Loyola University New Orleans Mourns the Passing of Longtime Loyola Opera Theatre Director David Morelock

Loyola University New Orleans mourns the passing of David Morelock, who led the Loyola Opera Theatre for 15 years. Morelock passed away May 13 at the age of 95.

Morelock served as director of the Loyola Opera Theatre from 1994 to 2009, shepherding dozens of productions and helping to guide emerging opera talent from the academic setting to the professional stage.

“David Morelock is remembered by Loyola singers as being very demanding and brutally honest,” said Carol Rausch, the current director of the Loyola Opera Theatre who succeeded Morelock. “Back then they didn’t want to hear his criticisms. But now, years later, many are in the opera business, and they recognize that he expected them to be not just students, but young professionals. And he wanted them to take those standards with them out into the world.”

A native of Memphis, Tenn., Morelock began his career as a singer and French teacher, with a particular interest in the French operatic repertoire. His first directing assignment was “Les pêcheurs de perles,” an opera in three acts by the French composer Georges Bizet, in 1971 for the New Orleans Opera Association.

He spent nearly four decades with the Association, directing more than 50 productions for the opera stage – more than any other director in the Association’s history at the time of his retirement in 2009. Fittingly, Morelock chose Bizet’s tragic love story, “Carmen,” as his final collaboration with the Association.

Morelock also directed at the Central City Opera, Connecticut Opera and Seattle Opera, and for the Bay View Festival’s summer season, as well as productions in Canada, Israel, Mexico and the Netherlands.

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