"The greatest adventure of my life": Co-Founder & Executive Director Aliana de la Guardia departs Guerilla Opera after 18 years at its helm
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 5, 2025
"The greatest adventure of my life": Co-Founder & Executive Director Aliana de la Guardia departs Guerilla Opera after 18 years at its helm
Boston, MA – Guerilla Opera announces the departure of co-founding artist and longtime Executive Director Aliana de la Guardia, who has been on sabbatical since February 2025. De la Guardia has been appointed Executive Director of the Mosesian Center for the Arts in Watertown, effective July 14, 2025.
Reflecting on her transition, de la Guardia said, “Being a part of Guerilla Opera has been the greatest adventure of my life. This company has challenged and inspired me in countless ways, and I am deeply grateful for the trust and collaboration of our community over the past 19 years. I am excited to join the Mosesian Center for the Arts, a vibrant multi-arts space that supports a wide range of artists and programming, and to help create transformative experiences for our region and beyond.”
Along with Mike Williams and Rudolf Rojahn, de la Guardia founded Guerilla Opera in 2007. As a new music and operatic soprano, her credits include American Lyric Theater, Americas Society/Council of the Americas, Castle of our Skins, Boston Modern Orchestra Project, Dinosaur Annex, Monadnock Music, New Gallery Concert Series, Transient Canvas, Windsor Music. She co-directs Bahué with percussionist Ariel Campos, an emerging duo that celebrates Latin culture through music. She is a PARMA Recordings Artist, contributing to their various labels, and can also be heard on BMOP Sound and independent labels.
De la Guardia will remain involved with Guerilla Opera as a member of the Board of Directors and the ensemble. Yooree Losordo will continue as Interim Executive Director until spring 2026.
Beth Wiemann, president of Guerilla’s Board of Directors, notes: “Aliana has been a director, a performer, a dramaturg, a fundraiser, and just about every role you could imagine as part of a chamber opera company. Everyone in Guerilla Opera’s community thanks her for all of her work for us since the founding of the company, and looks forward to her continued work on the Board while she takes on this important new role at the Mosesian.”
Contact:
Mia Joseph, Marketing Coordinator
mjoseph@guerillaopera.org
WHO WE ARE
Guerilla Opera is a BIPOC and feminist organization, Boston's only experimental chamber opera ensemble, and one of only a few in the world with a mission to exclusively present new works of opera theater. Founded in 2007, the ensemble has accumulated a repertoire of over 40 new works by 30 composers. One of Boston’s most exciting companies, they have garnered a national reputation for innovative contemporary opera and daring performances with Opera News raving that “Guerilla Opera redefines the opera experience.”
The works commissioned by this artist-led ensemble are custom-tailored to their artists, who confront, examine, and question traditional conceptions of what is “operatic” by championing cutting-edge music and immersing audiences in profound experiences. Their vision is to bring new music to new audiences through a unique body of work that ferociously confronts the status quo, eschews antiquated and stereotypical traditions of the art form of opera, and examines stories by and for the people of today through contemporary lenses. They model creative authenticity and diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility (IDEA) in order to inspire and influence emerging generations of artists and creators. (guerillaopera.org)