General Director & CEO

Robert M. Heuer is the General Director of Florida Grand Opera (FGO). His opera management career began in Detroit as the Founding Managing Director of Michigan Opera Theatre and he has been with Florida Grand Opera for the past twenty-eight seasons. He joined Florida Grand Opera as Director of Production in 1979, became Assistant General Director in 1983 and became General Director in 1985. As General Director, Mr. Heuer led the effort to merge the Greater Miami Opera and The Opera Guild Inc. of Ft. Lauderdale, creating Florida Grand Opera in June 1994.

During Mr. Heuer’s seasons as General Director and CEO, FGO has mounted 90 main-stage productions, including 25 operas never previously seen in South Florida. Among these productions are Richard Strauss’ Salome and Ariadne auf Naxos; Britten’s The Turn of the Screw; Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea; Handel’s Julius Caesar; Janacek’s Kátya Kabanová; Marc Blitzstein’s Regina; Bellini’s La sonnambula; and the American premieres of Rossini’s Bianca e Falliero and Ede Donáth’s Szulamit, and the world premieres of Robert Ward’s Minutes till Midnight and David Carlson’s Anna Karenina.

Under Mr. Heuer’s leadership, the Company has developed one of the most important young artist programs in the country with the purpose of providing a bridge for singers from the educational to the professional arena. The Company’s Young Artist Studio is one of the most prestigious in the country, receiving over 700 applications from singers all over the world, seeking the eight coveted positions in the program.

Robert M. Heuer was at the forefront of the community effort to build The Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts of Miami-Dade County in downtown Miami. In addition, Mr. Heuer spearheaded the purchase of a 43,000 square foot site immediately across the street from the Ziff Ballet Opera House, which will accommodate the James Byrd Anderson, Jr. Opera Center. The Anderson Opera Center will house the Company’s rehearsal studios, production office and studios, costume shop, artist apartments, administrative offices, and a 485-seat theater.

Mr. Heuer has served as a board member and Vice-Chairman of OPERA America. Mr. Heuer has also served both as Chairman and panel member for the Opera/Music Theatre Challenge Grant Program and Opera/Music Theatre Grants Panel of the National Endowment for the Arts, and as a member of the State of Florida Music Grants Review Panel. In 1988, the Florida Commissioner of Education appointed him to the Florida Alliance for Arts Education, which is an affiliate of the National Education Program at the Kennedy Center. In 1990, the Republic of Austria awarded him the Grand Decoration of Honor in recognition of his commitment to producing the operas of Mozart. In 2001, he was recognized with the Narot Humanitarian Award presented by Temple Israel of Greater Miami. In 2007, he was awarded the Arts Management Excellence Award by the Arts and Business Council for his outstanding achievement in the management of a local arts organization.

  Music Director

Stewart Robertson has served, for the past ten seasons, as Music Director of Florida Grand Opera conducting twenty-eight productions, encompassing more than one hundred performances. He has brought to his position an active involvement with new music combined with his great love of the works by Mozart, Britten, Puccini, and Strauss. In June 2005, Mo. Robertson made his debut with Opera Omaha and now serves as its Artistic Director and Principal Conductor. He also serves as Music Director of the Atlantic Classical Orchestra.

A native of Glasgow, Scotland, Maestro Robertson’s notable engagements have included numerous world premieres: Orpheus Descending for the Lyric Opera of Chicago, The Midnight Angel for the Opera Theatre of St. Louis and Glimmerglass Opera, Dreamkeepers for Utah Opera, Peace for the Scottish Opera, Operatic Trilogy, Central Park for Glimmerglass Opera (televised on the PBS series Great Performances), and Anna Karenina for Florida Grand Opera.

Internationally, Mo. Robertson has conducted with numerous orchestras including the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Danish Radio Orchestra, Philharmonia Hungarica, Vienna Tonkunstler Orchestra, Swiss-Italian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Scottish National and BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestras, and the Orchestra of Maastricht.

Mo. Robertson is a graduate of the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Bristol University. He studied piano in London with Dennis Mathews, and conducted with Otmar Suitner at the Salzburg Mozarteum and Professor Hans Swarowsky at the Vienna Academy, where he graduated with highest distinction. Mo. Robertson first attracted international attention as a second prize winner in the 1977 Austrian Radio Conductors Competition at the Salzburg Music Festival. He became the youngest conductor to lead a performance at the Cologne Opera since the debut of Herbert von Karajan. At age twenty-six, he moved to Switzerland as Music Director of the Zurich Ballet. Two years later, he was appointed Music Director and Principal Conductor of the Scottish Opera Touring Company.

Maestro Robertson’s 2005 recording of Sir Richard Rodney Bennett’s The Mines of Sulphur was released to great critical acclaim, culminating in a prestigious Grammy Award nomination for best opera recording. Mo. Robertson’s recording with the Utah Symphony of the symphonic works of David Carlson was also released on New World Records, and he has conducted New York City Opera productions that were nationally televised on Live from Lincoln Center. In addition to being an active pianist, Mo. Robertson is a broadcast writer and lecturer on music who has been seen and heard on National Public Radio, Public Broadcasting System, BBC, and Swiss-Italian radio and television.