Austin Opera Teaching Artists
Austin Opera’s Teaching Artists are highly accomplished singers based in Austin. They bring music into schools, perform for Austin Opera events, and hold positions as covers and chorus members in our mainstage productions. Read more about our 2022-2023 Teaching Artists below!
Lily Guerrero, soprano
Lily Guerrero is a soprano originally from Grand Rapids, Michigan, and is currently based in Austin, TX. Post-Covid, Guerrero covered Marzelline in Fidelio at Austin Opera, sang the soprano solo in Brahms’ Requiem with the San Antonio Choral Society, and performed as a Vocal Fellow at Spoleto Festival USA in Yuval Sharon’s new “backwards Bohème.”
She has performed frequently around the Midwest, notably as Norina in Don Pasquale with Windy City Opera in Chicago and as Despina in Così fan tutte with Winter Opera Saint Louis. She covered Marzelline (Fidelio) and Josephine (HMS Pinafore) as an apprentice artist with GLOW Lyric Theatre and attended the Atlantic Music Festival as an Opera Fellow under the tutelage of Mark Crayton and Arlene Shrut.
Lily Guerrero is Assistant Professor of Voice and Director of Vocal Studies at Texas Lutheran University, where she teaches in both the School of Music and the Center for Women’s Studies. The daughter of Mexican and Cuban immigrants, her research focuses on advocating for Latinx voices in classical music and she has received fellowship funding for this endeavor from the Society for American Music. She is sought out as a lecturer and panelist on the topic of diversity, equity, and inclusion in the voice studio and serves as a member of the NATS DEI Task Force as well as the organizer for the NATS Latinx/Hispanic Teachers Affinity Group. Guerrero also contributes her knowledge of underrepresented composers as an Art Song Advisor for Song Helix and the Institute for Composer Diversity. An activist-scholar, Guerrero’s research highlights the intersection of music and social justice in the United States.
She holds a Bachelor of Music from Grand Valley State University, a Master of Music from Wichita State University, and a Doctor of Music from Florida State University.
Willie Casper, tenor
William (Willie) Casper is a native, and now gain, Austin based tenor. He grew up surrounded by the art and music of his parents and sister. Though shy in his early years, Willie coincidentally opened up on the stage throughout his upbringing.
During his time at the Boston Conservatory, Willie performed the roles of Le Chevalier in Poulenc’s Dialogues des Carmélites, Tenor in Philip Glass’ Hydrogen Jukebox, Younger Thompson in Cipullo’s Glory Denied, as well as Prologue Tenor in Benjamin Britten’s The Turn of the Screw.
Willie attended Seagle Music Colony this past summer where he performed the roles of Don Curzio in Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro, and Andrew Hanley in Kevin Putz’s The Manchurian Candidate.
Willie reprised the role of Younger Thompson in Painted Sky Opera’s production of Tom Cipullo’s Glory Denied in January of 2020. That summer, Willie was contracted to sing at Opera Middlebury and Opera Maine, but both were cancelled due to Covid-19. Willie most recently made his Austin debut in the role of Malcolm in Opera for Earth’s production of Verdi’s Macbeth.
Willie obtained his Bachelor’s degree in Vocal Performance at Mannes College of Music and his Master degree in Opera Performance at the Boston Conservatory.
Kate Bass, soprano
Kate Bass, originally from Anchorage Alaska, now based in Austin, Texas, performs internationally in many varying musical genres ranging from classical, musical theater, and jazz, to her own pop and folk-inspired original music. She has appeared on stage as a soloist with the New York Philharmonic, at Carnegie Hall, as well as on and off-Broadway for Emmy and Tony Award-nominated productions. She has recorded for numerous film scores with music by Arturo Cardelús, David Stone Hamilton, and others; her voice was recently featured in award-winning films at both the Austin Film Festival and the Milan International Film Festival. Kate was also the soprano soloist for Iranian singer and setar player Hafez Nazeri’s Grammy-nominated SONY Worldwide release of Untold with the Rumi Symphony.
As a singer-songwriter, Kate has four albums released; her first single aired on international radio in 2013. She has performed her music to sold out crowds all over the world, and has been hailed by the press as “easy to love,” “infectious,” and “one of the best vocalists on the scene today.” Her latest, entirely self-made album, Quarantine, was written, recorded, and released in March 2020 from her apartment in Los Angeles.
Kate has taught on the vocal faculty at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California, where she also worked as a Musical Director for Pepperdine’s musical theater department. She leads vocal masterclasses and songwriting workshops around the globe for organizations such as the Girl Scouts, the Metropolitan Opera Guild, Classical Singer Magazine, and American Voices.
Yu-Hsin Teng, piano
A native of Taiwan, collaborative pianist Yu-Hsin Teng received her Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Collaborative Piano at the Sarah and Ernest Butler School of Music at The University of Texas at Austin under the tutelage of Colette Valentine. She served at the University of Texas as a Teaching Assistant, and was awarded the Butler Excellence Scholarship. She received her Master of Music degree in Collaborative Piano at Boston University where she also served as a Teaching Assistant.
Yu-Hsin has served as rehearsal pianist for the William Lewis School of Opera’s production of Die Fledermaus and the Bulter Opera Center’s productions of L’elisir d’amore and Carmen. She premiered the song cycle Love, Loss and Exile by Juhi Basal at the San Francisco Conservatory.
Yu-Hsin has performed piano recitals, concerts, and competitions of vocal and instrumental collaboration in Taiwan, Italy, and the United States, and is currently on the faculty of Texas Lutheran University.
