Welcome AVA’s new Dean of Students and Artistic Administrator, Dr. Joshua Miller!

January 6, 2022

AVA is thrilled to welcome Dr. Josh Miller to the AVA community, as our beloved Val Starr will be retiring next month as the Dean of Students. Ms. Starr will continue to be AVA’s costume designer. Please join us in welcoming him!

ABOUT DR: MILLER:

A stage director and designer noted for his “gorgeously constructed stage pictures,” Josh Miller’s most recent directing credits include Angelica/ Gianni Schicchi at St. Petersburg Opera, Albert Herring for Chicago Summer Opera and Turn of the Screw with Texas State Opera Theatre. He is the winner of the 2021 American Prize in Opera Directing (the Charles Nelson Reilly Prize) as well as a winner of the National Opera Association’s opera production competition. He has served on the directing staff of The Glimmerglass Festival, Palm Beach Opera, Opera San Antonio, Virginia Opera, Fort Worth Opera, Wolf Trap Opera and Austin Opera. In 2018, Dr. Miller directed Leonard Bernstein’s MASS as a part of the Bernstein Centennial Celebration with the Austin Symphony, Ballet Austin, the African Children’s Chorus and Consiprare. A staunch advocate for the development of new works that celebrate the stories of diverse audiences and artists, Miller produced Franklin Piland’s Rose Made Man for the 2015 Cohen New Works Festival. His production of Jake Heggie’s Three Decembers was chosen as a winner of Opera America’s Robert L.B. Tobin Director-Designer Showcase.