Tim Murray preparing for his Merola Grand Finale (right)
Wisconsin-born barihunk Tim Murray will perform in the Grand Finale concert at the prestigious Merola Opera Program in San Francisco tonight. He'll be performing the Act III mother-son duet from Ambroise Thomas' Hamlet with Alice Chung. He also recently performed the role of Paul with Merola in the world premiere of Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer’s new opera If I Were You.
The concert is the final event in the Merola Opera Program's intensive summer training program for some of the world's most promising operatic talent. Tickets for the August 17th concert are available online.
In March, Murray made his debut with the Arizona Opera as William Dale in Kevin Puts’ Silent Night. He has already appeared three times with the Lyric Opera of Kansas City where he was part of their Resident Artist Program, performing Marullo in Verdi's Rigoletto, Guy in Talbot's Everest and the Captain in Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin.
Harve Presnell, Edward Laurenson and Thomas Hampson
Also appearing tonight will be New Zealand born baritone Edward Laurenson, who we introduced to readers back in 2014 and featured again when he took off for the Guildhall School of Music and again when he first came to San Francisco to study.
A number of the world's greatest baritones have come through Merola, including Broadway legend and film star Harve Presnell (1957), Thomas Hampson (1980), Mark Delavan (1985), David Malis (1982, 83), John Del Carlo (1977), Lucas Meachem (2003), Allan Monk (1966), Burak Bilgili (2001), John Chest (2009), Richard Paul Fink (1983, 84), Ao Li (2010), Daniel Okulitch (2002), John Relyea (1995), Philippe Sly (2011) and Hadleigh Adams (2012).
American barihunk Mark Diamond will join Musica Marin for the world premiere of Clint Borzoni's new arrangement of the aria, "Two Nooses"
from his opera "When Adonis Calls” for baritone, viola, cello and piano. The New York-based Borzoni is the composer-in-residence for the California chamber music organization. Last year, they presented the world premiere of his two works for Baritone and String Quartet, Stufen and Magere Kost.
The program is a collaboration with San Francisco's Merola Opera Program, where Diamond was part a participant in 2011. He'll be joined by mezzo-soprano Laura Krumm, who was also in Merola in 2011 and accompanist Ronny Greenberg, who was in the program in 2014.
There will be additional song by Borzoni set to poets John
Grimmett, Sally M. Gall, Gavin Geoffrey Dillard, and Judith G Wolf.
Musica Marin presents concerts in beautiful private homes and tickets include wine, hors d'oeuvres and mingling with the
poets, composer and artists. Tickets are available at Eventbrite.
Diamond is a graduate of the Studio of Houston Grand Opera where he performed Figaro in Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia, Marcello in Puccini's La bohème and the Marchese d’Obigny in Verdi's La traviata. At the Houston Grand Opera he has sung Count Carl-Magnus in A Little Night Music and Wilbur in the world premiere of David Hanlon’s opera After the Storm. He has also appeared throughout France, performing in Limoges, Caen, and Reims.
He is the 1st Prize Winner of the 2010 Eleanor McCollum Competition at the Houston Grand Opera and the 2011 Sun Valley Opera Competition in Seattle. Diamond was twice a Regional Finalist in the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and was awarded 2nd Prize in the Charles A. Lynam Competition in North Carolina.
Marco Vassalli(left)and Ronny Michael Greenberg (far right)
Rehearsals kicked off for the upcoming U.S. debut of Marco Vassalli with Musica Marin, who is performing the world premiere of the new Clint
Borzoni songs for String Quartet & Baritone along with songs by Schubert, Richard Strauss and Tosti. He'll also be performing Samuel Barber's beautiful and moving Dover Beach, one of the few other pieces scored for String Quartet & Baritone.
Portions of this concert were funded by sales of the 2016 Barihunks calendar, so we would like to personally thank everyone who bought a calendar! Every year we donate proceeds to promote young artists and works written for baritone or bass. This year, we plan on funding a special baritone/bass prize at a major singing competition.
Vassalli's debut performances with Musica Marin are on Friday, January 22 and Sunday, January 24 in San
Francisco. The German-Italian baritone kicked off rehearsals with accompanist Ronny Michael Greenberg, a current Adler Fellow at the San Francisco Opera and former participant in the Merola Opera Program. The Sunday matinee is almost sold out, but there are still tickets for
the Friday night performance. Tickets for both shows are available on
the Musica Marin website.
Here is a sneak preview of them rehearsing Schubert's Nacht und Träume.
Rehearsals for the Borzoni songs with texts chosen by Vassalli begin on Monday with the composer and members of the Musica Marin quartet led by Ruth Kahn. Vassalli chose Hermann Hesse's Stufen and Hilde Domin's Margere Kost, making these the first German language texts set by the composer. Our first charity calendar helped fund a performance of Borzoni's beautiful setting of Walt Whitman's "I Dream’d in a Dream" sung by Randal Turner, which you can listen to HERE.
Borzoni, one of the most talented of many gifted American composers on the scene, recently completed his fourth opera, When Adonis Calls,
based on the poetry of Gavin Dillard and arranged by John de los Santos. The opera was presented at
Fort Worth Opera’s 2015 Frontiers Showcase. He is currently working on his fifth opera, The Copper Queen, also with librettist John de los Santos for Arizona Opera’s program, Arizona Spark.
Vassalli just wrapped up a performance of Leonard Bernstein's Candide at the Staatsoper Hannover. He grew up on Lake Constance and
began his studies at the Hochschule fur Musik in Cologne, where he
studied with the famed soprano Edda Moser.
