Seattle Gay Scene bemoans missing Mariusz

If you don't think fans of barihunks (small "b") love their singers, then check out the latest issue of the Seattle Gay Scene, which dedicates a whole article to the fact that Mariusz Kwiecien, who appears in the Seattle Opera's marketing materials does not actually appear in the Seattle Opera's production of Mozart's Don Giovanni.

We have to admit that were impressed that writer Michael Strangeways actually knew that Mariusz Kwiecien was one of the inspirations for Barihunks (big "B').  In fact after two of us had seen the "Hot Pole" in separate productions of Don Giovanni (in Seattle and San Francisco), the seeds of this site were planted seven years ago. So, naturally, one would think that we'd be disappointed, too. But we're regulars at the Seattle Opera and have no doubt that they will deliver an amazing performance of Mozart's timeless classic.

Evan Boyer and Erik Anstine (in his BARIHUNK tee shirt)

In fact, they've cast two singers who have been featured on this site, Evan Boyer as Masetto and Erik Anstine as Leporello. Those two should adequately fill the requisite "minimum barihunk requirement" for Don Giovanni. French bass Nicolas Cavallier will sing the title role. Performances will run from October 18 through November 1 and tickets and additional cast information are available online.

Mariusz Kwiecien on the Lyric Opera of Chicago website

If Michael Strangeways, or anyone else, wants to see Mariusz Kwiecien as The Don, then should fly to the Windy City, where he's starring in their production alongside fellow barihunk Kyle Ketelsen's Leporello. The Lyric Opera of Chicago even has a feature online called "Rolling with the Don" where the singer talks about the role (and is referred to as a "barihunk"). Performances run through October 29th and tickets are available online. Oddly, Lyric's website does not list who is singing Masetto.

Huffington Post: "Christian Van Horn -- A Busy Season at San Francisco Opera"

Christian Van Horn (as Oroveso - left)

Christian Van Horn  is part of a cast that is delivering old-fashioned vocal fireworks at the San Francisco Opera.  Joined by Sondra Radvonovsky as Norma, Jamie Barton and Russell Thomas as Pollione, the vocal quartet has already been dubbed The Fantastic Four by the opera staff. It's rare that an Oroveso receives this much attention, but Van Horn delivered a performance that defined the role for this generation. Sean Martinfield ran the following feature in the Huffington Post:

Christian Van Horn is Oroveso in San Francisco Opera's new production of Bellini's Norma. The bel canto gem opened the 2014/15 Season on September 5, making Christian's resounding bass-baritone the first voice to be heard in the company's 92nd season. As Chief of the Druids and father of Norma, the community's High Priestess, Oroveso enters and instructs the soldiers and priests to watch for the light of the silvery new moon. At that moment, the sacred gong will be struck, whereupon Norma will enter and deliver a mandate from their god. In no uncertain volume, Oroveso rouses the mens spirits predicting that the message will be a clear declaration of war against the occupying Roman forces. The clamor of defeat will reverberate even to the streets of Rome. Oroveso is persuasive in his vision of victory and Christian Van Horn is precisely the brand of baritone Bellini had in mind. For die-hard fans of Norma, a season opening is a dream come true. It has been nine years since San Francisco Opera last presented the work - and another seven before that.

"This is not La Bohème, you know," observed Christian. "I think it says a lot about the audience - that the company feels comfortable putting this on. This is a big opening and I think San Francisco is ready for it. Even Wagner has opinions about Norma, being one of his favorites - you have to cast heavy, top-to-bottom. You get vocal theatrics and there's no opportunity for passive performing. You have to be aggressively on top of it to make the opera what it needs to be. It is a privilege to sing this music. My role is a good size role. Bellini left us a document to go by and we have to follow what's in there. But within that - with Maestro Nicola Luisotti at the helm - there are these slight moments to be artistic."

[Read the entire interview HERE]

There are four performances of Norma remaining at the San Francisco Opera between September 19-30 and tickets are available online. 

David Adam Moore in innovative Alcina in NYC

David Adam Moore as Melisso in Alcina (Photo: Philippe Tremblay-Berberi)

David Adam Moore, who is featured in October in our 2014 Barihunks Charity Calendar, is currently appearing in Handel's Alcina in director R. B. Schlather's innovative production at the Whitebox Art Center in New York City. There will be performances on September 20 and 21 at the Whitebox main exhibition space.

Handel’s 1735 opera Alcina is a story of love and illusion that includes some of the composer's most inventive and melodic music. Schlather is staging this work in an untraditional opera venue and is opening up all the musical and staging rehearsals up to September 17, as well as the General Rehearsal on September 19th at 7pm.  These rehearsals are free, except on Thursdays, thanks to an IndieGoGo campaign, which you can still donate to. For the final performances, the opera will be enacted live with an orchestra, in Italian, utilizing new technologies with projected English subtitles.

The opera is set on the island of the enchantress Alcina, and explores themes of identity, illusion, and transformation. This island exists as a beautiful landscape in the middle of the ocean, where Alcina culls her powers to create a paradise, only to lure and seduce the knights that wash up on her shore, one of whom is the heroic Ruggiero. Alcina’s magic causes Ruggiero to fall under her spell and, in doing so, he forsakes his duty as a knight and forgets his fiancée, Bradamante. The opera develops as Bradamante disguises herself as a male warrior her brother “Ricciardo” and sets out on a mission to recover her love.

Accompanied by Alcina’s guardian, Melisso (played by David Adam Moore), the two are shipwrecked on Alcina’s island by fate. Imminent danger awaits Ruggiero, as Alcina possesses the power to transform her foes and lovers of whom she tires into rocks, trees, and wild beasts. The already heavily dramatized plot is further complicated by the integration of different characters who all, in their own right, act on emotions of love and jealousy. In portraying Alcina’s thickened plot, Schlather’s production brings to life a story of enchantment, folding into it classic operatic moments of romance, betrayal, violence, unrequited love, and magic.

Click HERE for tickets.

Pallesen and Abdrazakov performing in Richard Tucker Gala

Ildar Abdrazakov and Nicholas Pallesen

Barihunks Nicholas Pallesen and Ildar Abdrazakov will be part of the Richard Tucker Music Foundation's annual gala n Sunday, October 12 at Avery Fisher Hall. Other performers include Anna Netrebko, Joseph Calleja, Marcello Giordani, Zeljko Lucić, and previous Tucker Award laureates Angela Meade, Isabel Leonard, and Stephen Costello. The singers will perform arias and ensembles led by Emmanuel Villaume, Music Director of the Dallas Opera.


Founded in 1975, the Richard Tucker Music Foundation is a non-profit cultural organization dedicated to perpetuating the artistic legacy of the great Brooklyn-born tenor by nurturing the careers of talented young American opera singers. It also offers free performances in the New York metropolitan area and supports music education enrichment programs. Each year, the Foundation confers its most prestigious prize, the Richard Tucker Award, on an artist poised at the edge of a major international career. The award comes with a $50,000 cash prize as well as the ongoing support of the Tucker family and Foundation.

Tickets for this year’s event range from $40 to $600 and are on sale to the public through the Richard Tucker Music Foundation’s website. Reservations for the gala dinner can be arranged by contacting the Tucker Foundation offices at (212) 757-2218.

Further information about the 2014 gala and the work of the Richard Tucker Music Foundation is available at www.richardtucker.org.

Kristin Chenoweth & Paulo Szot in PBS broadcast

Broadway star Kristin Chenoweth will join barihunk Paulo Szot on the PBS broadcast of Star-Spangled Spectacular: Bicentennial of Our National Anthem on Saturday, September 13 at 8 p.m. ET on PBS. (Check local listings.) The concert is part of a weeklong celebration of the 200^th anniversary of our national anthem.

The duo will perform Leonard Bernstein's Make Our Garden Grow. The gala concert will also include performances by Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter Melissa Etheridge, mezzo-soprano Denyce Graves-Montgomery, country group Little Big Town, Pentatonix, R&B legend Smokey Robinson,  country crooner, Train, the U.S. Navy’s official chorus The Navy Band Sea Chanters and the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, under the baton of Music Director Marin Alsop.

Paulo Szot rehearsing for the Star-Spangled Spectacular

The program will also include ceremonial activities at Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine, historical highlights and an extraordinary fireworks crescendo.

Two hundred years ago, Francis Scott Key, a Maryland-born attorney, was inspired to write the words to what would become the United States’ national anthem.  In 2012, Star-Spangled 200 and the Maryland War of 1812 Bicentennial Commission began a multi-year commemoration of this legacy which will culminate with Star-Spangled Spectacular, a weeklong festival taking place on September 10–16, 2014. The festival will include tall ships, Navy gray hulls, a performance by the Blue Angels, landside festivities, and this special television program to honor the national anthem.

Daphne's three barihunks available for free viewing online

We recently posted about Richard Strauss' Daphne at the Théâtre de la Monnaie in Brussels featuring three singers who have appeared on this site: Matt Boehler, Justin Hopkins and Kris Belligh.  The opera, which is running through September 30th, features an all-star cast led by Sally Matthews as Daphne, Eric Cutler as Apollo, Peter Lodahl and Leukippos and Iain Paterson as Peneios.

La Monnaie will have the performance available on their website for free from October 1st through the 21st.

Matt Boehler in Don Giovanni

Upcoming roles for Justin Hopkins include the sold out world premiere of Repast: An Oratorio Homage to Booker Wright in Oxford, Mississippi, the role of Publio in Mozart's La Clemenza di Tito with Opera in the Heights, and Britten's War Requiem with the Dayton Philharmonic.

Upcoming performance for Matt Boehler include Rocco in Beethoven's Fidelio with the Madison Opera and Bertrand in Tchaikovsky's Iolanta at the Metropolitan Opera.

Pietro di Bianco stars in 20th Century opera buffa

Pietro di Bianco opens on Saturday, September 13th as Beaupertuis in Nino Rota's Il cappello di paglia di Firenze at beautiful Teatro Petruzzelli in Bari, Italy. This performance precedes his upcoming performance at the Paris Opera Competition on November 19tth, where he will be in the finals with fellow baritones Xiaohan Zhai of China and Sam Roberts-Smith of Australia.

Il cappello di paglia di Firenze (The Florentine Straw Hat) is based on the classic French farce The Italian Straw Hat by Eugène Labiche and Marc Michel, and the 1955 opera is considered one of the truest opera buffas since the death of Donizetti. 

Watch the opera complete in this 1999 production with Juan Diego Florez: 

The story is about Fadinard, a nervous bridegroom, who takes a ride in the park the morning of his wedding. His horse finds a straw hat and starts to eat it. It belongs to a young married woman named Anaide who is trysting in the park with her military officer lover, Emilio. Fadinard must find a match for the hat–else fight a duel with the officer–all the while fending off the suspicions of his bride’s father.

Di Bianco's character of Beaupertuis is the jealous husband of Anaide. 

(The Florentine Straw Hat) is based on the classic French farce The Italian Straw Hat by Labiche and Michel, and it may be the best pure opera buffa since the death of Donizetti. It has the sparkle of Rossini, the sassiness of Prokofiev, and the wit of Poulenc. (The plot: Fadinard, a nervous bridegroom, takes a ride in the park the morning of the nuptials. His horse finds a straw hat and starts to eat it. It belongs to a young married woman who is trysting in the park with her military officer lover. Fadinard must find a match for the hat–else fight a duel with the officer–all the while fending off the suspicions of his bride’s father.) - See more at: http://www.classicstoday.com/review/review-12670/#sthash.zmyZsG4c.dpuf

(The Florentine Straw Hat) is based on the classic French farce The Italian Straw Hat by Labiche and Michel, and it may be the best pure opera buffa since the death of Donizetti. It has the sparkle of Rossini, the sassiness of Prokofiev, and the wit of Poulenc. (The plot: Fadinard, a nervous bridegroom, takes a ride in the park the morning of the nuptials. His horse finds a straw hat and starts to eat it. It belongs to a young married woman who is trysting in the park with her military officer lover. Fadinard must find a match for the hat–else fight a duel with the officer–all the while fending off the suspicions of his bride’s father.) - See more at: http://www.classicstoday.com/review/review-12670/#sthash.zmyZsG4c.

Performances run from September 13-18 and tickets are available online.