Tony Kostecki, General Director

Tony Kostecki was appointed General Director of Seagle Music Colony in January of 2008.  Previous to this appointment, Tony held the position of General Manager of the Colony from 2006-2007.  Before moving into management, he was on the faculty of Seagle Music Colony as a coach/accompanist and conductor for ten years. 

Between 2002 and 2007, Tony was Director of Education at Fort Worth Opera and also Director of the Fort Worth Opera Studio.  During his tenure with Fort Worth Opera, Tony oversaw the creation of the Fort Worth Opera Studio Young Artists Program and all outreach aspects of Fort Worth Opera.  From 2002-2007 he was also the Fort Worth Opera Chorus Master and writer of many of the supertitle translations for Fort Worth Opera.

As a coach/accompanist, Tony worked for Fort Worth Opera, Shreveport Opera, Florida Grand Opera, Utah Opera, Kansas City Lyric Opera Express and Kansas City Civic Opera.  A native of Topeka, Kansas, he received his undergraduate degree in Music from Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas and his Master of Music Degree in Piano Accompanying and Organ Performance from the University of Kansas in Lawrence.

Darren K. Woods, Artistic Director 

Darren K. Woods was appointed General Director of the Seagle Music Colony in the summer of 1996. Since that time, the Colony has experienced incredible growth in almost every aspect including budget, production quality, facilities and faculty/staff.  The caliber of young artists at the Colony continues to rival any other program in the world with recent debuts of our artists at the Metropolitan Opera, New York City Opera, Santa Fe Opera and even on Broadway.  Because of this extensive growth and the need for Seagle Music Colony to have a full-time presence in Schroon Lake, Darren has transitioned to Artistic Director as of January 2008.  

Darren is also General Director of the Fort Worth Opera, where he has been since 2001. Under his leadership, the Fort Worth Opera has increased subscription and donor bases and also moved from a full season to a festival format company. Expanding on Mr. Woods’ dedication to young artists, the Fort Worth Opera Studio was founded during the 2002-2003 season with four members who participate in main stage productions, perform for more than 50,000 children each year and receive coaching and lessons from resident and guest artists.  Prior to his appointment in Fort Worth, he was the General Director of the Shreveport Opera in Louisiana. While in Shreveport, Mr. Woods founded Shreveport Opera Express, or SOX, a touring, arts in education program that involved school children working with professional artists in the schools.

Mr. Woods is a frequent vocal competition judge. Over the past few years, he has served as a panel judge for the Richard Tucker Foundation, the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, the Lieber Competition, the Denver Opera Guild Competition, the Dallas Opera Guild Competition and the Marguerite McCammon Competition.

He has been a guest grant panelist for the State of Louisiana (Music, Opera and Theater), the National Endowment for the Arts, the State of Nevada and the Fort Worth Arts Council.

Mr. Woods performed as a professional operatic tenor for twenty years prior to beginning his management positions in such venues as: The New York City Opera, Carnegie Hall, the Washington Opera, L’Opera Madrid, Opera Trieste, Seattle Opera, the Dallas Opera, Baltimore Opera, the Santa Fe Opera and many others.