Webster Music Students Take Top Spots at CRESCENDO! Opera Program

Top three 2026 CRESCENDO! scholarship winners Will Kinsella, from left, Emma Wittenauer and Anna Edwards, with Scott Schoonover, conductor of the Webster Opera Studio January production. 

Webster University voice students participated in CRESCENDO!, a collegiate enrichment program run by Union Avenue Opera.

The program culminated on March 8 with a recital and scholarship presentation on the Union Avenue Opera stage. All three scholarship winners are students in Webster’s Department of Music.

Senior Anna Edwards placed first. Edwards is majoring in Vocal Performance and is a voice student of Jacob Lassetter.

Junior Emma Wittenauer placed second. Wittenauer is majoring in Vocal Performance and is a voice student of Karen Kanakis.

Sophomore Will Kinsella placed third. Kinsella is majoring in Music Education (Choral Music) and is a voice student of Jacob Lassetter.

Webster students Piper Billingsley, Elese Joy Bishop, Holly Connor, Jude Fernandez, Delanie Glover, Ava Hettenhausen, Olivia Knopf and Audrey Sondag also participated in the program.

Now in its 12th year, CRESCENDO! is a free, hands-on, performance-based training program developed to further the education of local artists who are still young in their careers as they prepare to join the St. Louis arts community. 

Department of Music faculty also participated in the program. Adjunct Professors Jonathan Heaney, Nancy Mayo and Zachary Neumann served as vocal coaches.

Jacob Lassetter, Director of Vocal Studies and Opera Studio, was a master class instructor and adjudicator. 

Heaney and Martha J. Hart, former Director of Vocal Studies, taught diction. 

Scott Schoonover, conductor of the Webster Opera Studio January production, is the artistic director of Union Avenue Opera.  

Learn more about Union Avenue Opera and the CRESCENDO! enrichment program.