George Humphreys sings lead drag role in Donizetti's Viva la Diva

George Humphreys' shirtless curtain call in Glass' The Trial

British barihunk George Humphreys just wrapped up a successful run in Carl Maria von Weber's Oberon at the Salzburger Landestheater, where is a member of the ensemble.

He will next appear with the company in Donizetti's comedy Viva la Diva, whose original title was the mouthful Le convenienze e le inconvenienze teatrali (Conventions and Inconveniences of the Stage). Performances start on February 8 and run through April 2.

Donizetti wrote the lead role of La Diva (aka Agata) for a baritone, which opens up another level of comedy as the singer performs in drag. As the drama unfolds and the jealousies come to a head, it is up to La Diva  to rescue an evening at a theater company trying to mount an opera. Donizetti chose a subject that allowed him to compose both virtuosic and parodistic music.

The opera became a great success after its 1827 world premiere in Naples and 1831 performances in Milan, but was soon forgotten. Regular performances did not resume until 1963. Recent performance include a 2015 production at the Volksoper Wien and one at the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in 2017. The National Theatre Prague is currently staging the opera with Roman Hoza in the title role.

The Salzburger Landestheater produces its own version of the opera with a new translation by Andreas Fladvad-Geier, which revives the tradition of transferring the opera’s plot into a local setting to make the parody of the opera world even easier to recognize and appreciate for audiences.

Andreas Bauer Kanabas becomes Lucrezia Borgia's third husband

Andreas Bauer Kanabas as Méphisto and Osmin

Andreas Bauer Kanabas, who took the opera world by storm with his sexy portrayal of Méphisto in Gounods' Faust in Riga, will be starring as Alfonso d'Este, the Duke of Ferrara in Donizetti's Lucrezia Borgia.

The performances at the Theatre du Capitole in Toulose runs from January 24-February 3 and the title role will be sung by the thrilling soprano Annick Massis. The remainder of the cast includes fellow bass-barihunk Jérémie Brocard as Don Apostolo, Eléonore Pancrazi as Orsini, Mert Süngü as Gennaro, Thomas Bettinger, Galeano Salas, François Pardailhé, Rupert Grœssinger and Julien Véronèse.

Alfonso I d'Este, Duke of Ferrara, was Lucrezia Borgia's third husband and the marriage was arranged by Pope Alexander VI in early 1502.  She had eight children during this marriage and was considered a respectable and accomplished Renaissance duchess, effectively rising above her previous reputation as a unfaithful wife and murderess,  and surviving the fall of the Borgias following her father's death.

Bass-barihunk Jérémie Brocard

After his run in Lucrezia Borgia, he will sing Sarastro in Mozart's The Magic Flute in Australia and New Zealand, Escamillo at the Frankfurt Opera, the title role in Bartók's Bluebeard's Castle, and then a reprisal of Méphisto a the Latvian Opera in Riga.

He also returns to the Deutsche Oper Berlin in 2019 as King Heinrich in Wagner's Lohengrin, the role of his debuts at both the Vienna Staatsoper and the New National Theatre in Tokyo.  Berlin sees him again in 2020, as Zaccaria in Verdi's Nabucco. He will also perform Sarastro in Mozart's The Magic Flute at Covent Garden.


He recently add "Kanabas" to his name after singing professionally as Andreas Bauer his entire career. He made the change to honor his Bohemian ancestors on my mother’s side of the family, who experienced the perils of Nationalism despite living peacefully in a multi-cultural area. They were supporters of theatre and the arts in Ceska Lipa and Prague, and later in Weimar and Erfurt, Germany and had a profound impact on the singer. Two of his most roles in his repertoire are Vodnik in Czech and Bluebeard in Hungarian.

Alternating barihunks in La Favorite at Liceu

Mattia Olivieri as Alphhonse XI (Photo © Bofill)

Barihunks Markus Werba and Mattia Olivieri are alternating the role of Alphonse XI in the original French language version of Donizetti's La Favorite at the Liceu Opera House in Barcelona. The French version differs in various melodic parts than the more commonly performed Italian version La Favorita, and also has a revised finale by the composer.  

Mattia Olivieri, Stephen Costello and Eve-Maud Hubeaux, trio from La Favorite:

Mattia Olivieri performs the revised ending of La Favorite:

 La Favorite, which premiered at the Académie Royale de Musique in Paris on December 2, 1840 is one of the most important works in Donizetti’s French period. The opera is the second work in the genre composed after Les Martyrs and before Dom Sébastien, roi de Portugal, and was a huge success with Paris audiences. 

Markus Werba as Alphhonse XI (Photo © Bofill)

The story revolves around a love triangle involving the King of Castile, Alfonso XI, his mistress ('the favorite') Leonora, and her lover Fernando. The story unfolds against the background of the Moorish invasions of Spain and power struggles between church and state.

You can click HERE to watch Mattia Olivieri performing the same role at the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in April of this year on OperaVision.

Werba performs the role on July 22 and Olivieri on July 24. Tickets are available online.

Morgan Pearse joins husband and wife team for Elixir of Love

Morgan Pearse

Australian barihunk Morgan Pearse will be joining the New Zealand husband and wife team of Pene Pati and Amina Adris as Belcore in a run of Donizetti's The Elixir of Love. The all-Antipodes cast will perform the opera in Auckland on May 31, June 2, 7 and 9, and in Wellington on June 23, 26, 28 and 30. This will be Pearse's first time ever singing in a Donizetti opera.

Pearse recently made his solo Wigmore Hall recital, where he sang Six Songs by Johannes Brahms, Richard Strauss' Vier Lieder, Opus 27 and Samuel Barber's settings of James Joyce's poetry.

Pene Pati has become a best-selling classical music artist as part of the group Sol3 Mio. He met his wife while singing across the globe at San Francisco's prestigious Merola Opera Program. He has made Nemorino's aria "Una furtiva lagrima" a bit of a calling card.

Morgan Pearse sings the serenade from Handel's "Aci, Galatea e Polifemo":

Pearse's character of Belcore is a cocky Army sergeant, who takes an immediate liking to Adina. He puts his charms into high gear and quickly asks Adina if she’ll marry him, only to have the wedding delayed when military service beckons.

Donizetti wrote some 70 operas during his career, ranging from comedies like Elixir to tragedies, including the famous "Tudor Trilogy" of Anna Bolena, Maria Stuarda and Roberto Devereux.  In 1832, Donizetti set to work with librettist Felice Romani on his latest commission based on an existing French text about a love potion, Le philtre (The Potion) by Eugène Scribe for this new opera’s libretto. Le philtre had already been set to music by Daniel-François-Esprit Auber, but multiple uses of the same text was common at the time.

The story of the opera reflects Donizetti's own life, in that the composer’s military service was bought by a rich woman, like Nemorino, so that he did not have to serve in the army.

Watch Mattia Olivieri in La Favorite

Mattia Olivieri as Alphonse XI (right)

You can watch Italian barihunk Mattia Olivieri as Alphonse XI in Donizetti's La Favorite from the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, which was taped earlier this year. Click HERE to watch it on OperaVision. The performance is of the French version rather than the more commonly performed Italian version La Favorita, which differs in various melodic parts and has a revised finale.

La Favorite, which premiered at the Académie Royale de Musique in Paris on December 2, 1840 is one of the most important works in Donizetti’s French period. The opera is the second work in the genre composed after Les Martyrs and before Dom Sébastien, roi de Portugal, and was a huge success with Paris audiences. 

The story revolves around a love triangle involving the King of Castile, Alfonso XI, his mistress ('the favorite') Leonora, and her lover Fernando. The story unfolds against the background of the Moorish invasions of Spain and power struggles between church and state.

Olivieri will return to the role in July, when he alternates the role with fellow barihunk Markus Werba at the Liceu Opera House in Barcelona. Additional information is available online.

Introducing Bass-barihunk Carlo Checchi; Belcore at Festspiele Immling

Carlo Checchi

Italian bass-barihunk Carlo Checchi is new to our site and was brought to our attention by a reader, Checchi is performing Belcore in Donizetti's L'elisir d'amore through August 13th at the Festspiele Immling in Germany. The cast also includes Sergio Foresti (who we should also feature) as Dulcamara, Elisa Cenni as Adina, Chuanliang Wang as Nemorino and Anastasia Churakova as Gianetta. Tickets and additional information is available online.

Cecchi, who also has a degree in computer engineering, studied voice at l'Istituto Musicale Pareggiato "Vittadini" di Pavia. He was the winner of the VI Concorso ArteInCanto Competition.

Carlo Checchi

He made his debut at the Teatro Carlo Felice in Genoa as Apollo in Mozart's Apollo and Hyacinth. His past roles include Figaro in Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia at the Teatro Valle in Rome, as well as in opera houses in Lucca, Pisa and Livorno; Papageno in Mozart's Die Zauberflote at the Royal Opera House in Muscat, Oman; and, Count Almaviva in Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro at the National Theatre of Opera and Ballet in Tirana.

Peter Brathwaite discusses career on BBC

 

Peter Brathwaite (Photo: Maria Scard)

The English Touring Opera wraps up their Spring season today, which included barihunks Nicholas Lester, Grant Doyle, Jan Capiński and Peter Brathwaite. The company performed Donizetti's
The Wild Man of the West Indies (Il furioso all'isola di San Domingo) and his The Siege of Calais, as well as Puccini's La bohème.

Peter Brathwaite, who has been a regular on this site and appeared in two of our charity calendars, was a guest on Chris Mann's BBC show to discuss the English Touring Opera shows, as well as his career. You can listen to the interview HERE, which begins at the 1:48:30 mark. 

Simon Wallfisch

The English Touring Opera's Fall season opens on October 1st and will feature Debussy's Pelléas et Mélisande, Massenet's Werther and Offenbach's The Tales of Hoffmann. A number of barihunks will be featured in the new season, including Jonathan McGovern as Pelleas and Simon Wallfisch (aka The Singing Cellist) as Albert in Werther. Additional information about the upcoming season is available online.
 

Concert to feature hunkentenor Maxim Mironov and barihunk Vittorio Prato

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Vittorio Prato and Maxim Mironov

Two of the sexiest men in opera are collaborating for "D'amor sospiro" (I breathe for love) on November 27th, at the Grand Hall in St.Petersburg. Hunkentenor Maxim Mironov and barihunk Vittorio Prato will be joined by soprano Eleanor Lyons for an evening of arias and duets accompanied by the St. Petersburg State Academic Symphony Orchestra.

Prato's solo pieces will include "Hai già vinta la causa" from Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro, "Largo al factotum" from Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia, Belcore's aria "Come Paride vezzoso" from Donizetti's L'elisir d’amore,  and Enrico's aria "Cruda, funesta smania" from Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor. The two men will join forces to sing Figaro and Count Almaviva's duet "All'idea di quel metallo" from the opera Il barbiere di Siviglia, as well as Nemorino and Belcore's duet "La donna è un animale" from the opera L'elisir d’amore. Prato will team up with Lyons to perform Norina and Malatesta's duet "Pronta io son" from Donizetti's Don Pasquale.

Tickets are available online. 

Vittorio Prato will be featured in this year's 2015 Viva, Italia! Barihunks Charity Calendar, which will be on sale shortly.

Highlights from Thomas Hampson/Luca Pisaroni Concert

Luca Pisaroni (L) & Thomas Hampson (R)

We recently posted about the much anticipated concert in Heidelberg, Germany featuring Luca Pisaroni and Thomas Hampson. As regular readers will know, not only are these two men some of the most popular barihunks in the world, but they are a father-in-law/son-in-law tandem. They also happen to be two of the greatest singers in the world today.

Luca Pisaroni (L) & Thomas Hampson (R)

For those of you who missed the broadcast, here are the duets from the concerts. We've also added Luca Pisaroni singing "Sorgete... Duce di tanti eroi"  from Rossini's Mamoetto II, which he will be singing at the Santa Fe Opera this summer. A performance that is not to be missed.  You can watch the entire concert at teresa59's YouTube site.

Thomas Hampson, Luca Pisaroni - Il rival salvar... Suoni la tromba (I puritani)

Thomas Hampson, Luca Pisaroni - Restate (Don Carlo)

Thomas Hampson, Luca Pisaroni - Cheti, cheti immantinente (Don Pasquale)

Thomas Hampson, Luca Pisaroni - Uldino...Tardo per gl'anni (Attila)

Luca Pisaroni - Sorgete... Duce di tanti eroi (Mamoetto II)

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Leigh Melrose in Holocaust Opera

Leigh Melrose

British barihunk Leigh Melrose has never received the attention that he deserves on this site. We featured a video of him singing a selection from Britten's "Billy Budd" at the end of a feature on Alexander Tsymbalyuk. He certainly can't be ignored anymore, as Melrose has landed a key role at English National Opera in Mieczysław Weinberg’s 1968 opera The Passenger. 

The opera was banned in the Soviet Union and was first premiered last year at the Bregenz Festival. Weinberg, a Soviet composer of Jewish-Polish heritage who died in 1996, never saw a performance of this lost masterpiece in his lifetime. 


The opera revolves around an encounter between two women – one a former Auschwitz guard and the other a former prisoner. Melrose plays Tadeusz, a camp inmate and violinist who defies the Commandant byordered by performing some meloncholy music by Bach rather than a frolicking waltz. Needless to say, things don't end well for Tadeusz.



We continue to find the performances at ENO as some of the most innovative and interesting in all of opera right now. We loved Nic Muhly's "Two Boys" and look forward to seeing The Passenger. The opera runs from September 19-October 25. Additional cast and performance information is available HERE. If you're looking for more traditional operatic fare, ENO will be performing the highly acclaimed Jonathan Miller production of Donizetti's "The Elixir of Love" at the same time.

You can read an entire feature on Leigh Melrose and The Passenger in the Islington Tribune by clicking HERE. 

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Peter Barrett Steps in for Kwiecien; Makes Met Debut

Peter Barrett

Peter Barrett made his Metropolitan Opera debut on Valentine's Day singing the role of Dr. Malatesta in Don Pasquale, replacing Mariusz Kwiecien, who was ill.

Barrett, a Canadian baritone and prize winner at the Montreal International Competition, has appeared with the Canadian Opera in Toronto, Vancouver Opera, and the Wexford Festival in Ireland.

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Vittorio Prato Profiled

Italian Barihunk Vittorio Prato

Vittorio Prato was recently featured in this Italian language profile on the online web magazine Leccedafare. He discusses how he lives for the moment and doesn't plan too far ahead, his love for Mozart, and how the great bass-baritone roles truly arrived with Donizetti and Verdi.

Regular readers of this site know that we're huge fans of this gifted young singer. He opens as Dr. Malatesta in Don Pasquale on Friday in the town of Lecce.

Here he is singing Monteverdi:



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Gabriele Nani Delights in Mozart and Rossini

 [Photos from Don Giovanni]

Somehow we've managed to go two years without a posting of the delightful and talented Italian barihunk Gabriele Nani. Here are two recent videos of him singing Rossini and Mozart. He opens tomorrow as Dr. Malatesta in Donizetti's "Don Pasquale" at the music festival at the Olympic Theatre in Vicenza.

We always like to thank the great Italian soprano Mara Zampieri for "discovering" this amazing talent. Amazingly, no American opera company has scooped up Nani yet. Reports we've received from Italy say that few singers can rival the stage presence of this young barihunk.




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Christopher Temporelli

The adorable barihunk Christopher Temporelli is ringing in the New Year with some YouTube videos and some new publicity shots [see above photo]. Fans of Temporelli can see him at the Lake George Opera this year, where he will perform in Donizetti's "Viva La Mamma (Le Convenienze ed Inconvenienze Teatrali) and portray Zuniga in Carmen.



Here he is performing Handel's famous Largo. You can also hear him on YouTube singing "Aprite un po quegli occhi" from Mozart's Figaro, Tu lo sai by Giuseppe Torelli and the old standard "Danny Boy."



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Mariusz Kwiecien sings "Cruda, funesta smania"

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Donizetti's "Venti Scudi" from L'elisir d'amore

Another video has been posted of the Hot Pole Mariusz Kwiecien singing in his disco see-through shirt from a performance of L'elisir d'amore in Amsterdam in 2002. To hear how his voice has grown, listen to him sing the duet with Juan Diego Flores on the latter's new CD.

Mariusz Kwiecien IS the Elixir of Love

Here is a shot of the Hot Pole Mariusz Kwiecien in an updated production of the Elixir of Love. I believe that this production is from Amsterdam.

Barihunk and Hunkentenor together on CD

One of Barihunks most loyal readers sent these pictures of Mariusz Kwiecien who we both have a mad crush on (despite our relationship status!). The pictures reminded me that the grossly underrecoreded Hot Pole sings the duet "Venti scudi" from Donizetti's L'Elisir d'amore with the adorable tenor Juan Diego Florez on the latter's new CD.

You can purchase it here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bel-Canto-Spectacular/dp/B0014QNG9G/ref=pd_bxgy_m_h__img_a

A Barihunk Before My Very Eyes

I love the San Francisco Opera, but I'm always a little critical of them for not hiring better looking baritones. Other opera companies on the Left Coast seem to have no problem, most notably the Seattle Opera, San Diego Opera, Los Angeles Opera and, of course, the Sante Fe Opera (who remain in the barihunk stratosphere unchallenged).

Gabriele Viviani is an Italian baritone making his American debut in this production. He hails from Puccini's hometown of Lucca and regularly sings Marcello in La Boheme. So far, he has no real barihunk roles under his belt, but maybe he'll come back to SF Opera as Don Giovanni or Zurga in Pearl Fishers.

I saw the final dress rehearsal of SF Opera's Lucia di Lammermoor and my friends were all commenting about how cute tenor Andrew Bidlack was. It wasn't until I saw Lucia broadcast on the JumboTron at AT&T Park that I realized our Enrico was quite the barihunk. He does look like a little like a 70s rock star with his long, blonde hair, but who cares.