Gavan Ring takes 2nd Prize at Concorso Lirico Internazionale

Gavan Ring performing in Portofino

Irish barihunk Gavan Ring, who we introduced to readers back in October 2014, took 2nd Prize at the Concorso Lirico Internazionale Vocal Competition in Portofino, which concluded last night.  Two Russian sopranos, Maria Nazarova and Karina Kheruntc, took 1st and 3rd Prize respectively. Ring was awarded €4000.

The finalists were narrowed down from a field of 120 singers from 28 countries and had 10 minutes in the final round to sing the aria of their choice. The jury was headed by Dominique Meyer, the director of the Vienna State Opera. The top three winners will be invited to audition for the
Vienna State Opera.

Gavan Ring at the 2013 Wigmore Hall/Kohn Foundation Competition:

Gavan Ring can next be seen as Bill Bobstay in Gilbert & Sullivan's HMS Pinafore at the Edinburgh International Festival opening on August 23 and Figaro in Rossini's The Barber of Seville at Opera North opening on October 7th. On November 8th, he'll perform a song recital with accompanist Simon Lepper as part of the Dublin Song Series at Hugh Lane Gallery.

Listen to Stéphane Degout from Edinburgh

Stéphane Degout

French barihunk Stéphane Degout and British pianist Simon Lepper teamed up at the Edinburgh Festival to perform a recital of Gallic songs and miniature operas. You can listen to the entire recital HERE for the next seven days. The program is as follows.

Schubert: Der Zwerg D771
Loewe: Edward 1
Schumann: Belsatzar Op 57
Lizst: Die drei Zigeuner
Weill: Die Ballade vom ertrunkenen Mädchen
Wolf: Der Feuerreiter
Debussy Images
Faure: Automne in B minor Op 18 No 3
Faure: L'Horizon Chimérique Op 118
Liszt: Three Petrarch Sonnets

Degout will be in recital in Brussels on September 12th at La Monnaie. He'll be performing the Mörike-Lieder of Wolf and lieder by Richard Strauss. Tickets are available online.

You can see him on stage again from October 16-29, when he takes on Oreste in the revival of Gluck's Iphigénie en Aulide at the Theater an der Wien opposite the stunning  Iphigénie of Véronique Gens. Tickets and additional information are available online.

Listen to Simon Keenlyside's Edinburgh Recital

Simon Keenlyside at Edinburgh (right)

For the next four days one can enjoy Simon Keenlyside's amazing recital with Malcolm Martineau from the Edinburgh Festival on August 20th. The program contrasted English songs of regret and lost innocence in the first half with richly romantic German lieder in the second half.

Keenlyside and Martineau bring together songs from Butterworth’s A Shropshire Lad, a touching evocation of a vanishing pastoral England, and Vaughan Williams’s Songs of Travel, which explore the innermost thoughts and longings for home of soldiers on the front line.

The rich melodies of Schumann’s gripping mini-drama Ballade des Harfners are a fine contrast to the touching pastoral evocations of Wolf’s Fussreise and Blumengruss. For an encore, Keenlyside performs Britten's The Fly from Songs and Proverbs of William Blake. Click HERE to listen to the recital.

You can next catch Keenlyside live at the Royal Opera House where he opens as the title character in Verdi's Rigoletto, in a cast that includes Saimir Pirgu as the Duke of Mantua, Aleksandra Kurzak as Gilda and fellow barihunk Duncan Rock as Marullo. The opera runs through October 6th and additional information is available online.

Here is the entire program for the Edinburgh recital:

Ireland: Sea Fever
Somervell: Into my heart an air that kills
Vaughan Williams: Youth and Love
Eisler: Spruch 1939
Somervell: There pass the careless people
Butterworth: When I was One and Twenty
Gurney: In Flanders
Butterworth: Think no more, Lad
Butterworth: The Lads in their hundreds
Butterworth: On the Idle Hill of Summer
Ireland: Vagabond
Trad: The three ravens
Eisler: Despite these miseries
Eisler: The only thing that consoles us
Finzi: Fear no more the heat o' the sun
Vaughan Williams: The Vagabond

11:40 (during the interval)
Wagner: Siegfried Idyll

12:00
Schumann: Ballade des Harfners
Wolf: Fussreise
Wolf: Denk es, o Seele
Wolf: Blumengruss
Wolf: Lied vom Winde
Wolf: Schlafendes Jesuskind
Wolf: Wie sollt ich heiter bleiben
Wolf: Christblume II
Wolf: Nimmersatte Lieve
Wolf: Lied eines Verliebten
Wolf: Storchenbotschaft

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, Simon Keenlyside

Simon Keenlyside

On August 3rd, we're celebrating the 55th birthday of the seemingly ageless Simon Keenlyside, who continues to thrill audiences 27 years after his professional debut. 

Keenlyside began his singing career as a chorister at St John’s College, Cambridge. A keen ecologist, he returned to Cambridge to read Zoology, singing on a choral scholarship, and went on to study singing with John Cameron at the Royal Northern College of Music.

His career has taken him to the world’s major opera houses, singing repertory including Oreste in Gluck's Iphigénie en Tauride, Figaro in Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia, Rigoletto, Hamlet, Ford in Verdi's Falstaff) Pelléas and Billy Budd.

A lover of German Lieder, Keenlyside also performs widely in recital, including regular appearances at London’s Wigmore Hall. His discography includes CDs of opera, operetta duets and Lieder and songs by Schubert, Schumann, Brahms, Richard Strauss and Vaughan Williams. Many of his performances with The Royal Opera are available on DVD.

Simon Keenlyside sings Richard Strauss' Cäcilie:

He can next be seen on August 20th at the Edinburgh International Festival with accompanist Malcolm Martineau. The program includes Butterworth's A Shropshire Lad, a touching evocation of a vanishing pastoral England, and Vaughan Williams's Songs of Travel, which explore the innermost thoughts and longings for home of soldiers on the front line. The recital also includes works by Ireland, Somervell, Eisler, Gurney, Finzi, Schumann and Wolf. The concert will be broadcast live on BBC Radio 3 at 11am GMT/4am EST. 

Keenlyside lives on a farm in West Wales with his wife, Royal Ballet Principal Zenaida Yanowsky, and their children. His interests outside opera include planting trees, reading poetry and listening to a wide range of music including flamenco.