THE METROPOLITAN OPERA
|
NEW YORK, NEW YORK--The Met will commemorate the 20th Anniversary of September 11 with a pre-season performance of Verdi's Requiem, with Yannick Néset-Séguin (pictured above) conducting the Met Orchestra and chorus, and Soprano Ailyn Pérez, Mezzo Soprano Elina Garanca, Tenor Mathew Polenzani and Bass Baritone Eric Owens singing the four soloist parts. The Concert, the first performance inside the Metropolitan Opera House since the March 2020 closure, is going to be heard by the audience in New York City and beyond because Live audio from the performance will be broadcast outside the Met in Lincoln Center Plaza. Hosted by ballet star Misty Copeland the Requiem will be presented by Great Performances on PBS as a Live Transmission, and broadcast on September 11, 2021 at 7:45pm ET (Eastern Time) THE SOLOIST SINGERS American soprano Ailyn Pérez, was born in Chicago, from Mexican Immigrants and raised in Elk Grove Village Illinois, where she graduated from Elk Grove High School. After her graduation, she attended the Indiana University School of Music and the Philadelphia Academy of Vocal Arts from where she graduated in 2006, In Autumn of that year, she toured as "The Guess Soprano" with Tenor Andrea Borelli. Among the multiple awards she has received are: The Beverly Sills Award in 2016, the 2017 Sphinx Medal of Excellence from the Sphinx organization and the Opera News Award Honoree of 2019. When her splendidly supported vocal instrument, as her voice was described by The Washington Post, has been heard all over the world singing a multiplicity of Operatic Roles, the soprano had also been heard singing popular music in Spanish. She had also recorded records in that language. This month, Opera's patrons living in San Francisco, will also have the chance to listen to Pérez singing in person, because the soprano just made her anticipated debut in the S.F. War Memorial Opera House, on August 2, singing the main role in Puccini's TOSCA, and will sing it again on August 27, 29, and September 3 and 5. Mezzo Soprano Elina Garanca Born in the Latvian capital Riga, from a musical family Elina entered the Latvian Academy of Music at age 20. According to her Biography while still a student, she stepped in to perform the role of Giovanna Seymour in Donizetti's Anna Boolean, and singing the role discovered her love for the Bell Canto repertoire, which she decided to pursue. When the beauty of her tone started to be recognized "The Daily Telegraph defined the soprano as "The only singer in a handful of singers who combine the beauty of voice, technical excellence and musicianship. When her extraordinary tone of voice was recognized she was given an exclusive contract from the Yellow Label which recorded her first solo recording of Aria Cantilena in 2007, which won her great acclaim and the Echo Classic Singer of the year award. Since then, she has continued recording albums, her most recent La Favorite, By Donizetti which she recorded live at the Bavarian State Opera in Berlin in 2015. Garanca has won too many awards to mention, but the most recently was in May 2019 with Sol y Vida her first album of non core classical repertory that she recorded with the Robusta Filarmónica Gran Canaria, featuring popular songs from Italy, Spain and Latin America. The Album earned Garanca the 2020 Klassik "Female Singer of the Year Award."
American tenor Mathew Polenziani has been considered by today's world's Opera critics as one of the most gifted lyric tenors of his generation. In reviews of his performances, the sound of his voice has been described as beautifully soft, his tone as honeyed. And his singing style as Romantic lyricism. As a singer, Polenziani musicianship is seamless, his ability to portray his roles dramatic, and he has his own style, which had established him as a leading operatic, concert, and recital singer and had made him the winner of multiple Awards including the Metropolitan Opera's 2008 Beverly Sills Artist Award. Tenor Polenzani frequently performs with ensembles in the United States and Europe and in recitals across America and is continually in demand for concert engagements with influential conductors.
American Bass Baritone Owens started his musical career studying piano when he was six years old at the Settement Music School. He shifted his interest to oboe in Junior high school and at the age of 11 began his studies under Lloyd Shorter of the Delaware Symphony, and at the Settlement Music School with English-horn player Louis Rosenblatt, of the Philadelphia Orchestra and later on with Laura Ahlbeck, a second oboe in the Metropolitan Opera orchestra. Owens began studying singing At Temple University's Boyer College of Music with George Massey and earned a Bachelor of Music in Vocal Performance from the school. Continuing his voice studies as student of the graduate voice program at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, he studied under Armen Boyajian. Owens has been honored with multiple awards, including the Plàcido Domingo Operalia Competition, The Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and the Luciano Pavorotti International Voice Competition. As a singer, Owens, who made his Boston Symphony Orchestra debut under the baton of David Robertson in Adam's Nativity Oratorio El Niño, has created a niche for himself by tackling contemporary opera works and challenging roles and has received great critical acclaim for his portrayal of Elliot Goldenthal's Grendel, in the opera by the same name, in Los Angeles Opera and at Lincoln Center Festival, and for singing the role of General Leslie Goves in the world premiere of Dr. Atomic at the S.F Opera in 2005. The role also got him a Grammy in 2012 for Best Opera Recording with the London Symphony Orchestra. Bass Baritone Eric Owens has sang too many Opera's roles for Cultural World Bilingual to be able to enumerate, but one of his most popular is his role of Aristotle Onassis in Jackie O with the Houston Grand Opera Studio is still available on the Argo Label. |
