Maestro Fecteau works as a vocal coach, pianist, conductor and arranger, specializing in the Italian operatic repertoire and role-preparation for singers at all professional levels. He has prepared singers for engagements at companies including the Met, Chicago Lyric and Florida Grand, and has been a pianist/coach with Dicapo Opera, Bronx Opera and Encompass Opera.
Conducting engagements have taken him to Opera Illinois, Opera Theatre of Philadelphia, Harrisburg Opera, South Florida Opera Company, Opera in the Heights, and a tour of the Czech Republic. Local assignments include Bronx Opera, NYMVAE, Amore Opera and Opera Company of Brooklyn, as well as three seasons as Associate Music Director of the venerated Amato Opera Company. He counts over 50 operas in his repertoire, including several world and regional premieres. In 2000 he founded dell’arte Opera Ensemble, dedicated to providing quality experiences for young singers. dell’arte has produced over 35 workshop presentations of mainly standard repertoire, and staged productions of Ariadne auf Naxos, Der Rosenkavalier, I Capuletti e i Montecchi, La clemenza di Tito, Manon, Don Giovanni, La bohème, Anna Bolena, Le nozze di Figaro, Il trittico, Lucia di Lamermoor, Königskinder, Die Zauberflöte, Carmen and Dialogues des Carmélites.
Maestro Fecteau’s special interest is the re-examination of orchestral and operatic works for their possibilities in chamber settings, making these works accessible to companies with modest resources. He was commissioned by Skylight Opera Theatre (Milwaukee, WI) to create a new version of Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette, adapting the original music and Shakespeare’s text and story line into one another in a compelling two-act format which the Milwaukee Sentinel called “a miracle.” Other arranging projects have included chamber music reductions of Ariadne auf Naxos, La clemenza di Tito, Anna Bolena and Königskinder for dell’arte Opera Ensemble and I Capuleti e i Montecchi for Corleone Opera’s tour of the Czech Republic. In the 2011-12 season, Mr. Fecteau’s arrangements of Die Zauberflöte, Ariadne auf Naxos and Carmen have been performed at West Edge Berkeley Opera in San Francisco, St. Louis Winter Theatre, Lyric Opera of Virginia and by the California Opera Association.
He has also created arrangements for “Fünf Lieder” by Alma Mahler, and numerous contemporary songs, as well as for the album “Sleep is Behind the Door” by soprano Courtenay Budd. Notable recital appearances at the piano include a salon-style program with Sherrill Milnes for Orlando Opera, the world premiere of Valerie Saalbach’s song cycle “Catarina to Camoens” at the 2003 International Festival of Women Composers (FL), and a variety of programs with his wife, Karen Rich in Innsbruck, Austria, at the Donnell Library Center and Trios Concert Series in midtown Manhattan.