There are a ton of baritones making some extra holiday cash by singing Handel's Messiah over the next week. We would love to be in beautiful Charleston, South Carolina to hear John Brancy with the Charleston Symphony Orchestra. There are four performances beginning tonight and ending on Friday, December 21st. The Tuesday night performance is already sold out, so get your tickets now.
Curtis Sullivan as Neptune at Opera Atelier
A thousand miles north of Charleston, Curtis Sullivan will join the 100-member Peterborough Singers for the Messiah today and tomorrow at the George Street United Church. Tickets are available online.
Jesse Blumberg
San Franciscans are welcoming back Jesse Blumberg who is repeating his successful performances of the Messiah with the American Bach Soloists. Performance are on December 20. 21 and 22 and tickets are available online. Blumberg will return to the Bay Area on February 19th for the West Coast premiere of Ricky Ian Gordon's "Green Sneakers." Tickets are now on sale.
Finally, here is a classic version of "The Trumpet Shall Sound" sung by Samuel Ramey.
Barihunks calendars are selling fast, so order yours today before the last minute shoppers get online.
Now that Thanksgiving is over, we begin our annual posts on Messiahs around the world. One that we're particularly excited about is in Birmingham, Alabama with the Alabama Symphony Orchestra. Randal Turner will be singing the baritone part and will be joined by two other amazing male voices: countertenor Ryan Belongie and tenor Colin Ainsworth. Kimberly McCord will take on the soprano part. Performances are on December 15 and 16 and tickets are available online.
Last year, the Indianapolis Performing Arts Examiner wrote of his Messiah:
Of all the special moments (and there were many) provided by each
singer, there was one that stood out. With his deeply rich and imposing
voice, Turner was commanding when he sang the familiar, "The trumpet
shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be
changed."
Turner has shown himself to be adept at singing everything from early music to modern music. We've featured him in another Handel role, Siroe, as well as last year's Messiah in Indianapolis. His range of roles has taken him into Mozart, Donizetti and Rossini, as well as contemporary composers like Benjamin Britten, John Cage, Andre Previn and Rufus Wainwright. His CD of "Living American Composers" remains one of our favorite song recitals and is still available at CD Baby.
Randal Turner sings "Gelido inogni vena from Handels' Siroe:
Of course, you can enjoy Randal Turner in our 2013 Barihunks Charity Calendar. He's appearing for the second year in a row and has an entire month dedicated to him:
The National Arts Centre Orchestra will perform Handel’s Messiah on Tuesday, December 14 and Wednesday, December 15 with barihunk Michael Todd Simpson. The concerts are at 7 p.m. in Southam Hall of the National Arts Centre.
Simpson will be joined by soprano Ann Monoyios, mezzo-soprano Elizabeth Turnbull and tenor James Charles Taylor. Visit the National Arts Centre website for additional information and tickets.
Please send your Messiah listings to Barihunks@gmail.com
John Relyea will perform Handel's Messiah with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra on December 16, 18, 19, 20, and 21. For additional concert infornation and tickets visit the TSO website.
Barihunks will be posting concert information for upcoming Messiah's throughout the holiday season. If you know of a barihunk performing the Messiah, please send your listing to Barihunks@gmail.com.
The University Musical Society Choral Union will perform the Messiah on December 4, 5 and 8 at the Hill Auditorium in Ann Arbor with Jesse Blumberg. Visit the UMS website for details and tickets.
Keith Phares
TONIGHT Keith Phares performs the Messiah on Saturday, November 27 with the Kansas City Symphony at the Community of Christ Auditorium in Independence, Missouri. Visit the Kansas City Symphony website for details and tickets.
Randal Turner
The Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra performs the Messiah on December 18 at Clowes Memorial Hall with Randal Turner. Visit their website for tickets and performance information.
Tyler Duncan
If you want to hear a Messiah the way Handel wrote it and performed it, then check out the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, which is featuring Tyler Duncan. Performances are December 3, 4, 5 and 7 throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. Visit their website for performance and ticket information.
After our latest post about Teddy Tahu Rhodes appeared, a reader wrote to ask if he's the tallest barihunk. From what we know, "Teddy Bare" is tied for being the second tallest barihunk along with Michael Todd Simpson. Both are about 6'5" according to our theater sources. The tallest barihunk appears to be Canadian Olivier Laquerre who stands at 6'8" according to our sources.
All of Laquerre's upcoming performances are in Canada. On November 5th and 6th, he appears with the Orchestre Symphonique de Trois-Rivieres in a performance of Handel's "Messiah." Then he's with the Symphony Nova Scotia performing Mozart's Requiem on November 11th and 14th. Then it's off for another "Messiah" with the Guelph Chamber Choir on December 18th.
If you know of a taller barihunk, please let us know at barihunks@gmail.com.
It's been a year since we first featured barihunk Jesse Blumberg after he delivered a rousing performance of Handel's Messiah with the American Bach Soloists in San Francisco. Blumberg is back with the group to reprise his performance this month.
Blumberg is also the featured soloist on the world-premiere recording of Ricky Ian Gordon’s "Green Sneakers," a song cycle for baritone, string quartet and empty chair. The cycle was written by Gordon after his partner died of AIDS and it is an extremely personal and heartfelt composition. Blumberg whose singing is as stunning as his looks, delivers a poignant and memorable performance. You can buy the CD by clicking HERE.
Composer Ricky Ian Gordon knew from the beginning of working on this piece that he wanted Blumberg as his soloist. This is what he told Opera Today:
“Because of the honesty and intimacy of these poems I knew that a performer who was false in any way would kill Sneakers. It had to be a singer who was essentially an open vessel. Jesse is like that with his unusual combination of strapping casual masculinity and comfort in his own body. He’s unsaddled by any kind of ego that gets between him, the music he is singing and the words he is conveying.”
For readers on the East Coast, you should check out his website for his schedule. In March, he will also be performing Harlekin in Richard Strauss' "Ariadne auf Naxos" with the Boston Lyric Opera.
[Color photo by Cory Weaver; B&W photo by Nick Granito]
I went to hear Jesse Blumberg sing Handel's Messiah with the American Bach Soloists and he sounded as good as he looks. His delivery of the line, "...but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and his Glory shall be seen upon thee" was the greatest that I've ever heard live or recorded. His closing piece, "The trumpet shall sound" was truly magnificent, made all the better by him cutting a mean figure in his tuxedo.
He is performing it again tonight at Jackson Hall in Davis, California at 7:30 p.m. Tickets can be purchased either by calling (530) 754-2787 or (866) 754-2787, or going to www.mondaviarts.org.
Blumberg was scheduled to reprise his role in the Grapes of Wrath, but Opera Pacific has become a victim of the economic crisis. Hopefully, somebody will hire him to sing a barihunk role to fill the void on his calendar.
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