A musician who started his career teaching kids in a Bronx school was yesterday named manager of the New York City Opera.
George Steel – who will also be the company’s artistic director – will assume the job next month.
“We are confident that his strong, visionary leadership will take City Opera to a new level of artistic achievement and popular success,” said Susan Baker, chairwoman of the company’s board.
Steel, 42, took his first job teaching music at St. Augustine School of the Arts in the South Bronx in 1994.
Since then, he’s been managing producer of New York’s Tisch Center for the Arts, the founder and conductor of the Gotham City Orchestra, and the executive director of Columbia University’s Miller Theatre.
The New York City Opera post “is an enormous honor, and an enormous responsibility,” Steel said.