Introducing bass-barihunk Jake Stamatis in Hydrogen Jukebox

Jake Stamatis in Trouble in Tahiti (left)

A reader alerted us to the fact that we've never posted bass-barihunk Jake Stamatis, who is opening next week in Philip Glass' Hydrogen Jukebox with Tri-Cities Opera in Binghamton, New York. He'll be joined in the cast by Stacey Geyer, Abigail Smith, Mary Beth Nelson, Jordan Schreiner and Scott Purcell.

Stamatis is a native of Tunkhannock, Pennsylvania and received his Bachelors Degree in Vocal Performance at Susquehanna University and his Masters Degree in Opera at Binghamton University. He is currently an artist-in-residence at Tri-Cities Opera where he's also sining the Marquese d’Obingy in Verdi's La traviata and Don Iñigo Gomez in Ravel's L’Heure Espagnol. He recently appeared with Opera Ithaca as Abdul in Kamala Sankaram's Thumbprint.

Other roles in his repertory include Leporello in Mozart's Don Giovanni, Frosch in Johann Strauss' Die Fledermaus, Taddeo in Rossini's L’Italiana in Algeri, Sam in Bernstein's Trouble in Tahiti and and Anthony in Sondheim's Sweeney Todd.

Performances of Hydrogen Jukebox are on April 21, 23, 28 and 30 with performances at Savoca Hibbitt Hall in Binghamton. Tickets and additional information is available online.

This is also our first post highlighting Tri-Cities Opera, with our only mention of the company being Brandon Coleman singing Mephistopheles in their production of Gounod's Faust.

Introducing Barihunks Patrick McNally & Peter Johnson

Patrick McNally

Two singers who are new to this site are developing their careers as young artists in Tennessee. Patrick McNally and Peter Johnson both wrapped up a successful rung in Philip Glass' Hydrogen Jukebox at the Nashville Opera.

McNally is a 2016 Mary Ragland Young Artist with the company and will take the stage as Guglielmo in their upcoming mainstage production of Mozart's Così fan tutte opening on January 22 and running through January 26. This season he's performed Argente in Handel's Rinaldo and Albert in Massenet's Werther with the Boston Opera Collaborative, Enrico in Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor and two roles with the New York Opera Exchange.

He has also been a winner of multiple awards including the Richard F. Gold Career Grant from the Shoshana Foundation.

Peter Johnson in Carmen

Bass-barihunk Peter Johnson is a graduate of the Knoxville Opera Studio about 160 miles down the road from Nashville. He appeared in numerous roles with the Knoxville Opera, including Sid in Puccini’s La fanciulla del West, Hermann in Offenbach’s Les contes des Hoffmann, the Boatswain in Gilbert and Sullivan’s H.M.S. Pinafore and Zuniga in Bizet’s Carmen. In April, he returns to the company to sing Angelotti in Puccini's Tosca in a cast that features Kerri Marcinko as Floria Tosca and Jonathan Burton as Mario Cavaradossi.

In the summer of 2014 he completed the Apprentice Artist Program at the Des Moines Metro Opera where he covered the role of The Tutor in Rossini’s Le comte d’Ory.  While a young artist at the Brevard Music Center he created the roles of the Campaign Consultant and Triathlon Dan in Michael Ching’s new opera Speed Dating Tonight!, as well as appearing as Escamillo in Peter Brook’s Le tragédie de Carmen.  

Johnson earned his master’s degree from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville after completing his undergraduate training from Concordia College in Moorhead, Minnesota. He also toured both nationally and internationally with The Concordia Choir. You can hear him sing Kurt Weill's Let Things Be Like They Always Was by clicking HERE.

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Happy Birthday, Philip Glass!!!

Martin Acrainer in Orphée (left) and Spuren der Verirrten (right)

Nary a year goes by where we don't celebrate the birthday of American composer Philip Glass who turns 77 today.

Many of his 20+ operas have become staples of the standard repertory including Hydrogen Jukebox, Einstein on the Beach, Satyagraha, Akhnaten, and The Voyage. We've featured many of the more obscure operas on this site, including Kepler, Les Enfants Terribles, The Perfect American, Orphée and Galileo Galilei, which have become popular vehicles for barihunks like Martin Achrainer, Philip Cutlip, Matthew Worth, Nicholas Nelson and Timothy McDevitt.

Glass was born in Baltimore and studied at the University of Chicago, the Juilliard School and in Aspen with Darius Milhaud. Finding himself dissatisfied with much of what then passed for modern music, he moved to Europe, where he studied with the legendary pedagogue Nadia Boulanger and worked closely with the sitar virtuoso and composer Ravi Shankar. He returned to New York in 1967 and formed the Philip Glass Ensemble.

Guillaume Andrieux in Philip Glass' Les Enfants Terribles

Glass likes speak of himself as a composer of “music with repetitive structures.” Much of his early work was based on the extended reiteration of brief, elegant melodic fragments that wove in and out of an aural tapestry. Or, to put it another way, it immersed a listener in a sort of sonic weather that twists, turns, surrounds, develops.

Upcoming performances of Glass operas include The Trial, which will run at the Theater Magdeburg from April 1-May 8 with barihunk Johnny Herford as Josef K. In the U.S., Hydrogen Jukebox will play at the Long Beach Opera from May 30-June 7. Perhaps the most popular Glass opera this season is Akhnaten, which will play in Antwerp in February, Gent in March, Heidelberg in March and Maastricht in June.

Introducing bass-barihunk Michael Scarcelle

Michael Scarcelle headshot and in Hydrogen Jukebox (right)

In our recent post about Philip Glass' Hydrogen Jukebox at the Skylight Music Theater in Milwaukee, we gave passing mention to bass-barihunk Michael Scarcelle in a post that focused on Dan Kempson, who role is particularly central to the drama. However, Scarcelle clearly needs to be added to the roster of barihunks and we wanted to wait until his birthday (which is March 24) to introduce him to readers.

Scarcelle  holds a Master of Music degree from Yale University and a Bachelor of Music degree from Hunter College. He also studied at the Catholic University of America and the American Musical and Dramatic Academy focusing on dancing and acting. He has distinguished himself in both musical theater and opera, as well as in recitals and concerts.

In 2007, he made his European debut as Crespel in Offenbach's The Tales of Hoffmann and the Marchese in Verdi's La traviata at the Lyrique-en-mer Festival in Belle-Île.

In 2011, he made his debut with Munich Philharmonic performing Herrmann Augustus in Leaonard Bernstein's Candide, a role he's also performed with the London Symphony Orchestra, Die Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen and Tonkünstler-Orchester Niederösterreich. Last April, he appeared as the Pirate King in the Pirates of Penzance with the Anchorage Opera.

Performances of Glass' Hydrogen Jukebox continue at the Skylight Music Theater through March 30th and tickets are available online.

Dan Kempson in Milwaukee's Hydrogen Jukebox

Dan Kempson in Hydrogen Jukebox

On Friday March 14th, the Skylight Music Theater in Milwaukee will present Hydrogen Jukebox, Philip Glass' opera set to the poetry of counter-culture poet Allen Ginsberg. The text deals with a variety of topics from the 1950's through the 1980's ranging from the sexual revolution, eastern philosophy, drugs, the environment, the threat of nuclear destruction, Iran-Contra scandal and meditation. The six vocal parts were thought to represent six archetypal American characters- a waitress, a policeman, a businessman, a cheerleader, a priest, and a mechanic.

Unlike other Glass operas that deal with social issues, Hydrogen Jukebox is sung in English. In other operas, he has used languages unfamiliar to most opera-goers, including Sanskrit for Satyagraha, ancient Egyptian for Akhnaten, Latin for the CIVIL warS, or just numbers and syllables in Einstein on the Beach.

Hydrogen Jukebox at Skylight Music Theater

The baritone lead in this production will be sung by barihunk Dan Kempson and directed by the brilliant Ted Huffman. As was the case when he performed it at the Fort Worth Opera Festival in 2011, he'll be showing off some skin, as you can see from the pictures.

According to Allen Ginsburg, "The title Hydrogen Jukebox comes from a verse in the poem Howl: "...listening to the crack of doom on the hydrogen jukebox..." It signifies a state of hypertrophic high-tech, a psychological state in which people are at the limit of their sensory input with civilization's military jukebox, a loud industrial roar, or a music that begins to shake the bones and penetrate the nervous system as a hydrogen bomb may do someday, reminder of apocalypse."

Skylight Music Theater will perform the piece eleven times between March 14-30 and tickets are available online. The remainder of the cast includes Erica Schuller, Kristen DiNinno, Michael Scarcelle, Megan Williams and Ben Robinson.

BREAKING NEWS: Justin Hopkins wins 2nd Place in Lotte Lenya Competition

Justin Hopkins

Barihunk Justin Hopkins, who first impressed us in Philip Glass' Hydrogen Jukebox with the Fort Worth Opera Festival, has won second prize in the prestigious Lotte Lenya Competition. He shared 2nd place with tenor Jacob Keith Watson. Eastman School of Music master’s degree student Matthew Grills, who was a winner in the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions last month, was awarded 1st place.
The Lotte Lenya Competition is an international theater singing contest that recognizes talented young singer-actors, ages 19 to 30, who are dramatically and musically convincing in a wide range of repertoire, and emphasizes the acting of songs within a dramatic context. It was founded in 1998 by foundation President Kim H. Kowalke, who is the Richard L. Turner Professor in Humanities at the University of Rochester and professor of musicology at the Eastman School.

 Justin Hopkins sings "The Impossible Dream":

Justin Hopkins burst onto the international opera scene in 2010, performing the combined roles of Il Servo, Il Medico and Heraldo in Macbeth with Le Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie in Brussels in a production that was awarded "Production of the Year" by Opernwelt.  In the same season he performed the roles of Colline in La Boheme with the Verbier Festival Academy and Cappadocian in Richard Strauss' Salome under the direction of Valery Gergiev with the Verbier Festival Orchestra in Switzerland. 

Hopkins was a semi-finalist in the Competizione dell' Opera at The Bolshoi Theater in Moscow as well as a finalist in the Mildred Miller International Voice Competition.

A native of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Mr. Hopkins began singing at the age of eight with the Philadelphia Boys Choir and Men's Chorale.

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Photos from Hydrogen Jukebox

In our post about Fort Worth Opera's winning season, we teased readers about there being some skin in Philip Glass' "Hydrogen Jukebox." Enough teasing, here are some photos from the production:

Dan Kempson (L), Kempson, Jonathan Blalock & Justin Hopkins (C), Justin Hopkins (R)

Barihunk Justin Hopkins, hunkentenor Jonathan Blalock and barihunk Dan Kempson

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Another Winning Season in Ft. Worth

Malcolm MacKenzie in Trovatore; Dan Kempson & Justin Hopkins in Hydrogen Jukebox

The Ft. Worth Opera Festival continues to establish itself as a major force among summer opera festivals internationally. The company continues to showcase some of the best emerging talent in the business today, as well as mixing standard repertory with operas that both challenge audiences and appeal to a new generation of opera goer.

Among the "second tier" of opera companies, Ft. Worth practically stands alone in terms of both innovation and quality of performance. Next season is no exception, when they will feature two standard repertory operas, Mozart's "Marriage of Figaro" and Puccini's "Tosca," with two contemporary operas, Mark Adamo's "Lysistrata" and Jake Heggie's "Three Decembers."

This year's surprise hit is Philip Glass "Hydrogen Jukebox," which has been completely sold out for weeks. It also happens to feature two emerging barihunks, Dan Kempson and Justin Hopkins. The show also features them baring a bit of skin, so warn your grandma. It's no secret that we're huge Glass fans on this site where you can watch his opera "Kepler" in its entirety, so we're thrilled that Glass is being performed deep in the heart of Texas.

Emerging Barihunk Jesse Enderle and Director John de los Santos

This year's Fort Worth Opera Festival is also featuring a critically acclaimed production of Verdi's "Il Trovatore" with baritone Malcolm MacKenzie. Also on the program is an updated version of Gilbert & Sullivan's "Mikado" directed by our favorite young director/choreographer John de los Santos, who choreographed last year's hit "Before Night Falls." Fans of countertenors will be delighted with the production of Handel's "Giulio Cesare," which features two countertenors and a male soprano. Despite the high male voices, barihunk fans will be delighted to know that Achillas will sung by the stunning and gifted young singer Donovan Singletary, who was a standout in the Lindeman Young Artists program.

Donovan Singletary

Here is Singletary performing some Rachmaninov songs:



The festival runs through June 5. Check out the Ft. Worth Opera website for performance times and additional cast information.

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Dan Kempson: Britten & Glass

Dan Kempson: Sexy with our without a shirt

Our recent post of a shirtless Dan Kempson enjoying some ice cream has proved quite popular. Here's a video of him talking about his participation in Britten's "Rape of Lucretia" during Pittsburgh Opera's 2009-2010 season.



We just learned that Kempson will be at Ft. Worth Opera's upcoming season in Philip Glass' "Hydrogen Jukebox." Performances will run from May 24 to June 5, 2011. Visit the Ft. Worth Opera website for more information.

Hydrogen Jukebox is the result of a collaboration between Beat Poet Allen Ginsberg and Philip Glass. It premiered in 1990 at the Spoleto Music Festival in Charleston, SC. The original production had six members in its cast, each one representative of an American archetype. The idea was to present a portrait of America, from Ginsberg and Glass's point of view, from the 1950s to the late 1980s.

Fort Worth Opera's version of Hydrogen Jukebox will vary from its original production. It will be performed in a very small space and we are exploring ways of integrating the audience into the piece, if not physically, then mentally and emotionally. It will also include imagery of "journey" – both the journey of the poet as well as the country. It will not be a literal setting of a journey as an arc of the entire piece; rather, there will be re-occurrences of journey and/or travel as a common theme among the poems.



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