Houston Grand Opera Wins 2026 GRAMMY Award for Intelligence
Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer’s company-commissioned 2023 world premiere opera recognized with GRAMMY Award for Best Opera Recording
Third GRAMMY in HGO history goes to first release from the new Houston Grand Opera label, created with London Symphony Orchestra’s label LSO Live
Houston Grand Opera (HGO) announced the company has won the GRAMMY Award for Best Opera Recording for the HGO-commissioned opera Intelligence, created by composer Jake Heggie and librettist Gene Scheer in collaboration with director and choreographer Jawole Willa Jo Zollar.
Recorded live during the opera’s world premiere run at the Wortham Theater Center in fall 2023 and released in August 2025, Intelligence preserves a masterful performance from a celebrated cast and the HGO Orchestra led by Maestro Kwamé Ryan. The recording represents the first release from the new Houston Grand Opera label, created in partnership with the London Symphony Orchestra’s renowned label LSO Live as part of a distribution agreement announced in spring 2025.
“We’re beaming with pride to see our city celebrated on the world stage today,” says HGO General Director and CEO Khori Dastoor. “This GRAMMY win is an affirmation of what Houston Grand Opera stands for—bold creativity, artistic excellence, and the power of American opera. It is a joy to see Jake Heggie, Gene Scheer, and Jawole Willa Jo Zollar’s extraordinary opera recognized at the highest level. This award belongs to our brilliant cast, our virtuosic orchestra, Maestro Kwamé Ryan, and every artist and collaborator who brought this remarkable story to life. Intelligence was the very first release on our new label, established to share American opera with international audiences. There is much more to come.”
Both the 2023 production and its subsequent recording are led by soprano Janai Brugger and mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton as the Civil War-era story’s pair of unlikely partner spies: Mary Jane Bowser, born into slavery in the household of a prominent Confederate family, the Van Lews, and Elizabeth Van Lew. They are joined by mezzo-soprano J’Nai Bridges as Lucinda, baritone Michael Mayes as Travis Briggs, soprano Caitlin Lynch as Callie Van Lew, bass-baritone Nicholas Newton as Henry, and tenor Joshua Blue as Wilson. This world-premiere mounting was produced in collaboration with the acclaimed dance ensemble Urban Bush Women.
Today’s GRAMMY win is the third in HGO history. In 1978, the company won in the Best Opera Recording category for the Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess, and in 1989, it won Best Contemporary Composition for company-commissioned world premiere Nixon in China, composed by John Adams with a libretto by Alice Goodman. The company was also nominated for Scott Joplin’s Treemonisha in 1977.
HGO’s Intelligence album is available in both physical and digital formats, with streaming offered via HGO’s partner platform, Apple Music Classical—Apple Music’s dedicated app for classical music fans—as well as major platforms including Amazon Music and Spotify.
Several more albums are already planned for release by the Houston Grand Opera label, including Daniel Catán and Marcela Fuentes-Berain’s HGO-commissioned opera Florencia en el Amazonas (May 2026), the first-ever recording of Missy Mazzoli and Royce Vavrek’s Breaking the Waves (August 2026), and Javier Martínez and Leonard Foglia’s HGO-commissioned mariachi opera El Milagro del Recuerdo (to be announced).
Photo courtesy of Houston Grand Opera