David Adam Moore as Stanley Kowalski(Photo @dabva)
The Teatro Colón has announced its 2019 season, which will include barihunk David Adam Moore as Stanley Kowalski in Andre Previn’s A Streetcar Named Desire, in what will be the South American premiere of the opera. Moore has had great success with the role at both the Lyric Opera of Chicago and the Virginia Opera.
The opera is based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning play by Tennessee Williams and has become a showcase for barihunks, including Gregory Gerbrandt, Dan Kempson, Rod Gilfry, Ryan McKinny, Teddy Tahu Rhodes and Jordan Shanahan.
A Streetcar Named Desire was premiered at the San Francisco Opera
in 1998 with Rod Gilfry as Stanley and its become one of the most
popular contemporary American operas in the repertory. It has gone on to
see performances in New Orleans, Kentucky, Carnegie Hall in New York San Diego, Washington D.C.,
San Francisco (Merola Opera), Cleveland, Chicago, Santa Barbara,
Honolulu and Virginia Opera. It had it European premiere in Strasbourg
in 2001 and its U.K. premiere in 2003, with subsequent performances
throughout Europe and in Tokyo.
The Teatro Colón cast will also include Sarah Jane McMahon, Eric Fennell, and Victoria Livengood. Performances run from May 7-14, 2019
The lastest barihunk to take on Stanley Kowalski in André Previn's A Streetcar Named Desire is Gregory Gerbrandt, who will sing the role with Opera Santa Barbara on April 24 and 26. In recent months we've seen Wes Mason take on the iconic role at Kentucky Opera, Ryan McKinny at the Los Angeles Opera and Dan Kempson with Townsend Opera and Fresno Grand Opera.
Gerbrandt will have some help in creating an authentic New Orleans flavor, as his Mitch is New Orleans native Casey Candebat. Joining them in the cast are Beverly O'Regan Thiele as Blanche DuBois and Micaela Oeste as Stella.
Dan Kempson, Wes Mason and Ryan McKinny as Stanley Kowalski
The production will utilize the revised score prepared by Peter Grunberg for the Merola Opera, which reduces the score from a 70-piece orchestra to a 40-piece ensemble. Jose Maria Condemi, who directed the opera at Merola and Kentucky Opera, will direct the work again in Santa Barbara. Candebat also sang the role of Mitch at the Merola Opera.
The production next travels to the Tulsa Opera where barihunk Jordan Shanahan will take on the role on March 4 and 6, 2016.
We always thought that no one could possibly like Mozart's Don Giovanni more than those of us involved with Barihunks. After all, the opera has given us more sexy photos than humanly imaginable, with Leporello, Masetto and the Don often cast with stunningly handsome men in various states of undress.
Then along cam the documentary movie “Naked Opera,” which tells the story of Marc Rollinger, an obsessed opera fan who
travels around the world to see productions of Don Giovanni. His goal is to find the perfect production of the Mozart classic. His travels take him to Venice,
Vienna, and Berlin and the movie features clips from Joseph Losey's classic film starring Ruggero Raimondi, José van Dam, Edda Moser and Kiri Te Kanawa.
Rollinger's travels are a way to escape his mundane existence and he enhances the experience by surrounding himself with gorgeous young men. He lavishes them with great food, expensive champagne and luxury hotel suites.
You'll have a tough time finding a viewing of the movie, as it has seen very limited release. It did manage to win the Heiner-Carow-Award during this years Berlinale. The DVD is available for purchase in Europe, but not in the US. You can order a copy HERE.
If you're like Rollinger and pining for the next great production of Don Giovanni, you may want to head to St. Gallen, Switzerland where a trio of barihunks who have appeared on this site are performing; Palle Knudsen as Don Giovanni, Jordan Shanahan as Masetto and Matt Boehler as Leporello. Performances run through December 30th.
A loyal reader who is catching some opera in Switzerland next week alerted us to the Don Giovanni in St. Gallen, which features four singers who have appeared on this site. Of course, there are two casts, so one won't find them all on stage at once. Performances will be running throughout the remainder of the calendar year, so there is plenty of time to make your travel plans and catch both casts.
Rotating as the title character are Danish barihunk Palle Knudsen and Dutch barihunk Thomas Oliemans, who was first brought to our attention by the very same reader. Oliemans released a recording of Schubert's Schwanengesang in 2011 with Malcolm Martineau that is not to be missed.
Matt Boehler sings Leporello's Catalog aria:
Alternating as Leporello are Swedish baritone Gabriel Suovanen, who is new to this site, and American Matt Boehler, who we featured when he made his New York City Opera debut as the Hotel Manager in Thomas Ades’ Powder Her Face. Boehler is now part of the regular ensemble at St. Gallen. Upcoming performances include Daland in Wagner's Der fliegende Hollander, Sparafucile in Verdi's Rigoletto and Der Pfarrer in Janacek's The Cunning Little Vixen.
Jordan Shanahan, as seen in the Barihunks charity calendar
Alternating as Masetto are American baritones Jordan Shanahan and David Maze. Shanahan, you may recall was featured in our Barihunks calendar in photos taken from Jake Heggies' Dead Man Walking. Shanahan is also part of the ensemble at St. Gallen where he will be featured as Harlekin in Richard Strauss' Ariadne auf Naxos, Marullo in Verdi's Rigoletto, Harasta in Janacek's The Cunning Little Vixen and Fritz in Korngold's Die tote Stadt.
Anicio Zorzi Giustiniani
For those of you who like a little tenor eye candy, as well, check out the Don Ottavio of Anicio Zorzi Giustiniani. If the owners of the Hunkentenors site ever decide to resurrect their site, Giustiniani should be their next post. The guy can sing, too.
Michael Mayes (L) & John Packard (R) as Joseph de Rocher
Michael Mayes created quite a stir when we posted pictures of him on Barihunks as Joseph de Rocher in the Tulsa Opera production of Jake Heggie's Dead Man Walking. We followed it up with a post about his dramatic weight loss and workout routine that got him his "prison gym" body, which also generated intense interest. Mayes received rave reviews for his intense performance and became the talk of the opera world overnight even though he was performing in a city that is hardly considered an opera capital of the world. Such is the power of the internet.
Philip Cutlip (top) and Daniel Okulitch (bottom)
Heggie's opera has quickly become a mainstay of the operatic standard repertory, something that rarely happens this soon after a work's debut. The opera premiered at the San Francisco Opera in 2000 with an all-star cast led by John Packard as Joseph de Rocher, Frederick von Stade an his mother, Susan Graham as Sister Helen Prejean and Jay Hunter Morris as Father Grenville.
Mel Ulrich (L) & Teddy Tahu Rhodes (R)
Some of the hottest barihunks in the world have taken on the role of Joseph de Rocher including Teddy Tahu Rhodes, Mel Ulrich, Daniel Okulitch, Jordan Shanahan, Marcus DeLoach and Philip Cutlip.
Here is a promo piece from the Dresden Opera in German:
Just over 5,000 miles from Tulsa, as the curtain comes down on the final performance of Dead Man Walking, another production is running at the Semperoper in Dresden with John Packard returning as the convicted killer. Remaining performance are on March 4, 9, 18 and 23 with Antigone Papoulkas as Sister Helen Prejean. Tickets are still available and can be purchased online.
In related casting news about barihunks who played Joseph de Rocher, read our recent post about Daniel Okulitch, who is reprising Willy Wonka in Atlanta, a role that he created. Philip Cutlip opens two weeks from today as Guglielmo in Mozart's Cosi fan tutte at New York City Opera in a cast that includes fellow barihunk Rod Gilfry. Michael Mayes heads to the Ft. Worth Opera Festival to perform in Mark Adamo's Lysistrata, Jordan Shanahan will be performing in La boheme with the Green Mountain Cultural Festival, Marcus DeLoach will be performing in Of Mice and Men with the Utah Opera and Teddy Tahu Rhodes will be taking his famous Don Giovanni to Bordeaux opposite the Leporello of fellow barihunk Kostas Smoriginas
We recently posted about Jordan Shanahan portraying Joseph de Roucher in Jake Heggie's "Dead Man Walking" at Union Avenue Opera in Missouri. All that was missing were the Barihunks=worthy photographs, so here they are:
Jordan Shanahan
Jordan Shanahan as Joseph de Roucher
Jordan Shanahan as Joseph de Roucher (We know what you're thinking)
You can listen to Jordan Shanahan singing the Confession Scene from "Dead Man Walking" here (not from the recent production):
If you're a barihunk or know one who is worthy of our 2012 charity calendar, you can submit High Res photos and a brief bio to Barihunks@gmail.com
Elise Quagliata as Sister Helen Prejean Jordan Shanahan as Joseph De Rocher
Jordan Shanahan, who won our favorite opera couple poll along with his wife Audrey Luna, will be peforming Joseph De Rocher in Jake Heggie's "Dead Man Walking" with the Union Avenue Opera in Missouri. The opera is the modern-day story of Sister Helen Prejean and her journey as she undertakes the role of spiritual advisor to Joseph De Rocher, an inmate on Louisiana's death row.
Performances will take place August 19, 20, 26, and 27 at 8:00 p.m. The real-life Sister Helen Prejean will be attending the opening night performance on August 19th. Tickets for the dinner are $250.00 per person. Additional information is available HERE.
We love seeing our reader responses to our poll questions. Not only is it fun, but it helps inform us what is of interest to you. It's been fun watching the current race to see who your favorite opera couple is in the world. As of today, three couples are leading the pack, so make sure to vote.
Dan Kempson & Zach Altman
Anna Netrebko & Erwin Schrott
Jordan Shanhan & Audrey Luna
Jordan Shanahan showers while singing some Mozart:
Lunahan: Jordan Shanhan & Audrey Luna (photo by Greg James)
We've featured many opera couples on this site, from barihunk couples like Zach Altman and Dan Kempson, to superstar couples like Erwin Schrott/Anna Netrebko and Teddy Tahu Rhodes/Isabel Leonard. So let us introduce two fast rising stars who have also tied the knot, Tebaldi International Voice Competition winner Audrey Luna and Jordan Shanahan, who has been featured on this site before.
The original Barihunk couple: Dan Kempson (L) & Zach Altman (R)
The couple is singing Rosina and Figaro in Rossini's "Barber of Seville" in a collaboration between Mississippi Opera and Opera Memphis. They begin in Jackson, Mississippi on Saturday, April 9th and then head to Delta State University in Cleveland on Tuesday, April 12th. The production then wraps up in Memphis with performances on April 16 and 17.
You can hear Shanahan sing the famous "Largo al factotum" at his website.
Since all of the star couples have nicknames, we're suggesting "Lunahan" for opera's new love couple.
The new issue of Opera News has features on barihunks Simon Keenlyside and Paulo Szot, so we almost missed Jordan Shananan. Luckily, one of our readers reminded us about this young barihunk whose career is taking off in a big way. Fortunately, we also found this video of him taking a shower and singing (what else?) Don Giovanni.
Here is Brian Kallow's feature on Shananan from Opera News:
Jordan Shanahan has a natural gift: he instinctively knows how to let the music breathe, and he never pushes himself, musically or dramatically. Yet his warm lyric baritone always has a delicate edge that stays with you. Singing Yeletsky's aria at the 2008 Gerda Lissner competition, he was a model of musical precision, economy and refinement.
Born and raised in Hawaii, Shanahan was trained as a trombonist and began studying voice as a way of improving his breath control. "I don't need as much breath to sing," he says. "What you need is a more focused, sustained, but lesser pressure. It was learning how to roll the dial back a bit." He got work in the chorus of Hawaii Opera Theatre before his teacher, Robert McFarland, secured a scholarship for him at Temple University. "I jumped in head first," recalls Shanahan. "I got to do Silvio in Pagliacci, Ford in The Merry Wives of Windsor. I decided this was a lot more fun than being in the pit as a trombone player." Eventually, he made his way to Lyric Opera of Chicago's Ryan Opera Center. He's racked up a number of major competition wins, including the Lissner, the Licia Albanese–Puccini Foundation and the George London Foundation. After he sang in the semifinals of the National Council Auditions, the Met offered him a spot as second cover for Nathan Gunn in Tobias Picker's An American Tragedy. "It was a great opportunity to come into the house with almost no pressure," says Shanahan. "I didn't have a single stage rehearsal. I got to see the process and work with people at the highest level, and it sort of humanized the business for me."
Though he misses the climate and openness of the people in Hawaii, he admits that "growing up there, nothing seemed real. I never got to see any of these people in person. I would listen to the Met on Saturday and watch PBS, but opera singers were like movie stars."
At thirty-two, Shanahan has a repertory that ranges from Posa in Don Carlo to Joe in Jake Heggie's Dead Man Walking to covering Gerald Finley in Doctor Atomic at the Met. In June 2008, Shanahan married soprano Audrey Luna. Chicago is their home base, but this month he's back at the Met, as Horatio in Ambroise Thomas's Hamlet. "It's by far the biggest thing I have ever done," he says. "Stylistically, I don't know that my personality is a 100-percent fit with the French style. I think I'm much more Verdian than the even keel that the French asks for. Actually, people have never known what to make of my voice. In this age of specialists — 'I'm a Rossini singer,' 'I'm a Mozart singer' — people don't run the gamut as much as they used to. I think there's some value to being a generalist."
