Administration

Craig Trompeter, Founder & Artistic Director

Craig Trompeter is the founder and Artistic Director of Chicago’s acclaimed Haymarket Opera Company. As cellist and violist da gamba he has performed with Second City Musick, the Chicago Symphony, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Chicago Opera Theater, Music of the Baroque, the Smithsonian Chamber Music Society, and the Oberlin Consort of Viols. He has performed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Glimmerglass Festival, the Brooklyn Academy of Music, and the Valletta International Baroque Festival in Malta and has appeared as soloist at the Ravinia Festival, the annual conference of the American Bach Society, with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and with Music of the Baroque. Trompeter has recorded works of Mozart, Bologne, Biber, Boismortier, Marais, Vivaldi, Handel, Greene, Henry Eccles, and a potpourri of Elizabethan composers on the Harmonia Mundi, Cedille, and Centaur labels. As a modern cellist, he was a founding member of the Fry Street String Quartet and premiered several chamber operas by MacArthur Fellow John Eaton, performing as actor, singer and cellist. He has taught master classes at the Cleveland Institute of Music, Oberlin, Grinnell College, and the Chicago Musical College. In 2003 he founded the Feldenkrais® Center of Chicago where he teaches Awareness Through Movement® and Functional Integration®. He has given Feldenkrais workshops throughout the nation in universities, music conservatories, opera companies, and dance studios. Trompeter conducts the Early Music Ensemble at the University of Chicago and teaches Baroque Performance Practices at Northwestern University.

Chase Hopkins, General Director

Chase Hopkins is the general director of Chicago's acclaimed Haymarket Opera Company and the artistic director of Opera Edwardsville. Hopkins was appointed as Haymarket’s first general director in 2020. Recently, Hopkins made his directorial debut at Haymarket Opera Company with Hasse's Marc'Antonio e Cleopatra starring Kangmin Justin Kim and Lauren Decker, which received praise from Heidi Waleson in the Wall Street Journal, saying "Chase Hopkins, the director, wisely had the performers interact naturalistically, and the portrait of their relationship deepened through the evening." Chicago Classical Review praised Hopkins' staging as "skillful and alert to the intimate nature of the piece." Previously, Hopkins served as a creative producer for three innovative cinematic productions of Handel operas that received praise as “an inspiring and relevant modern production” (Operawire) and “a superb document of a Handel opera” (Chicago Tribune). Hopkins served as creative producer for the 2022 production of L’Amant Anonyme by Joseph Bologne, the Chevalier de Saint-Georges, which was praised by the Chicago Tribune for “making history.” The world-premiere recording of this forgotten work was released in collaboration with Chicago’s Grammy Award-winning label, Cedille Records, earning a 5-star review from the BBC Music Magazine and praise for “luxury casting” by Gramophone. Hopkins also served as creative producer for Haymarket’s 2022 production of L’incoronazione di Poppea, which was included in the Chicago Tribune’s “Top Performances of 2022.” Hopkins is currently pursuing executive training at the Harvard Business School.

Jianghai Ho, Development Coordinator

Jianghai Ho is currently serving as the development coordinator of Chicago’s acclaimed Haymarket Opera Company. As a performer he has performed with Haymarket Opera Company, Chicago Symphony, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Chicago Opera Theater, Music of the Baroque and Fargo Moorhead Opera.