As the summer season has drawn to a close, we wanted to reflect on an amazing MWA summer! This summer, we have had 40 artist appearances at 23 different summer opera festivals across the world!
Audiences in the UK have been able to see Sofia Fomina at Glyndebourne Festival’s production of Carmen as Micaëla, and newly signed Louise Alder as Cleopatra in David McVicar’s much loved production of Giulio Cesare. Thomas Atkins starred in Grange Park Opera’s Kat’á Kabanová as Boris; David Butt Philip and Anthony Gregory returned to Opera Holland Park as Canio Pagliacci and Acis Acis and Galatea respectively. Huw Montague Rendall performed Schubert’s Die Schöne Müllerin with pianist Graham Johnson at the Cambridge Summer Festival before he made his way up to Scotland to perform at the Edinburgh International Festival with Angela Brower and Christopher Maltman in their concert performance of Mozart’s Così fan tutte. Christopher Maltman then joined forces with Martyn Barbbins and the BBC Symphony Orchestra for Stanford’s Songs at the BBC Proms. David Butt Philip also wowed audiences at the Proms with the Czech Philharmonic and incoming Music Director of the Royal Ballet & Opera, Jakub Hrůša, in Janacek’s Glagolitic Mass.
MWA artists were seen right across the world from Australia to America and of course all over Europe! Freddie De Tommaso made his Australian debut with two recitals in Melbourne and Sydney whilst Filipe Manu returned closer to his home in a production of Così fan tutte at Opera Australia; audiences in Oslo witnessed two history making performances of Wagner’s Der fliegende Holländer which featured Gerald Finley, Lise Davidsen, Brindley Sherratt, Stanislas de Barbeyrac and Anna Kissjudit; Anna Pirozzi, Erin Morley and Freddie De Tommaso all returned to Arena di Verona; Natalia Tanasii performed at the Helsinki Festival in their performance of Khovanshchina; Pavel Černoch stars in a gala concert at the Savolinna Opera Festival. Four MWA artists appeared at the Bayerisches Staatsoper Summer Festival – Lise Davidsen as Lisa in Tchaikovsky’s Pique Dame, Gerald Finley as Amfortas and Alexander Köpeczi as Zweiter Gralsritter in Parsifal and Louise Alder as Susanna in Le nozze di Figaro. Anna Pirozzi performed with the Quartetto Lirico Italiano and pianist Sophia Muñoz at Festival Castell Perelada and returned to Puccini Opera Festival for one of her signature roles, Turandot. Freddie De Tommaso sang Alfredo La traviata at the Athens Epidaurus Festival and performed with L’Auditori for a legendary celebration of the Louis Vuitton 37th America’s Cup which was an ode to the anthems of major sporting events. This televised concert took place on the San Sebastian beach to a live audience of 50,000 people. De Tommaso was also joined by soprano Iulia Maria Dan for a concert at Litomysl Festival titled, ‘Stars of the Opera Sky’. Huw Montague Rendall returned to Festival d’Aix-en-Provence to perform in Katie Mitchell’s production of Pelléas et Mélisande whilst Stanislas de Barbeyrac sang Pylade in Dmitri Tcherniakov’s production of Gluck’s Iphigénie en Tauride. David Butt Philip returned to perform the Glagolitic Mass with the Czech Philharmonic as part of the Dvořák Prague International Music Festival and was joined by Brindley Sherratt as the bass soloist. Cody Quattlebaum performed as the baritone soloist in Orff’s infamous Carmina Burana with Staatsoper Hamburg in the city’s Rathausmarkt and superstar Lise Davidsen joined the Vienna Philharmonic and Andris Nelsons for the infamous Summer Night Concert, an outdoor concert in Vienna which has over 100,000 people attending.
In North America, Elena Villalón starred in Santa Fe’s world premiere of Gregory Spears’s The Righteous as Sheila before performing at the Tanglewood Music Festival with the Boston Symphony Orchestra for a performance of Mahler’s Symphony No.4 and several Mozart arias with conductor, James Gaffigan. Gerald Finley returned to his home nation, Canada, to perform a one-off recital at Westben with artistic director, pianist and cousin, Brian Finley.