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Description: "I worked as an intern for the Dramaturgie department in general. This meant that anyone within the department could call on me to do some work for them at anytime. The department is set up for interns; they generally have 2-4 interns at any given time during the season. Some of the work is more menial than other parts. Mostly I did a lot of "middle intensity" work, which was really helpful to me in improving my German. I wrote up the biographies for program booklets, which invloved getting used to working with agencies and devloping a certain kind of condensed writing style in German. I did some editing of texts that the house was publishing, in both German and English. I would do basic research on topics, providing the dramaturgs with sources to scour. Every intern gets about one larger project: I did the first round of research for the a production in the next season of Henze's "Elegie für junge Liebende".

Comments: "My internship gave me the opportunity to work in an enviroment that was finally musically intense enough. It was absolutely crucial to my Stanford education in insifying the background I received at the home campus. It reassured me that I was professionally on the right track. /.../ One of my goals coming to Berlin was to immerse myself in the music of the city. This internship helped me to realize this goal: during my time at the Staatsoper I learned about the past present and some of the future of opera in Berlin while attending up to 5 concerts a week. The repertoire I knew expanded and I got a sense for the way in which Germand and European arts management was different from American. /.../ The connections that Stanford has in Berlin enabled me to play in an orchestra, which is my equivalent of joining a Sportverein. I maintained my private violin lesson teacher from the beginning of the year. He was absolutely crucial to my immersion in the Berlin music world".

For further information, please write to abohlman@stanfordalumni.org