Liz Cass

Producer and Socialite
Liz is a producer, educator, arts leader, and active operatic performer based in Austin, Texas. She is the founder and executive producer of the award-winning opera company LOLA (Local Opera Local Artists), and executive director of the Armstrong Community Music School. A passionate advocate for the arts, Liz is president of the Seagle Festival Alumni Association, secretary of Austin Classical Guitar, and a member of the community advisory board of KMFA 89.5, Austin’s classical music radio station.

Equally at home in opera and beyond, Liz has appeared in the roles of Mrs. Lowe and Dora, the Bartender in Kevin Puts’ The Manchurian Candidate with Austin Opera, and as soloist in Brahms’ Alto Rhapsody with Chorus Austin. She has presented a program of French art songs for Songs in the Skyspace, the monthly music series of Landmarks at the University of Texas, and was featured in Austin Chamber Music Center’s Blue Bash annual fundraising gala. In Guatemala, she appeared as a soloist in Handel’s Messiah at Centro Cultural Miguel Ángel Asturias in Guatemala City and at Casa Santo Domingo in Antigua.

Having appeared in several notable world premiere performances, Liz continually champions new vocal works. In 2019, she premiered the mezzo role in Graham Reynolds’ English and Spanish cross-border opera Pancho Villa From a Safe Distance, for which she garnered the Best Singer award from the Austin Critics Table. She also performed Pancho Villa at the PuSh Festival in Vancouver and the PROTOTYPE Festival in New York City. Collaborating with composer Peter Stopschinski and playwright Terry Galloway, LOLA commissioned the opera Lardo Weeping in 2018, based on Galloway’s one-woman play. Fully staged in August 2022, Liz’s tour de force performance as Dinah LeFarge was nominated for the 2021-22 B. Iden Payne Outstanding Lead Performance award, while Lardo Weeping was nominated for an additional twelve awards. Also in 2022, Liz premiered Donald Grantham’s song cycle Love Songs Sweet and Sour, with pianist Carla McElhaney.

Liz began her vocal studies with Dr. Rebecca Folsom. She is a graduate of the University of Missouri at Kansas City Conservatory of Music, where she received her degree in Vocal Performance with renowned professor Inci Bashar.

Graham Yates

Piano
Hailing from Canada’s west coast, pianist Graham Yates has been performing collaboratively in central Texas since 2014. He owns Timbral Music Studios in Round Rock, TX where he teaches private piano lessons. He gigs with Austin’s top classical organizations such as LOLA, Austin Opera, One Ounce Opera, Conspirare, and Austin Chamber Music Center. While with One Ounce Opera, he was nominated for the B. Iden Payne “Outstanding Music Director” award. He was the keyboardist and music director for Penfold Theatre’s recent production of Ordinary Days. He co-founded CTC Music Publishing which works to promote the creation and production of new music by central Texas composers. CTC’s most recent showcase, Curses, presented irreverent musical settings of poems commissioned from Typewriter Rodeo, and a second collaboration is in production. As a composer, Graham was Inversion Ensemble’s Sandra Fivecoat Memorial Composition Contest winner in 2021. Recent commissions include vocal works for Panoramic Voices and Tetractys New Music.

Chuck Fischer

Drums
Chuck Fischer is a veteran member of the Texas music community, cutting his teeth with San Antonio’s seminal alt-rock band the Robertsons at the age of 17. Upon moving to Austin and graduating from the University of Texas School of Music, he immediately began a long tenure as the main percussionist for Austin Musical Theatre under the baton of New York-based conductor and composer Fred Barton. He has been a member of many stalwart Austin-based bands such as cabaret-influenced Mistress Stephanie and Her Melodic Cat, funk masters Foot Patrol, the swinging Mr. Fabulous and Casino Royale, and prog rockers The Invincible Czars. Chuck is a sought-after freelance musician, regularly appearing as a local hire for jazz, rock, country, classical, and Broadway Across America touring productions.

Chuck is also an accomplished music educator, having taught in Eanes ISD for 26 years as an assistant band director, as well as being a versatile performing musician. Many of his students have themselves gone on to their own successful music careers studying at such prestigious schools as the Juilliard Conservatory, the Manhattan School of Music, Eastman Conservatory, the University of North Texas, and the Butler School of Music at the University of Texas at Austin. Most recently, one of his former students won a position as section percussionist with the Boston Symphony. Most recently, the West Ridge Middle School Jazz Band performed as the 2025 Invited Middle School Jazz Band at the Texas Music Educator’s Association Convention this past February in San Antonio, TX.

Among the recordings on which Chuck Fischer appears are “Beluga” by the Robertsons (1992), “Cult of Color: Call to Color” by Graham Reynolds (2008), “Now Would be a Good Time” by Peter Stopschinski (2013) “the music of Reynolds / Stopschinski Vol 1.” by the Invincible Czars (2014), “Things I Should Have Done Better” by Zirque Bois D’arc (2015) and “the Logical Path” by Sam Arnold (2024). He also appears on various music soundtracks for theater and film.

Chuck is a member of the Sabian Cymbals and Premier USA Percussion roster of sponsored artists. He is a member of the American Federation of Musicians, the Texas Music Educators Association, the Texas Bandmasters Association, the Texas Music Adjudicator’s Association, and is a voting member of the Recording Academy (Grammy Awards).

Noel Gaulin

Wildman
Noel is a four-time winner of Best Actor from the Austin Critics Table and Austin Revolution Film Festival. Noel will soon be on a national tour of Theatre Heroes’ one-man show adaptation of Kenneth Grahame’s Wind in the Willows. Noel is also known to thousands of young people across the greater Austin area as “Curly Fries” and is revered as an educator for his commitment to kindness, community engagement, and radical joy.

Austin Siebert

Magnate
Praised for his vibrant coloratura, warmth of tone, and versatility; Austin Siebert brings a kinetic energy to both operatic stages and concert halls. He is excited to return to LOLA after his debut as the Baritone in Undine Speaks. Baritone Austin Siebert recently debuted with the Indianapolis Opera as Angelotti in Tosca. Siebert also performed the bass soloist roles with Chorus Austin in Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis, Mozart’s Vespers, and Handel’s Messiah.

While performing as Austin Opera’s resident young artist, he covered Lt. Audebert in Kevin Puts’ Silent Night and Marcello in La Bohéme. In addition to these covers, he sang the roles of Araldo in Otello, Customs House Officer in La Bohéme, and German Solider 1 in Silent Night. Siebert was featured as the Bass soloist for Haydn’s Stabat Mater with Chorus Austin and Austin Symphony Orchestra’s Messiah. Other performances include Mr. Gobineau (The Medium) and Marco (Gianni Schicchi) with Merola Opera Program, Belcore with Dallas Opera Outreach’s version of L’elisir d’amore, and Mustafá in Seagle Music Colony’s L’Italiana in Algeri. While at the University of North Texas, Siebert performed the title role in Stephen Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd and played the villains in Les Contes d’Hoffmann. Siebert holds a Masters Degree in Music from the University of North Texas and a B.A. in Music from Northwestern University.

Julia Taylor

Maid
Soprano, Julia Taylor, has performed as a soloist with the Austin Symphony Orchestra in Bruckner's Te deumand Handel's Messiah, with Chorus Austin in Haydn's Lord Nelson Mass, Mozart's Exultate Jubilate and Vespers, and with the Austin Chamber Music Festival in Philip Glass' Songs of Longing. Operatic roles include Curley's Wife in Floyd's Of Mice and Men and Frasquita in Bizet's Carmen with Austin Opera, Mimi in LOLA Opera's production of La femme boheme and the Queen of the Night in the University of Texas Butler Opera Center's Die Zauberfloete.  She has been recognized as “Best Singer” by the Austin Critics’ Table Awards for the roles of Mimì in La femme bohème and Beatrice in Jake Heggie’s Three Decembers.

Additional accolades include being a winner of the Mid-Atlantic Regional NATS Competition, a Regional Finalist in the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions twice, and a Finalist in the Dallas Opera Competition. Past notable engagements include a performance of Ginastera's String Quartet No. 3 with the Miro Quartet, Villa-Lobos' Bachianas Brasileiras with guitarist John McLellan and the Williamson County Guitar Society, a solo recital with the Puccini Foundation and performances of Handel's Messiah in Guatemala City and Antigua, Guatemala. Her next upcoming performance will be a recital with pianist, Nyle Matsuaka, as part of the Sarofim School of Fine Arts Guest Artist Series at Southwestern University on March 25th. Dr. Taylor is currently a part-time Assistant Professor of Voice at Southwestern University's Sarofim School of Fine Arts in Georgetown, Texas.