Wichita, Kansas in December 2024, receiving high praise from the composer himself for her interpretation of the role. Another warmly received return to Wichita saw her portrayal of pioneering woman pilot, Louise Thaden, in Lisa DeSpain and Rachel Peters’s Staggerwing, her debut performance with Opera Kansas. She was a Young Artist at the Chautauqua Institution’s Opera Conservatory in the Summer of 2025, where she sang in the orchestral workshop of Missy Mazzoli and Royce Vavrek’s Lincoln in the Bardo, as well as Manuel de Falla’s La Vida Breve, appearing as Carmela. |
Owen Doods,
pianist, music coordinator, educator American pianist and composer Owen Dodds leads a diverse and stimulating musical life, driven by his desire to share the music he enjoys. A native of North Carolina, Owen currently resides in New York, where he performs as classical soloist, chamber musician, song writer, and composer. He has recently appeared in venues such as Carnegie Hall, Steinway Hall, Lincoln Center’s Clark Studio Theatre, and Rockwood Music Hall.
An active collaborator and chamber musician, Owen is a member of the Béla Trio with clarinetist Kelsi Doolittle and violinist Stephanie Bonk, which was recently awarded the Donald Spieth Prize for chamber music. Owen’s modern-folk duo, Early Gray, with guitarist Drake Duffer, has released two albums of original music. They have collaborated with artists including Gabriel Kahane and Tanner Porter and were featured on PBS North Carolina. In recent years, Owen has enjoyed devoting more time to composition. His chamber music works have recently been featured as a part of Stony Brook’s Contemporary Chamber Players, The New School’s Tech Forward concert series, Blairsville Chamber Music Festival, and the Weekend of Chamber Music festival in the Catskills of NY. Owen’s upcoming compositional projects include a piece to be performed by his mentor, pianist Gilbert Kalish. Owen has received awards in piano competitions including Music Teachers National Association, the Baltimore International Piano Festival Competition, the Malaysian International Music Competition, and the Stony Brook Concerto Competition. He has appeared as a concerto soloist with the UNC School of the Arts Symphony Orchestra and the National Academic Orchestra of Ukraine. Owen began his official music studies in the high school program at UNC School of the Arts, first receiving instruction from Clifton Matthews and later continuing with Dr. Dmitri Shteinberg for his bachelor's degree. In 2020, Owen received his Master of Music degree from Boston University, where he studied piano performance with Gila Goldstein. From 2020-2022, Owen studied at Mannes School of Music with Vladimir Valjarević. He is currently pursuing a Doctor of Musical Arts degree at Stony Brook University under the guidance of Gilbert Kalish. |
