Ildebrando D'Arcangelo performs Verdi's Requiem on PBS

Ildebrando D'Arcangelo and the Hollywood Bowl

The Los Angeles Philharmonic’s performance of Verdi's Requiem from last summer, celebrating the 200th anniversary of the composer’s birth will be broadcast on PBS's Great Performances, Friday, August 1 at 9 p.m. on PBS (check local listings).

The performance features Italian barihunk Ildebrando D'Arcangelo, a favorite of Los Angeles audiences, where he has performed in Bizet's Carmen and Mozart's Don Giovanni. He'll be joined by soprano Julianna Di Giacomo, mezzo Michelle DeYoung and hunkentenor Vittorio Grigolo, as well as the Los Angeles Master Chorale and the L.A. Philharmonic under the baton of Gustavo Dudamel.

D'Arcangelo is currently at the Salzburg Festival performing the title role in Mozart's Don Giovanni, which he will then perform in Oslo. He returns to the United States in the same role in February 2015 at the newly revived and reorganized San Diego Opera.

Introducing Abdiel Gonzalez

Abdiel Gonzalez

We've decided to pass on our annual feature of posting a calendar of barihunks singing in Handel's Messiah around the world. Let's face it, if there's a Messiah, there's an 80% chance that it features a sexy baritone belting out "Why Do the Nations Rage."

However, as we head down to Los Angeles today for Mozart's Magic Flute at the L.A. Opera, we noticed that Puerto Rican baritone Abdiel González is performing the Messiah tonight and next Sunday with the Los Angeles Master Chorale at Disney Hall. Tickets for his two performances of the Messiah are available online.

We had heard about him previously from singers who attended the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, but somehow never got around to posting him. He was brought to attention a second time last March when he was performing in Stravinsky's Renard under Esa-Pekka Salonen with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. 

He has performed Mercutio in Gounod's Roméo et Julliette, Shrike in the West Coast Premiere of Lowell Liebermann's Miss Lonelyhearts, Athanaël in Massenet's Thaïs, Enrico in Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor, and a number of zarzuelas, including the title role in Luis Alonso, Paquiro in Goyescas and Don Pedro in El Barberillo de Lavapies.

On the concert stage he has perfomed as a soloist in Handel's Messiah, Orff's Carmina Burana, Fauré's Requiem, Stravinsky's Pulcinella, Haydn's Creation, Mozart's Requiem and Mass in C Minor, and others.

He was a first place winner in both the San Diego District of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and the Opera 100 Competition.