NEAL D. LONG

Neal D. Long enjoys a vibrant career as a singer, pianist, educator, and arts administrator. Originally from Nevada, Neal is now based in the greater Kansas City area.

 

As a tenor, Neal has been described as "powerful and commanding," “totally at ease,” "sonorous," and "spectacularly clear-voiced." His operatic repertoire includes Nemorino in L’elisir d’amore, Pedrillo in Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Ferrando in Così fan tutte, Bénédict in Béatrice et Bénédict, Candide, Valère in Mechem's Tartuffe, Lysander in Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and Laurie in Adamo’s Little Women. For his portrayal of Laurie with Opera in the Ozarks, Neal received the company award for Best Performance by a Male in a Leading Role. With a profound interest in contemporary opera, Neal recorded the title role in Frank Nawrot’s chamber podcast opera Don Henry and created the role of Hamm in Dale Ramsey’s Mother Noah. Concert credits include the tenor solos in Bach’s Magnificat and Handel’s Messiah.

 

A new music champion and enthusiast, Neal has premiered works by several composers. He sang the Voice of the Architect in Forrest Pierce's Resonant Vessels, a multi-location work celebrating architecture and place commissioned by the Spencer Museum of Art, and The Burning Harp, an epic song cycle. With contemporary vocal ensemble The Meadowlark Project, Neal toured the Midwest with a recital program featuring new art songs by Kansas-based composers and poets. In 2021, The Meadowlark Project premiered There Will Come Soft Rains by Allison McIntosh. Co-commissioned by the Spencer Museum of Art and Reach Out Kansas, the piece illuminates Sara Teasdale’s enduring poem in conversation with the exhibition Audubon in the Anthropocene.

 

Off the stage, Neal had the honor of music directing the first stage production of Disney’s The Descendants in 2020. In 2021, he directed a double-bill production featuring the Kansas premiere of Kaminsky’s As One and the world premiere of Bonnie McLarty’s Snow Angel for the University of Kansas. He conducted Stacy Busch’s She Breathes Fire in 2023, an opera written for women and non-binary vocal octet with an accompanying score generated entirely by vocal sampling and manipulation. In 2024, Neal will workshop the second entry in the She Breathes Fire universe during a residency at the HERE Arts Center in New York City. In 2024, Neal served as advisor and music director for three micro-operas written under the auspices of an inaugural fellowship program facilitated by No Divide KC and Lyric Opera of Kansas City.
 

In his full-time role at Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Neal carries out the organization’s mission of education and community engagement with programs designed to promote artistic literacy in Kansas City and provide audiences the social-emotional tools needed to connect deeply with what they see on stage. Highlights of his work including launching a comprehensive in-school education program serving students in grades K–12; developing Community Conversations, a series using opera to discover our shared humanity on and off the stage; and commissioning and producing three works for intergenerational audiences—Rachel J. Peters’ Sketchbook for Ollie, Rosabella Gregory and Dina Gregory’s The Haberdasher Prince, and Lori Laitman and Dana Gioia’s Maya and the Magic Ring. Neal was recognized by Gramophone in November 2023 for, “An upsurge in new initiatives, not least for families and children, integrating this conventionally ‘grown-up’ art form into the wider and younger communities in the area in engaging and even unexpected ways.”

 

A passionate educator, Neal has taught at institutions including The University of Kansas and Missouri Western State University and offers private voice lessons and vocal coaching. He holds a BM in piano from the University of Nevada, Reno and both a MM and DMA in voice from the University of Kansas. His thesis was entitled “Songs of Nature and the Human Experience: A Performance Guide to Bonnie McLarty’s Weather-telling.” Additional areas of research include vocal music exploring queer themes and the process of learning and teaching contemporary repertoire. Outside of work, Neal enjoys adventures with his husband Steven.