A second-year Butler Studio artist from Garni, Armenia, Navasard Hakobyan won first place at HGO’s 2022 Eleanor McCollum Competition Concert of Arias Arias and is a 2024 national semifinalist in the Metropolitan Opera’s Laffont Competition. During HGO’s 2023-24 season, he performs as Sharpless in alternate cast performances in Madame Butterfly. During the 2022-23 season at HGO, he performed the roles of Baron Douphol in La traviata, Antonio in The Marriage of Figaro, and Second Nazarene in Salome. He was a member of the young artist program of the National Academic Theatre of Opera and Ballet in Yerevan, Armenia from 2018-23. His roles there included Silvio in Pagliacci, Giorgio Germont in La traviata, and Belcore in a new production of The Elixir of Love. He has won numerous international competitions, including first prize in the Premiere Opera Foundation International Vocal Competition, third prize in the José Carreras Grand Prix in Moscow, Russia, first prize in the Butler Opera International Voice Competition in Austin, and third prize and the Don Plácido Domingo Ferrer Prize of Zarzuela at Operalia in Capetown, South Africa. Hakobyan received his master’s degree at Komitas State Conservatory of Yerevan. He was named the 2019 winner of the President of the Republic of Armenia Youth Prize. This past summer, he performed the role of Marcello in La bohème at Music Academy of the West.