Barihunk duo in Monteverdi's L'Orfeo

Damien Pass and Alex Rosen

OPERA2DAY is teaming up with the Nederlandse Reisopera and Studio Drift to produce Claudio Monteverdi's L’Orfeo, often considered to be the first successful opera. Monteverdi referred to the piece as a "favola in musica," in which “all the actors are to sing their parts.”

Barihunks Damien Pass will sing Spirito and Alex Rosen will take on Caronte in a cast that also includes Samuel Boden as Orfeo, Kristen Witmer as Eurydice, Yannis François as Plutone and Laurence Kilsby as Apollo.

Hernán Schvartzman will conduct the orchestra of La Sfera Armoniosa on period instruments.  There will be ten performance  production can be viewed 10 times in January and February in theatres throughout the Netherlands starting in Enschede on January 25, then traveling to Leeuwarden, Maastricht, Utrecht, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Zwolle, Arnheim and ending in Den Haat on February 22.

OPERA2DAY in Den Haag is a company founded to bring opera to new audiences by presenting old standards in contemporary settings. They often condense the opera to shorter running times.

Damien Pass' legendary strip tease in Agrippina

At the time when Monteverdi was composing L’Orfeo,  he was dealing with the recent death of his first wife Claudia and 18-year-old star soprano Caterina Martinelli. These events inspired him to compose some of the most beautiful music of love and mournful tunes ever written in opera.

Australian baritone Damien Pass has performed many baroque roles including Handel's Lucifero (La resurrezione), Zoroastro (Orlando) and Pallante (Agrippina), as well as Rameau's Borée (Les Boréades). After L'Orfeo, he head to Opéra de Lille to sing Pistola in Verdi's Falstaff.

American bass Alex Rosen is also not stranger to early music, having performed Seneca in Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea with Cincinnati Opera, Haydn’s Creation and Handel’s Acis and Galatea with Les Arts Florissants and Somnus and Cadmus in Handel’s Semele with Opera Philadelphia.

Watch Quirijn de Lang's Hamlet online

Quirijn de Lang as Hamlet (Image: OPERA2DAY)

Add Quirijn de Lang to the list of barihunks who have made their mark in the title role of Ambroise Thomas' Hamlet, which includes Thomas Weinhappel, Thomas Oliemans, Franco Pomponi, Stéphane Degout, Edward Nelson, Régis Mengus, Bo Skovhus, Simon Keenlyside and Liam Bonner.

You can watch the Dutch baritone's performance on OperaVision on September 13th. The broadcast will start at 7 PM CET/1 PM EST/10 AM PST.

The performance is with OPERA2DAY in Den Haag, a company founded to bring opera to new audiences by presenting old standards in contemporary settings. The opera has been reduced to 2 hours from the standard 3 1/2 running time by eliminating the ballet and streamlining the story, including an ending that combines the two existing versions of the opera.

The cast also includes Lucie Chartin as Ophélie, fellow barihunk Martijn Sanders as Claudius, Martina Prins as Gertrude, Jan Willem Schaafsma as Laërte  and Patrick Pranger as Horatio. The opera is a co-production with the New European Ensemble.

If you want to see de Lang live, he can be seen in Kurt Weill's Street Scene with Opera North from January through March in Leeds, Newcastle, Manchester and Nottingham. He will also be singing the Count in Mozart's​ The Marriage of Figaro with the company during the same period.

Quirijn de Lang in updated and abridged Hamlet

Quirijn de Lang as Hamlet

OPERA2DAY in Den Haag in the Netherlands will present barihunk Quirijn de Lang as the title character in Ambroise Thomas' Hamlet. The innovative company has reduced the 3 1/2 hour opera to just over 2 hours, by eliminating the ballet and streamlining the story, including an ending that combines the two existing versions of the opera.

The cast also includes Lucie Chartin as Ophélie, Martijn Sanders as Claudius, Martina Prins as Gertrude, Jan Willem Schaafsma as Laërte  and Patrick Pranger as Horatio. The opera is a co-production with the New European Ensemble. The opera will be performed in 20 different venues throughout the region between January 17th and April 11th. Tickets and locations are available online.

OPERA2DAY was founded to bring opera to new audiences by presenting old standards in contemporary settings.