Macedonian barihunk, turned hunkentenor, turned pop singer Vasil Garvanliev is representing his native country in the upcoming Eurovision Song Contest in Rotterdam. Readers may remember him as one of our models in the 2014 Barihunks Calendar!
Garvanliev and his family moved to the United States when he was a child where he sang in the Chicago’s Children Choir. He is a graduate of the University of Toronto and the Glenn Gould School of
the Royal Conservatory of Music. He was a member of Calgary’s Opera
Emerging Young Artist Program, Glimmerglass Young Artists Program and a member of Opera Atelier, as well as part of the Toronto Summer Music Festival & Academy. He was a winner
of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions – Illinois
District in 2014-15.
He performed over 50 operatic roles before switching to a pop career. As a pop singer, he has released the singles Gjerdan, Patuvam and Mojata Ulica.
In the Eurovision competition he'll be singing You, composed by his friend Nevena Neskoska, a Macedonian born composer who studied songwriting at the Berklee College of Music.
Tickets will go on sale March 26 for performances which run from May 11-16.
Macedoonia has participated in the Eurovision competition times, but has never placed higher than 7th place when Tamara Todevska performed Proud last year.
Barihunk Mariusz Kwiecien continues to cancel performances, with the latest being as Rodrigo in Verdi's Don Carlo at The Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. He will be replaced by fellow barihunk Luca Micheletti, who will be making his company debut in the June 29th performance. This is Kwiecien's second cancellation with the company. Germán E. Alcántara and ByeongMin Gil are also replacing previously announced singers as Flemish deputies.
Micheletti will join a cast that includes Michael Fabiano in the title role, Hibla Gerzmava as Elisabeta, Ferruccio Furlanetto as Filippo II, and Elina Garanca as Princess Eboli. The performances scheduled for July 13, 16, 19 will include Plácido Domingo as Rodrigo. Ticket and cast information is available online.
Luca Micheletti sings "Credo" from Verdi's Otello:
This is the latest in a series of cancellations for Kwiecien, including three with the Dallas Opera, withdrawing from the The Met's Pearl Fishers and as the Count inLe Nozze di Figaro, Dr. Malatesta in Donizetti's Don Pasquale at the Royal Opera House at Covent Garden and the Count in Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro at the Bavarian State Opera.
Repeated
attempts to get a get a comment from his US and European agents have
gone unanswered. There is also no information on his website. We wish him a speedy and healthy recovery to the opera
stage.
Sara LaMesh and Anders Froehlich (photo: Pocket Opera)
American Barihunk Anders Froehlich is no stranger to this site, having appeared on this site rock climbing, as a shirtless Don Giovanni and in a sexy production of Fabrizio Carlone's Bonjour M. Gaugin with West Edge Opera.
He's back as the serial seducer Don Giovanni with San Francisco's Pocket Opera, for performances of the Mozart classic on March 1, 8 and 15. He'll be joined by fellow barihunks Spencer Dodd as his sidekick Leporello and Mitchell Jones as Masetto. Tickets and additional cast information are available online.
Froehlich previously appeared with the company as The Marshal in the premiere of the rarely performed Polish opera The Haunted Manor by Stanisław Moniuszko. He is also a member of the San Francisco Opera Chorus, as well as a trained actor and ballet dancer. He began his professional career at Los Angeles Opera, and has appeared with Opera San Jose, Opera Parallèle and in Ars Minerva's production of La Cleopatra by Daniele da Castrovillari.
Mitchell Jones and Spencer Dodd
Spencer Dodd previously appeared with Pocket Opera as Belcore in Donizetti's Elixir of Love. He has performed with the chorus at both the Sacramento Opera and the San Francisco Opera, and also works as a professional voice teacher.
Mitchell Jones is a former chorus member at the Atlanta Opera, where he also sang the role of the Jailer in Puccini's Tosca. He is a member of both the San Francisco Opera and San Francisco Symphony choruses.
The remainder of Pocket Opera's season includes a double bill of Offenbach's The Cat Became a Woman and Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana, Wagner's Das Liebesverbot, Bizet's Carmen and Rossini's La Cenerentola.
There will be two baritone, two bass-baritones and a bass among the 23 singers chosen to compete in the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions semi-finals. They will move on to a closed competition on Monday, February 24 for the chance to advance to the Grand Finals on March 1st conducted by Bertrand de Billy.
The low male voices include Brent Michael Smith, bass-baritones Joel Allison and Ben Brady, as well as baritones Blake Denson and Xiaomeng Zhang. The remaining competitors includes sopranos Erika Baikoff, Claire de Monteil, Cara Gabrielson, Courtney Johnson, Chasiti Lashay, Jana McIntyre, Whitney Morrison, Alexandria Shiner, Denis Vélez and Suzannah Waddington; mezzo-sopranos Katherine Beck, Gabrielle Beteag, Lindsay Kate Brown and Katherine DeYoung; countertenor Key’mon Murrah; and, tenors Jonah Hoskins, Joseph Leppek and Joshua Sanders.
Met Opera 2020 semi-finalists
This year’s semifinalists were chosen from more than 1,000 singers who participated in auditions held in 40 districts throughout the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico, and Mexico, and who then competed in the 12 regional finals. These auditions are sponsored by the Metropolitan Opera National Council and administered by National Council members and hundreds of volunteers from across the country.
Brent Michael Smith performs "I'm a Lonely Man" from Susannah:
The singers who advance to the Grand Finals will have a week of training with Met musical and dramatic coaches to prepare for the Grand Finals Concert. Each finalist will sing two arias on the Metropolitan Opera stage. Tenor Javier Camarena will perform for the audience while the judges deliberate. Following the performance, the winners will be announced, each of whom will receive a cash prize of $15,000 and career-making exposure.
Results will be posted to @MONCAuditions Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Tickets for the Grand Finals Concert are available online.
The Deutsche Oper Berlin continues its foray into the operas of Giacomo Meyerbeer, who at his death in 1864 was one of the most performed composers in Europe. The company featured a new production of his Les Huguenots in 2016, which was followed by Le prophète the next year. On March 4 and 7 they will perform two concert performances of his rarely seen opera Dinorah, ou Le
Pardon de Ploërmel. more commonly referred to as just Dinorah.
French barihunk Régis Mengus sings Hoël and American barihunk Seth Carico takes on the huntsman. They will be joined by Rocío Pérez in the title role, Philippe Talbot as Corentin, Gideon Poppe as the Harvester, and Nicole Haslett and Karis Tucker as the shepherds. Principal Guest Conductor Enrique Mazzola will lead both
performances.
Jerry Hadley and Thomas Hampson in the Act 2 duet from Dinorah:
The story takes place near the rural town of Ploërmel and is based on two Breton tales by Émile Souvestre, "La Chasse aux trésors" and "Le Kacouss de l'Armor," both published separately in 1850.
Dinorah is betrothed to Hoël. Her cottage has been destroyed in a storm. Hoël, in order to rebuild it, goes into a region haunted by evil spirits searching for a hidden treasure. Dinorah thinking that she's been abandoned loses her reason and wanders through the mountains in search of Hoël accompanied by the sound of her goat's bell.
André Courville, Erik Anstine and Brian James Myer
The Berkshire Opera Festival has announced its 2020 season, which includes Mozart's Don Giovanni starring the barihunk trio of André Courville in the title role, Erik
Anstine as Leoporello and Brian James Myer as Masetto. They will be joined by Laura Wilde as Donna Anna, Joshua Blue as Don
Ottavio, Joanna Latini as Donna Elvira, John Cheek as the Commendatore and Natalia Santaliz as Zerlina.
The new production will be directed by co-founder Jonathan Loy and conducted by artistic
director Brian Garman. The production will include scenic designs by
Stephen Dobay, costumes by Charles Caine, and lighting Alex Jainchill.
The production will open on August 22 with additional performances on the 25th and 28th at the Colonial Theatre in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. Tickets and additional information is available online.
Erik Anstine can next be seen as Osmin in Mozart's Die Entführung aus dem Serail at Opera Omaha on February 7 and 9. André Courville can be heard as Figaro in Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro at the Kentucky Opera from February 14-16. Brian James Myer will be Mercutio in Gounod's Roméo et Juliette at the Knoxville Opera from February 14-29.
A reader alerted us to barihunk Mark Nathan, who is currently a Scottish Opera Emerging Artist, where his roles will include Starveling in Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream in March and April, Mr Goldbury in Gilbert & Sullivan's Utopia Ltd. and Giuseppe in The Gondoliers, all in May and June.
Nathan is appearing in concert on Sunday, January 26th in the Scottish Opera’s Emerging Artists series at Helensburgh Parish Church at the mouth of Gare Loch. He'll be joined by soprano Charlie Drummond and mezzo-soprano Heather Ireson in a program of arias, duets and songs accompanied by Michael Papadopoulos.
Mark Nathan sings Papageno's Suicide Aria:
Nathan studied at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland’s Alexander Gibson Opera School and received his Master's from the London’s Royal College of Music.
He performed Joseph de Rocher in the UK staged premiere of Jake Heggie's Dead Man Walking at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in Glasgow in May 2019. He went on to cover the role at Welsh National Opera and Israeli Opera.
Nathan only sings opera and musical theater, but is a lyricist who has penned Riptide: The Slasher Musical, which was performed at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. The work was honored with an award from the Musical Theatre Network. He has written a number of other musicals, as well as a collection of children’s poems, Riddle Me This, which was set to music by Ronald Corp for the New London Children’s Choir.
George Humphreys' shirtless curtain call in Glass' The Trial
British barihunk George Humphreys just wrapped up a successful run in Carl Maria von Weber's Oberon at the Salzburger Landestheater, where is a member of the ensemble.
He will next appear with the company in Donizetti's comedy Viva la Diva, whose original title was the mouthful Le convenienze e le inconvenienze teatrali (Conventions and Inconveniences of the Stage). Performances start on February 8 and run through April 2.
Donizetti wrote the lead role of La Diva (aka Agata) for a baritone, which opens up
another level of comedy as the singer performs in drag. As the drama unfolds and the jealousies come to
a head, it is up to La Diva to rescue an evening at a theater company trying to mount an opera. Donizetti chose a subject that allowed him to compose both virtuosic and parodistic music.
The opera became a great success after its 1827 world premiere in Naples and 1831 performances in Milan, but was soon forgotten. Regular performances did not resume until 1963. Recent performance include a 2015 production at the Volksoper Wien and one at the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in 2017. The National Theatre Prague is currently staging the opera with Roman Hoza in the title role.
The Salzburger Landestheater produces its own version of the opera with a new translation by Andreas Fladvad-Geier, which revives the tradition of transferring the opera’s plot into a local setting to make the parody of the opera world even easier to recognize and appreciate for audiences.
American barihunk Christopher Bolduc will make his house debut tonight as Marcello at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein's Theater Duisburg in Puccini's La bohème. Bolduc will be joined by fellow barihunks Richard Šveda as Schaunard and Luke Stoker as Colline in a cast that also includes as Luiza Fatyol as Mimi, Luis Gomes as Rodolfo and Lavinia Dames as Musetta.
Director Philipp Westerbarkei has updated the production to contemporary times, with the male foursome wearing muscle shirts and even dancing in pink tutus. Performances with Bolduc are on December 21, 25, March 28 and May 2 and 13.
After the first two performances of La bohème, Bolduc returns to his home base at the Hessiscches Staatstheater Wiesbaden to perform Lescaut in Massenet's Manon, Stern in Mark-Anthony Turnage's Anna Nicole and Belcore in Donizetti's L'elisir d'amore.
Luke Stoker and Richard Šveda in La bohème
Bass-barihunk Luke Stoker is new to this site. He hails from Australia, where he received his Bachelor of Music from the University of Queensland and a Master of Music Studies from the Queensland Conservatorium of Music/Griffith University. In 2013, he was awarded the German Opera Scholarship and subsequently became part of the ensembles at Oper Köln and Oper Dortmund. In January 2020, he will make his role and house debut at the Volksoper Wien as Escamillo in Bizet's Carmen.
Richard Šveda is also new to this site. He has been a member of the ensemble at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein since the 2010-11 season. He has performed most of the leading Mozart baritone roles, including Guglielmo in Così fan tutte, Papageno in The Magic Flute, Count Almaviva in the Marriage of Figaro and the title role in Don Giovanni. The famous soprano Edita Gruberová regularly included him in her concerts with young artists. Mozart continues to fill his calendar, as he performs Don Giovanni at the Slovak National Theater Bratislava and the Count in The Marriage of Figaro at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein in January and May.
Bass-barihunk Hadleigh Adams is going to rack up some frequent flyer miles singing Handel's Messiah this holiday season. Fresh off a huge success as Schaunard in Puccini's La boheme at the Lyric Opera of Kansas City, he heads across the globe to his native New Zealand.
He will sing his first Messiah with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra on December 7th in Wellington. He then hops back on a plane to his home base of San Francisco for three performances of Handel's holiday classic with the American Bach Soloists on December 11, 12 and 13. He then heads south to the Lone Star State for three more Messiah's with the Houston Symphony Orchestra on December 20. 21 and 22.
Composed in just 24 days in 1741, the Messiah received a lukewarm reception at its first London performance. However, over the years it has grown in popularity. Although Messiah is structured like an opera, it features no characters or dialogue.
He'll wrap up the year back in San Francisco for the American Bach Soloists New Years Eve concert. He'll be joined by mezzo-soprano Sarah Coit for arias and duets from Handel, Rameau, Vivaldi and Monteverdi.
Tobias Greenhalgh will sing Caliban and Philip Stoddard will take on Ferdinand in Sibelius' rarely performed The Tempest with the Oregon Symphony on November 23, 24 and 25. The piece is more often heard in suites that the composer extracted from the complete work.
Caliban is the son of a witch-hag who insists that Prospero stole the island from him, of which he is the only native resident in the play. Ferdinand is the son and heir of Alonso, who. seems to be as pure and naïve as Miranda. He falls in love with her upon first sight and happily submits to servitude in order to win her father’s approval.
The idea for music for The Tempest was first suggested to Sibelius in 1901 by his friend Axel Carpelan. In 1925, his Danish publisher Wilhelm Hansen again raised the idea, as the Royal Theatre in Copenhagen was going to stage the work the following year. Sibelius composed it from late 1925 through early 1926. The Tempest and Tapiola were to be his last great works, and he wrote little else for the remaining 32 years of his life, which came to be known as "The Silence of Järvenpää."
The Tempest was first performed in Copenhagen on March 15, 1926. The first night attracted international attention but Sibelius was not present. Reviews noted that "Shakespeare and Sibelius, these two geniuses, have finally found one another", and praised in particular the part played by the music and stage sets. Only four days later Sibelius set off for an extended trip to work on new commissions in Rome. He did not hear the music for the first time until the autumn of 1927 when the Finnish National Theatre in Helsinki staged the work.
Shakespeare's story has inspired 50 operas including Thomas Adès' and Lee Hoiby's The Tempest, Fromental Halévy's La Tempesta, Zdeněk Fibich's Bouře, Frank Martin's Der Sturm and Michael Tippett's The Knot Garden. Incidental music based on The Tempest has been written by Arthur
Sullivan, Ernest Chausson, Malcolm Arnold, Lennox
Berkeley, Arthur Bliss, Engelbert Humperdinck, Hector Berlioz, Willem
Pijper and Henry Purcell.
Tobias Greenhalgh can next be seen as Valentin in Gounod's Faust, Ottakar in Weber's Der Freischütz and Count Almaviva in Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro at the Aalto Theater in Essen, Germany.
The Hamburg State Opera kicked off its Mozart/Da Ponte trilogy of opera with the premiere of Don Giovanni on October 20th featuring the barihunk trilogy of Andrè Schuen in the title role, Kyle Ketelsen as Leporello and Alexander Tsymbalyuk as the Commendatore. Additional performances are on October 23, 26, 29 and November 3, 6 and 9.
On October 22, they will add Così fan tutte to the rotation with barihunk John Chest as Guglielmo. Additional performances will be on October 22, 27, 31 and November 2. The final opera will be Le Nozze di Figaro, which opens on November 1, with additional performances on November 5, 8 and 12. The cast features barihunks Christoph Pohl as the Count and Wilhelm Schwinghammer as Figaro.
Tickets for all three operas are available online.
Alessio Arduini as Don Giovanni in Rome
If you can't make it to an Hamburg or another opera house featuring Don Giovanni, you can watch a performance from the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma on Oct. 26, 2019 on OperaVision. The cast includes barihunk Alessio Arduini in the title role, along wtih Vito Priante, Emanuele Cordaro, Antonio Di Matteo, Juan Francisco Gatell, Maria Grazia Schiavo, Salome Jicia, and Marianne Croux. The livestream may not play in some countries.
Ildar Abdrazakov, Brendon Cedel and Davide Luciano
Four barihunks will be making their Lyric Opera of Chicago debuts in the upcoming production of Mozart's Don Giovanni, which opens on November 14. Russian bass-barihunk Ildar Abdrazakov will alternate the title role along with Davide Luciano, while Brandon Cedel sings Masetto. Finnish basso Mika Kares also makes his debut with the company as the Commendatore after an impressive performance in Mozart's Requiem earlier this year with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
They will be joined by Rachel Willis-Sørensen as Donna Anna, Ben Bliss as Don Ottavio, Amanda Majeski as Donna Elvira, Matthew Rose as Leporello and Ying Fang as Zerlina.
Mika Kares
Don Giovanni was the first opera that the company produced in early
1954 in an effort to gauge Chicago's support for a new opera company. Needless to say, it was quite a success, considering the cast included Nicola Rossi–Lemeni as Don Giovanni, John Brownlee as Leporello, Eleanor
Steber as Donna Anna, Léopold Simoneau as Don Ottavio and Bidú Sayão as
Zerlina. The debut season also included Maria Callas performing her signature role of Norma.
The current production will be the company's eleventh performance of the season. There will be nine performances from November 14 through 8. Tickets are available online. David Luciano will perform on December 3 and 8, while Ildar Abdrazakov sings on all other dates.
Erwin Schrott in Don Giovanni(Photo: Mark Douet, ROH)
Erwin Schrott is currently performing the title role in Mozart's Don Giovanni at the Royal Opera House in London, which runs through October 10th. If you can't make the performance, you're in luck, as it will be shown in theaters in 53 countries encompassing 1,000 movie houses. Screenings will be on October 6 and 13.
Schrott will be joined by barihunks Roberto Tagliavini as Leporello and Leon Košavić as Masetto, along with Malin Byström as Donna Anna, Daniel Behle as Don Ottavio, Christine Rice as Donna Elvira, Louise Alder as Zerlina and Peter Magoulas as the Commendatore.
Roberto Tagliavini and Leon Košavić
Kasper Holten’s production casts Don Giovanni as an artist who thrives on an audience enticed by his creative gifts.
Schrott next heads to the Teatro Real in Madrid to perform Dulcamara in Donizetti's L'elisir d'amore from October 29-November 12. Tagliavini heads off to the Opéra de Lyon to sing de Silva in Verdi's Ernani opening on November 8th. Košavić will head to the Opera Vlaanderen to sing Herzog Alba in Schreker's rarely performed Der Schmied von Gent.
The Lotte Lenya Competition will begin taking applications on September 3rd. The competition seems to attract the best barihunk talent, many of whom have walked away with the top prize, including John Brancy, Trevor Martin, Lucas Meachem, Liam Bonner and Jonathan Michie, Doug Carpenter, as well as hunkentenor Noah Stewart. Bass-barihunk Justin Hopkins took away second prize in 2012.
The Lotte Lenya Competition is an international theater singing contest
that recognizes talented young singer-actors, ages 19 to 32, 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.
John Brancy's 2018 winning set:
Singers are required to sing one theatrical selection by Kurt Weill, one song from the pre-1968 “Golden Age” of American musical theater, one song from the American musical theater repertoire of 1968 or later, and one aria from the operatic or operetta repertoire
Applicants will be required to upload an audition video that includes all four of the required repertoire selections. Applications can be found online. The competition will hand out $75,000 in prize money this year, including $20,000 for the Grand Prize.
Canadian bass-barihunk Robert Gleadow has become the Figaro of choice in Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro for many of the world's leading opera houses. He'll be singing the role at the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia in Valencia from September 27-October 6. The cast will include Andrzej Filończyk as the Count, María José Moreno as the Countess, Sabina Puértolas as Susanna, Cecilia Molinari as Cherubino, Susana Cordón as Marcellina and Valeriano Lanchas as Bartolo. Tickets are available online.
He then takes the role to the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris from November 26-Decmeber 7 with fellow barihunk Stéphane Degout as the Count, the legendary Jennifer Larmore taking on Marcellina, Sabine Devieilhe as Susanna, Vannina Santoni as the Countess and Mathias Vidal as Basilio. Tickets are available online.
He then flies to the La monnaie in Belgium for more of Figaro from February 18-March 21 with fellow barihunk Björn Bürger as the Count, Simona Šaturová as the Countess, Alexander Roslavets as Basilio, Ginger Costa-Jackson as Cherubino and Rinat Shaham as Marcellina. The company is doing the entire "Mozart-Da Ponte" series this season, with Gleadow's Leporello making up a "barihunk trio" in Don Giovanni that includes Björn Bürger in the title role and Iurii Samoilov as Masetto. Samoilov also appears as Guglielmo in Così fan tutte.Tickets are available online.
Marie-Adeline Henry as Donna Elvira & Robert Gleadow as Leporello (Photo: Mats Bäcker)
In Bordeaux, it will be Gleadow who sings roles in each of the "Mozart-Da Ponte" operas in May 2020, taking on Leporello, Figaro and Guglielmo. Tickets and additional cast information is available online.
We asked Gleadow about the role of Figaro and he had this to say, "I'd say he's one of the most loveable characters in the operatic repertoire. He's big-hearted, hot-blooded, quick-witted, overconfident; who's easy to root for and wears his heart on his sleeve (when the Count is out of the room anyway....). We see the entire spectrum of emotion throughout his "Folle Journée". Happiness, love, naiveté, jealousy, anger, humour, finding his parents, winning the girl, and defeating a rival. A true jack of all trades!"
Robert Gleadow and Serena Malfi sing Così fan tutte
Robert Gleadow was born in Toronto and was a member of the Opera Studio of the Canadian Opera Company of Toronto and the Jette Parker Young Artist Programme of the Royal Opera House in London.
Mozart has played a big role in his career, having performed the aforementioned roles, as well as Publio in La clemenza di Tito and the Speaker in Die Zauberflöte.
He can be heard as Lorenzo in Bellini's I Capuleti e i Montecchi with Anna Netrebko on Deutsche Grammophon.
John Chest as Billy Budd at the Deutsche Oper Berlin(Photo: Marcus Lieberenz)
In celebration of Herman Melville's bicentennial and the 100th anniversary of the posthumous
discovery of the author's unfinished manuscript of Billy Budd, the San Francisco Opera will present Benjamin Britten's operatic version from September 7-22.
This will be only the fourth time that the opera has been performed in the company's history. It was last performed during the 2004-05 season with barihunks Nathan Gunn as Billy Budd, Philip Skinner as Mr. Ratcliff, Mel Ulrich as Donald, Daniel Okulitch as the Gunner's mate, Lucas Meachem as the Novice's Friend, Troy Cook as Mr. Flint and Joshua Bloom as the First Mate.
Nathan Gunn as Billy Budd at the SF Opera (Photo: Merkle)
The all-male cast of 75 principle artists and choristers, will be led by barihunk John Chest in the title role. Chest returns to San Francisco, where he was a member of the Merola Opera Program. Chest has performed the role twice with the Deutsche Oper Berlin in 2014 and 2017.
The cast also include a veritable feast of barihunks and bass-barihunks, including Christian van Horn as the evil John Claggart, Hadleigh Adams as Arthur Jones, Christian Pursell as Lieutenant Ratcliffe, Wayne Tigges as Mr. Flint, John Brancy as Donald, Edward Nelson as Bosun, Sidney Outlaw as First Mate, Kenneth Overton as Second Mate, Eugene Villanueva as the Novice's Friend and Philip Skinner as Dansker. The critical role of Captain Vere will be sung by tenor William Burden.
The production will be by Tony Award-winning
director Michael Grandage, who unveiled this staging at the 2010 Glyndebourne Festival and revived it at the Brooklyn Academy Of Music in 2014.
Tickets and additional cast information is available online.
The CBC recently ran a feature called "30 Hot Canadian Classical Musicians Under 30." They surveyed Canada's conservatories, music competitions and professional training programs to come up with their list. Although we at Barihunks take the word "HOT" to mean sexy, it appears that they are going for a double meaning, with "HOT" also meaning "musicians with talent to keep an eye on."
This year they didn't manage to come up with a single barihunk, despite having included them in past years, including Philippe Sly and Gordon Bintner. So we decided to add two to the list.
Micah Schroeder
Canadian-American baritone Micah Schroeder will be appearing as Harlekin in Richard Strauss' Ariadne auf Naxos with the Highlands Opera Studio in Haliburton, Ontario on August 24 an 26. He is a 2018 graduate of the Vancouver Opera Yulanda M. Faris Young Artist Program and an alumni of the Aspen Opera Centre, as well as The Banff Centre of Arts and Creativity. He recently completed a Diploma in Operatic Performance from the University of Toronto and holds a Bachelor of Music and Master of Music in Opera from the University of British Columbia.
Dimitri Katotakis
Toronto native Dimitri Katotakis studied at McGill University and Juilliard, before being accepted into the prestigious Merola Opera Program in San Francisco. Last year, he was part of Steven Blier's New York Festival of Song concert "Protest." He was the Second Prize winner at the Canadian Opera Company's vocal competition.
Björn Bürger as Papageno and Sofia Fomina as Pamina
You can watch German barihunk Björn Bürger online in the Glyndebourne Festival Opera’s new production of Mozart's Die zauberflöte on the The Telegraph's website. You can watch it live on Sunday, August 4 at 5.35 PM BST/12:35 PM EST/9:35 AM PST and then on demand for seven days until Monday, August 12 at 9.30 AM BST/4:30 AM EST/1:30 AM PST.
Björn Bürger in trailer for Die zauberflöte:
Björn Bürger was previously featured in Glyndebourne's streaming video of Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia.
There are eleven performances at Glyndebourne remaining running through August 24, with an additional performance at the BBC Proms on August 27.
Barihunk Tobias Greenhalgh will make his role debut as Silvio in Ruggero Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci with the Boston Lyric Opera this Fall. It will be the first time that the company has performed the classic verismo opera.
The opera will be performed at the DCR Steriti Memorial Ice Rink, where the company has previously performed Leonard Bernstein's Trouble in Tahiti. Greenhalgh will be joined by tenor Rafael Rojas as Canio and Lauren Michelle as Nedda. Performances will run from September 27 – October 6, 2019 and tickets are available online.
Tobias Greenhlagh in Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin:
This season, Greenhalgh is joining the ensemble at the Aalto-Musiktheater Essen where his roles will include Count Almavivia in Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro in June 2020, Valentin in Gounod's Faust running from April-June 2010 and Ottokar in Weber's Der Freischütz, also running form April-June 2020. Tickets and additional cast information is available online.
