COOPERSTOWN

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Esther Nelson, who spent six years at general director/CEO of Glimmerglass Opera, will join the Boston Lyric Opera as general & artistic director, effective Sept. 2.
Chosen after an eighth-month search, she will replace Janice Mancini Del Sesto, who announced last year she would be leaving the lyric opera when her contract expired.
In a statement, Search Committee Co-Chairs David Scudder and Horace H. Irvine II noted praised Nelson’s “distinguished and successful career among many of the country’s opera companies,” and predicted an increase in “not only the quality but also the quantity of opera in Boston.”
Since leaving Glimmerglass in 2002, Nelson has been a management consultant for arts organizations in New York, Virginia, Tennessee, Maine and Germany.
Before joining Glimmerglass, she held high-level executive positions with the Nevada Opera Association; the Virginia Opera Association in Richmond, Triangle Opera Theater in North Carolina; and the New Orleans Opera Association. A native of Germany, she entered the New Orleans’ arts community in the late 1970s at the city’s PBS station, WYES.
She has been an on-site evaluator for the National Endowment for the Arts, a consultant for OPERA America, an evaluation panelist for the state Council of the Arts, and a frequent panelist and speaker.
She and her husband Bernd Ulken, a retired Delta Airline captain, reside in Fly Creek with their two children, Dieter and Clara. Ms. Nelson’s other interests include piano music, painting, writing, medieval history and literature, bicycling and running, and she holds a license as a private pilot. She is active in her family organization dedicated to the preservation of their ancestral castle in Sulzfeld/Baden.


COOPERSTOWN

Dr. Siobhan Hayden, board certified in obstetrics and gynecology, has been appointed chief of obstetrics and gynecology at Bassett Healthcare.
She joined Bassett in July 2002, and will also continue to care for patients at Oneonta Specialty Services and locally. She will plan the “Women’s Health” segment for the incoming medical students.
Dr. Hayden is a SUNY Geneseo graduate, and earned her medical degree from the SUNY Health Science Center at Syracuse. She completed her residency at University Hospital and Medical Center, Stony Brook.

JOINS BOARD: Scott Fickbohm, Burlington Flats, manager of the county’s Soil and Water Conservation District, joined the county Planning Board at its August meeting.

NEW GRAD: Breanne Bond, Richfield Springs, has graduated from SUNY Plattsburgh with a bachelor’s in communication disorders and sciences.

BABY BOY: Joshua Johnson Hridar Moretti was born Monday, Aug. 4, to Jessica Moretti and Jeremiah Hridar, Richfield Springs. He weighed 9 pounds, 14 ounces, and was 21 inches long. His grandparents are Donna and William Hridar, Fly Creek, and Laura and Dan Moretti, Schenevus.

ON DEAN’S LIST: Matthew P. Branigan of Cooperstown, a business-administration (finance) major, has been named to the Marist College Dean’s List for the spring semester.

9-11 MONUMENT: Father John P. Rosson, right, and Dan Viscosi of Cherry Valley Memorials review a monument commemorating the fifth anniversary of 9-11 in front of St. Mary’s “Our Lady of the Lake” Catholic Church on Elm Street. The monument is also dedicated to St. Mary’s parishioner Henry Nicols, the young AIDS sufferer and activist, who died in 2000. The monument will be officially dedicated this coming Sept. 11.

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