Internationally renowned conductor Nicole Paiement is celebrated for her expertise in contemporary opera and her commitment to premiering new works.
As the Founder & Artistic Director of Opera Parallèle in San Francisco, Paiement has overseen numerous premieres, including the world premieres of Lou Harrison and Robert Gordon’s Young Caesar, Dante De Silva and Mitchell Morris’ Gesualdo, Prince of Madness, Luciano Chessa’s A Heavenly Act, the chamber reorchestration of John Harbison and Murray Horwitz’s The Great Gatsby, the chamber reorchestration of Terence Blanchard and Michael Cristofer’s Champion, Laura Kaminsky, Mark Campbell, and Kimberly Reed’s Today It Rains, the chamber adaptation of Paul Moravec and Mark Campbell’s The Shining, Kenji Oh and Kelley Rourke’s The Emissary, David Hanlon and Stephanie Fleischmann’s The Pigeon Keeper, Carla Lucero and Jarrod Lee’s Hello, Star, and the abridged chamber version of Douglas Cuomo and John Patrick Shanley’s Doubt. Paiement has also led the American premieres of Adam Gorb and Ben Kaye’s Anya 17 and Tarik O’Regan and Tom Phillips’ Heart of Darkness; and the West Coast premieres of John Rea’s re-orchestration of Alban Berg’s Wozzeck, Philip Glass’ Orphée and La Belle et la Bête, and Lembit Beecher and Hannah Moscovitch’s Sophia’s Forest.
Some of Paiement’s other notable productions with Opera Parallèle have included a double bill of Jake Heggie and Terrence McNally’s At the Statue of Venus alongside Bernstein’s Trouble in Tahiti, Rachel Portman and Nicholas Wright’s The Little Prince, Philip Glass and Rudolph Wurlitzer’s In the Penal Colony in partnership with the Days & Nights Festival, three innovative adaptations of Joby Talbot and Gene Scheer’s Everest (Everest: A Graphic Novel Opera, Everest: An Immersive Experience, and Everest: Opera in the Planetarium), a double bill of David T. Little and Royce Vavrek’s Vinkensport alongside Laura Karpman and Gail Collins’ Balls called Birds & Balls, and Stewart Wallace and Michael Korie’s Harvey Milk: Reimagined.
In addition to her work with Opera Parallèle, Paiement maintains an active career as a guest conductor for orchestras and opera houses around the world. Her 2012 debut with The Dallas Opera, conducting Peter Maxwell Davies’ The Lighthouse, received enthusiastic reviews and led to her appointment as Principal Guest Conductor.
She subsequently returned to conduct many acclaimed productions, including Tod Machover and Robert Pinsky’s Death and the Powers, the world premiere of Joby Talbot and Gene Scheer’s Everest, Benjamin Britten and Myfanwy Piper’s The Turn of the Screw, Douglas Cuomo’s Arjuna’s Dilemma, the U.S. premiere of Michel van der Aa and David Mitchell’s Sunken Garden, Bizet’s The Pearl Fishers, and—most recently in 2024—Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette.
Paiement’s other guest-conducting engagements have included Jake Heggie and Terrence McNally’s Dead Man Walking at Lyric Opera of Chicago, Mason Bates and Mark Campbell’s The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs at Seattle Opera, Joby Talbot and Gene Scheer’s Everest at Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Kevin Puts and Mark Campbell’s Silent Night at The Atlanta Opera, the world premiere of Mohammed Fairouz and Mohammed Hanif’s The Dictator’s Wife at Washington National Opera, George Benjamin and Martin Crimp’s Written on Skin and Osvaldo Golijov and David Henry Hwang’s Ainadamar at Opéra de Montréal, an orchestral program with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer’s It’s a Wonderful Life at English National Opera, Joby Talbot and Gene Scheer’s Everest with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, an orchestral program with Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana, an orchestral program and John Adams and Peter Sellars’ The Gospel According to the Other Mary at Volksoper Vienna, an orchestral program at the Grant Park Music Festival, Derek Bermel and Sandra Cisneros’ The House on Mango Street at the Glimmerglass Festival, Janáček’s Jenůfa at Opéra de Montréal, an orchestral program with the Transylvanian State Philharmonic, and—most recently—Gluck’s Orphée et Euridice at Pacific Opera Victoria.
As a teacher, Paiement has served as the Artistic Director of the BluePrint Project at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music (SFCM) where she has commissioned, premiered, and recorded works from many living American composers. At SFCM, she holds the Jean and Josette Deleage Distinguished Chair in New Music. Paiement previously served as the Director of Ensembles at the University of California – Santa Cruz (UCSC), where she was awarded the UCSC Eminent Professor Award in 2014. She received the Edward A. Dickson Emeritus Professorship in 2015 in recognition of her outstanding contributions and achievement in artistic scholarship and teaching.
Paiement was awarded the “Champion of New Music Award” by the American Composers Forum for her outstanding contributions to contemporary music in 2016. In addition to being a leader in the world of contemporary opera, Paiement is a specialist in early twentieth-century French music and regularly conducts music from the Baroque and Classical repertoire.
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