Introducing British barihunk Huw Montague Rendall

Huw Montague Rendall

We learned about British barihunk Huw Montague Rendall in a unique manner, having seen him as response to our question on Twitter and Facebook: "Name a parent and their child who both sang opera professionally."

It turns out that Huw Montague Rendell comes from operatic royalty, being the son of British mezzo-soprano Diana Montague and tenor David Rendall, who also was one of his voice teachers.

Montague Rendall graduated from the Royal College of Music and was as a 2016 Jerwood Young Artist with the Glyndebourne Festival Opera. At Glyndebourne he sang the role of Fiorello in Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia, for which he was awarded the John Christie Award. The following summer he joined the prestigious Young Artist Programme at the Salzburg Festspiele where he made his debut in the role of Second Apprentice in Berg's Wozzeck. He is currently a member of the International Opera Studio Zürich with fellow barihunk Cody Quattlebaum. 

Huw Montague Rendall sings "Avant de quitter ces lieux" from Gounod's Faust: 

On July 4th, he'll make his debut as Harlequin in Richard Strauss' Ariadne auf Naxos at the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence in a cast that includes Lise Davidsen as Ariadne, Eric Cutler as Bacchus, Sabine Devieilhe as Zerbinetta and Angela Brower as The Composer. He will also be making house debuts this season wit the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, Komische Oper Berlin and Garsington Opera. In Zürich his roles include the Nazarene in Richard Strauss' Salome with Catherine Naglestad in the title role, Yamadori in Puccini's Madama Butterfly with Saimir Pirgu as Pinkerton and Svetlana Aksenova as Cio-Cio San, and Nardo in Mozart's La finta giardiniera, which runs from May 5-18.

Introducing Italian Barihunk® Mattia Olivieri

Mattia Olivieri: Don Giovanni (left), rehearsing Belcore (right)

Italian barihunk Mattia Olivieri will be starring as Nardo in Mozart's La finta giardiniera at Glyndebourne from October 5-23. The production then goes on tour to Woking, Canterbury, Norwich, Milton Keynes, Plymouth, Dublin & Stoke-on-Trent.

Mozart wrote  La finta giardiniera when he was just 18 years old for the Salvatortheater in Munich. Mozart based the opera on Goldoni's play Pamela nubile and it was only his second comic opera. The story follows seven characters in search of love, involving disguise, and recognition of both identities and emotions - trying to discover what is real and what is finta (fake). You can listen to an earlier performance of the opera on BBC 3 starring Gyula Orendt as Nardo and the amazing tenor Joel Prieto as Count Belfiore. It will be available until October 22.

Mattia Olivieri as Ping at the Arena di Verona:

30-year-old Mattia Olivieri was born in Sassuolo, Italy and studied at the G.B. Martini Music Conservatory in Bologna and at the G.B. Pergolesi Music Conservatory in Fermo. He made his operatic debut in 2008 as the Imperial Commissioner in Puccini's Madama Butterfly and Fiorello in Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia at the Tuscan Lyric Festival. He also toured Italy as Papageno in Mozart's Die Zauberflöte as part of a nationwide opera education project.

In 2012, he sang Dulcamara in Donizetti's L’elisir d’amore at the Sarzana Opera Festival and Don Prudenzio in Rossini's Il viaggio a Reims with the Rossini Academy in Pesaro. This year he's sung the title role in Mozart's Don Giovanni in Palermo and Ping in Puccini's Turandot at the Arena di Verona.

After the tour of La finta giardiniera, he sings more Mozart as he takes on Guglielmo in Cosi fan tutte in Nice. In August 2015, he makes his debut at La Scala in Milan as Schaunard in Puccini's La boheme followed by Belcore in Donizetti's L’elisir d’amore.

Glyndebourne's La finta Giardiniera broadcast on BBC Radio 3

Gyula Orendt

BBC 3 radio will broadcast Mozart's La finta Giardiniera on their initial Opera on 3 offering on Monday, September 22 at 7:15 PM GMT/2:15 PM EST. The performance is from this summer's Glyndebourne Festival and includes barihunk Gyula Orendt as Nardo and hunkentenor Joel Prieto as Count Belfiore with the Age of Enlightenment Orchestra conducted by Robin Ticciati.

Written when he was only eighteen, Mozart comic opera La finta Giardiniera on Goldoni's is based on the play Pamela nubile. The story follows seven characters in search of love, involving disguise, and recognition of both identities and emotions - trying to discover what is real and what is 'finta'.

Gyula Orendt sings Gounod's "Queen of Love":

Martin Handley presents, and during the interval discusses the opera with Mozart specialist Professor Cliff Eisen. You can tune in HERE.

Gyula Orendt, who is of Hungarian-Romanian  descent, studied singing at the Transilvania Music University in Brasov, Romania, and completed his studies at the Academy of Music Franz Liszt in Budapest, where he was also trained as a singing teacher. He won at the Francisco Viñas Competition in Barcelona the Mozart Prize and the prize for oratorio/lieder.


Since 2013, he has been a member of the Berlin State Opera, where his roles since have included Silvano in Verdi's Un ballo in maschera, Papageno, Figaro in Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia, Cesare Angelotti in Puccini's Tosca and Tempo/Consiglio in Cavalieri's Rappresentatione di anima et di corpo. He made his Royal Opera debut in 2012 singing the Gamekeeper in Dvorak's Rusalka. He returns to London this season to sing the title role in Monteverdi's Orfeo at the Roundhouse.

Quartet of Barihunks arrives at Merola

Hadleigh Adams

It's not often that we post about events in the same city two days in a row, but there has been quite a bit of chatter about some of the barihunks in the Merola Opera Program in San Francisco. It started with and email that read, "Have you seen Hadleigh Adams? Whoa!" It's been a steady stream of "tips" about this model turned opera singers since he arrived in San Francisco. 

Of course, we were tipped off about the New Zealand native years ago by our eagle eye down under in Australia. Adams will be performing in Merola's Schwabacher Summer Concerts on July 5th and 7th, where he'll be performing Ralph's aria "Quand la flamme de l'amour" from Bizet's rarely heard La jolie fille de Perth. The concert on July 5th is at the Herbst Theater and the July 7th concert is free to the public at Yerba Buena Gardens. 

Seth Mease Carico as he appears in the Barihunks calendar

Also at Merola is Seth Mease Carico, who is one of our 2012 Charity Calendar models and a regular on this site. Carico, recently scored another critical success in his young career as Leonidas in the Fort Worth Opera's production of Mark Adamo's Lysistrata. Don't miss the pictures we posted of Carico and fellow barihunk Michael Mayes in drag at a mock "Battle of the Sexes" event promoting Lysistrata. Admittedly, he won't be a contestant on RuPaul's Drag Race, but it ranks as one of our favorite posts of all time. 

Carico will also be performing in Merola's Schwabacher Summer Concerts and singing Nick Shadow's music from Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress. We've had the good fortune of having seen this American singer a few times and he's an artist well ahead of years and not to be missed. 

Joseph Lattanzi: Opera singer or Brooks Brothers model?

We've been following the budding career of Joseph Lattanzi with great interest. Like Adams and Carico, he is perfectly suited to where opera is heading with HD broadcasts. All three singers are perfectly suited for the stage, but also have the looks to start hearts fluttering on the big screen. He's also one of our 2012 Barihunks Charity Calendar models.

We've posted about Lattanzi's recent work with the Seattle Young Artists Program and added him to our growing list of singing competition winners (Palm Beach Opera Junior Division Winner). 

Lattanzi will be performing in Merola's Postcard from Morocco by Dominick Argento on July 19th and 21st at San Francisco's Cowell Theater. 

Gordon Bintner

A new singer to us is bass Gordon Bintner, who joins the growing list of Canadian barihunks on the site. The Saskatchewan native attended McGill University and studied with the great baritone Sanford Sylvan. (As an aside, recent Merola sensation and Metropolitan Opera National Council winner Philippe Sly also studied at McGill.) Bintner also has been wowing judges at competitions, having won the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal Standard Life competition in 2011. 

Bintner wil be performing Mozart’s La finta giardiniera with Merola on August 2nd and 4th at San Francisco's Cowell Theater. 

You can see all of the wonderful Merola singers at their Grand Finale on August 18th. Tickets and memberships can be purchased online. 

CONTACT US AT Barihunks@gmail.com