Don Giovanni
Phillip Addis
Baritone
Canadian baritone Phillip Addis is praised for his creamy, bright, smooth voice as much as for his spell-binding, daring, yet sensitive interpretations. A rising star on the international stage, Addis has performed in opera, concerts and recitals throughout Canada, the United States, Europe and Japan.
Following his highly acclaimed Paris debut in the title role of Pelléas et Mélisande with l'Opéra Comique and conducted by Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Phillip's 2010-11 season is marked by three major role debuts. He begins as with his debut as Jaufre Rudel in Kaija Saariaho's L'Amour de loin in Antwerp with De Vlaamse Opera. In January 2011, he takes on the second of his new roles when he appears in the title role of the rarely performed baritone version of Massenet's Werther with l'Opéra de Montréal. The spring sees him return to the Atlanta Opera in his third role debut this season, as Gugliemo in Così fan tutte. As well, Phillip will be heard in recital in Toronto and in concert with the Omaha and Phoenix symphonies.
The 2009-10 season featured his role debut as Belcore in Donizetti's comic opera L'elisir d'amore with Atlanta Opera, his New York debut as Roderick Usher in Debussy's The Fall of the House of Usher with Opéra Français de New York, his role debut as John Brooke in the Canadian premiere of Mark Adamo's Little Women with Calgary Opera and appearances as the Count in Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro with Opera Atelier.
Zerlina
Carla Huhtanen
Soprano
Soprano Carla Huhtanen is in demand internationally for her “soaring, translucent” voice, “winning stage presence,” and her diverse repertoire. She debuted in the UK as Lisetta in Garsington Opera’s La Gazzetta (Rossini) and returned as Serpetta in their production of Mozart’s La Finta Giardiniera, a performance repeated at the Barbican Centre’s Mostly Mozart series. She debuted in Italy at Gran Teatro la Fenice in Venice as Daisy Park in Gershwin’s Lady, Be Good! and returned to La Fenice as Athenaïs in Cherubini’s Anacréon. In France, she sang the title role of Purcell’s The Fairy Queen for Festival Mars en Baroque (Marseille, Tarascon, and Aix-en-Provence) and Angelica in Händel’s Orlando for Théatre Gyptis (Marseille), Festival Musique au Coeur (Antibes) and Festival de hartres. A reprise performance of Lady, Be Good! took her to Lisbon’s Teatro Sao Carlos and that same year she was featured soloist in a Leonard Bernstein Tribute with the Israel Philharmonic. She has been praised for her “vivid, fine-toned, accurately placed coloratura” (Independent) and her “clarity of tone and smoothness of line…matched only by her exquisite acting” (Opera Now).
Other past highlights include Cunegonde in Candide with the BBC Concert Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall in London and also in Malta for the Valletta Festival. She was soloist with the Royal Philharmonic and the Welsh National Opera Orchestra under Carl Davis for a concert tour of festivals in the UK and Germany. With Opera Atelier she sang Monteverdi’s Minerva/Amor, Drusilla/Fortuna, Mozart’s Blonde and Papagena, and a South Korean tour of Charpentier’s Actéon and Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas.
A leading interpreter of modern and contemporary music, Carla performs with Continuum New Music, Queen of Puddings Music Theatre, and as a s Studio Ensemble member of Tapestry New Opera, where she develops and premieres many roles for their Opera to Go and Opera Briefs performances. Carla appeared in The Shadow with Tapestry, in Soundstreams Canada/CBC’s performance of Brian Current’s Airline Icarus, and covered Marie in Luminato’s production of Rufus Wainwright’s Prima Donna.
Carla was one of Now Magazine’s Top Ten Theatre Artists in 2008, and her “amazing versatility and unwavering voice” won her a place on Eye Weekly’s Top Ten Great Individual Achievements List of 2007. Nominated for a Dora Award for her performance as Susanna in The Marriage of Figaro with Opera Atelier in 2010, she will return in their 2011 production of Don Giovanni. She recently performed Orlando/Lunaire with Opera Erratica in Toronto (combining Händel opera and Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire) and in Array New Music’sMichael J. Baker Tribute.
Upcoming projects include Saariaho’s From the Grammar of Dreams, Ana Sokolovic’s opera Svadba with Queen of Puddings, Blonde with Edmonton Opera and recitals with Off Centre Music and L’Alliance Française in Toronto.
Donna Elvira
Peggy Kriha Dye
Soprano
Critically acclaimed international soprano Peggy Kriha Dye recently made her debut with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in Charles Martin Loeffler’s Quatre Poems and Nicholas Maw’s Roman Canticle. Praised for her performances of Stella in A Streetcar Named Desire with Washington Opera under Andre Previn, she repeated the role with the Pittsburgh Symphony, again with Maestro Previn. A former Adler Fellow, Ms. Kriha Dye has performed many roles with San Francisco Opera including, Musetta, Poussette, Drusilla, and Gretel. A favorite at Toronto’s Opera Atelier, she appeared last season as the Countess in Mozart’sThe Marrriage of Figaro.
Leporello
Vasil Garvanliev
Bass
Macedonian baritone, Vasil Garvanliev, began performing professionally at the age of seven as a child singer in his native country, achieving celebrated status. He moved to Toronto in 2004 and completed his music studies at the Glenn Gould School, and the University of Toronto under the tutelage of Mary Morrison. Vasil is thrilled to be a member of Calgary Opera’s Emerging Young Artist Program in the 2010/11 Season.
Vasil kicks off the 2011 Season with a debut and world premiere of The Inventor (Calgary opera) followed by a guest appearance as the title role in Don Giovanni (U of T Opera School). As an Emerging Artist at Calgary Opera he takes the stage as Don Alfonso in Cosi fan Tutte, then repeats the title role in Nozze di Figaro (Opera on the Avalon), and is proud to be finishing the season off with a leading role debut as Leporello in Don Giovanni (Opera Atelier). On the concert stage Mr. Garvanliev makes his debut with the Calgary Civic Symphony, and returns to OffCentre Music salon and The Helliconian Birthdays Series for a recital. Vasil, along with Opera Atelier, was recently awarded a CTV BRAVO!Fact grant to make his operatic music video debut as Don Giovanni under the direction of Andrew Gregg.
Winning the University's Concerto Compeitition brought Vasil the opportunity to sing Mahler's Rückert Lieder in the 09/10 Orchestra Season. Other recent performances include Pangloss in Candide, Bonafede in Il Mondo della Luna, Ramiro in L’Heure Espagnole, and Geronimo in Il Matrimonio Segreto (University of Toronto’s Opera School); Papageno in Die Zauberflote (MacMillan Singers Opera Concert); Harasta in The Cunning Little Vixen (Banff Opera Centre); Bob in The Old Maid and the Thief, Falke in Die Fledermaus, Tobia Mill in Cambiale di Matrimonio, and title role in Signor Deluso (Highlands Opera Studio); Antonio in Marriage of Figaro and Grand Priest in Idomeneo (Opera Atelier); and the title role in Le Nozze di Figaro (Glenn Gould School) . Vasil also had the opportunity to perform across the pond, playing Mesetto in Don Giovanni as a Member of the Britten-Pears Young Artists Programme in Aldeburgh, England.
Donna Anna
Hailed by critics as a singer with “lovely stage presence” a “silvery tone” and “exquisite mezza voce” Canadian soprano Meghan Lindsay begins the 2010/11 season as a member of Opera Studio Nederland. Meghan made her international debut as Euredice in Pierre Audi’s production of Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo and made her Concertgebouw debut in November performing excerpts as Donna Anna in Don Giovanni and Contessa from Le Nozze di Figaro. In 2011, she will make her Canadian debut as Donna Anna in Opera Atelier’s Don Giovanni, will sing Contessa in Opera on the Avalon’s Le Nozze di Figaro, and will perform the role of Fiordiligi in Opera Studio Nederland’s spring production of Cosi fan Tutte. Ms Lindsay spent the summer of 2010 at Joan Dornemann’s inaugural music festival, Viva Virginia, where she performed Richard Danielpour’s Sonnets to Orpheus under the baton of Paul Nadler.
During the 2009/10 season, Ms Lindsay performed the title role in Massenet's Cendrillion, the premiere opera at Toronto's Koerner Hall with the Royal Conservatory Orchestra. She was one of twenty singers across Canada to be named a Laureate of the Jeunes Ambassadeurs Lyriques, Ambassadeurs; was a finalist in the 2010 Czech Slovak International Music Competition; and was the recipient of the Dean's Scholarship from The Royal Conservatory of Music. Other recent credits include Contessa in Le Nozze di Figaro, La Principessa in the Canadian premier of La Bella Dormente nel Bosco, Pamina in Fatal Song, and Ciesca in Gianni Schicchi.
As an accomplished concert artist, Meghan has been featured on CTV television and CBC radio broadcast. She toured China representing the Royal Conservatory of Music in a program that was broadcast nationwide on Chinese television and radio. She has presented
concerts in venues across Canada, including Barrie's Colours of Music and the Creemore Music Festival and was a performer in Holland's Uitmarkt. In 2008, Meghan organized and presented Opera for Oprea, a charity gala that raised nearly $14,000 for cancer drug research for the Robert and Maggie Bras Drug Cancer Development Program. Meghan is an alumni of the Daniel Ferro Vocal Program; of Joan Dornemann's International Vocal Arts Institute in Tel Aviv, Israel; and The Royal Conservatory of Music's Glenn Gould School, where she completed her Bachelor of Music and participated in the Artist Diploma Program.
Masetto/Commendatore
Curtis Sullivan
Bass
On the opera stage, Curtis Sullivan starred as Count Almaviva in Opera Atelier's Le Nozze di Figaro in Toronto and Tokyo and he has also been heard for Opera Atelier in Charpentier’s Medée, Sarastro in Die Zauberflöte and most recently as Neptune in Idomeneo. For the Stratford Festival, he was cast as Giuseppe in The Gondeliers directed by Brian Macdonald. Sondheim's innovative music theatre work, Passion, was his assignment at the Canadian Stage in Toronto where he starred as the brooding romantic hero, Giorgio. In another change of pace, the Banff Centre alumnus appeared in the Classical Kids production of Tchaikovsky Discovers America with the Houston Symphony, Oklahoma City Philharmonic, San Diego Symphony, and the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center.
Mr. Sullivan was at Huron Country Playhouse for Billy Bigelow in Carousel and followed his performances there with Opera Atelier’s Iphigénie en Tauride and Die Entführung aus dem Serail in Toronto. He has appeared in Korea in Don Giovanni, Cleveland in L’Incoronazione di Poppea and in Toronto for Opera Atelier’s Persée. An Opera Atelier favourite, he has been seen with the company as Masetto and the Commendatorein Don Giovanni, Aeneas in Dido and Aeneas, Eumete in Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria as well as featured roles Armide and Orfeo. Balancing Baroque with contemporary, he returned to Grand Bend starring in The Secret Garden and Man of la Mancha, Calgary for Weill’s Seven Deadly Sins, Popolescu in Kalman’s Countess Maritza and Weill’s Lady in the Dark for Toronto Operetta Theatre and the National Arts Centre for ‘Vienna to Broadway’.
Don Ottavio
Lauded for his luminous projection, lyrical sensitivity, and brilliant coloratura, American-born Canadian tenor Lawrence Wiliford is in high demand in concert, opera, and recital repertoire ranging from works by Monteverdi to contemporary composers. Critics have acclaimed him as an “amazing tenor” (Vancouver Sun) having “exceptional power throughout his range” (Boston Globe) and as a “phenomenal” and “matchless artist” (Globe & Mail).
Mr. Wiliford has collaborated with conductors such as Richard Bradshaw, Bernard Labadie, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Trevor Pinnock, Helmuth Rilling, and Pinchas Zukerman. He has been recognized in particular for his interpretation of Bach and other composers of the Baroque period. A dedicated recitalist, Mr. Wiliford also champions English and North American art song, a passion that has led to engagements across North America and at the Aldeburgh Festival in England. He has recorded on the ATMA Classique & NAXOS labels and will be releasing his debut solo recording Divine Musick: the late works for tenor and harp by Benjamin Britten in September 2010.
Highlights from Mr. Wiliford's 2010-11 include Bach’s Johannes Passion with Les Voix Baroques at the Montreal Bach Festival, with the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir, and with the Winnipeg Symphony under the direction of Jane Glover, Bach’s Matthäus Passion with the Richard Eaton Singers, and a concert of Bach cantatas with Vancouver Early Music. He returns to Tafelmusik
for performances of Rameau’s grand motet In convertendo and Handel’s Dixit Dominus and debuts with Houston's Mercury Baroque in Handel's Messiah. The works of Benjamin Britten also feature prominently this season with a recital at the Aldeburgh Festival celebrating the 100th anniversary of Peter Pears’ birth, the cantata St. Nicholas at the Elora Festival, and the Serenade for Tenor & Horn with I Musici de Montréal conducted by Jean-Marie Zeitouni. His opera appearances include the role of Damon in Opera Atelier's production of Handel’s Acis & Galatea and Pedrillo in Edmonton Opera’s production of Mozart’s Die Entführung aus dem Serail.
Stefano Montanari has been first violinist with Accademia Bizantina from Ravenna since 1995. He performs with leading exponents in the field of early music, in particular with Christophe Rousset (with whom he has recently recorded the Sonatas for violin and harpsichord by J.S. Bach), and with Concerto Köln as leader and conductor, as well as with Kammerorchester Basel, with whom he will be making a world premiere recording of the violin concertos by the baroque Roman composer Antonio Montanari. He has recorded for Fonè, Frequenz, Denon, Opus 111, Erato, Virgin, Tactus, Astrée, Thymalus, Simphonya, Bottega discantica, Decca, Oiseau Lyre, Naïve and Arts. His recent recording of Corelli’s Violin Sonatas op. 5 received widespread recognition and numerous international prizes, including a Diapason d’Or. He recently made his debut as conductor in Mozart’s Nozze di Figaro with I pomeriggi musicali di Milano, and Donizetti’s Don Gregorio and Elisir d’Amore at the Teatro G. Donizetti in Bergamo. Mr. Montanari holds diplomas from the Music Academy of Florence and the Swiss Italian School of Music in Lugano. He teaches at the International Music Academy of Milan, the Dall’Abaco Conservatory of Verona, and at the Novara Conservatory.
Gerard Gauci
Set Designer
Resident set designer Gerard Gauci is an associate of the Ontario College of Art and Design. His relationship with the company dates from its first fully staged production of Monteverdi’s Orfeo at the Art Gallery of Ontario in 1986. Since then he has designed many shows for Opera Atelier including Pygmalion, Persée, The Coronation of Poppea, The Magic Flute, Medée, Iphigénie en Tauride, Actéon, Dido and Aeneas, Armide, Orpheus and Eurydice, The Return of Ulysses and Idomeneo.
When not designing for Opera Atelier he pursues a career as a painter, exhibiting regularly in Toronto at the Leo Kamen Gallery and in Montréal at the Galerie de Bellefeuille.
Martha Mann was first moved to believe in art at the age of 2 1⁄2 by the works of Beatrix Potter, and later, by afternoons spent with her Granny watching the double bills at Toronto’s Kent Cinema. She’s designed ever since.
Recent theatre and opera credits include: The Marriage of Figaro (Opera Atelier, Dora Award Winner, 2010);The Mikado (Westin Playhouse); Armide (Maryland Opera Theatre); Italiana in Algeri (Opera Festival of New Jersey); Romeo et Juliette, Aida, Don Carlos (Boston Lyric Opera); Intermezzo (New York City Opera); The Mikado (Glimmerglass Opera Theatre); The Savage Land (Washington Opera); Macbeth, Julius Caesar (Stratford Shakespeare Festival); Sullivan And Gilbert (National Arts Centre/Kennedy Centre). Television credits include: Anne of Green Gables Parts 1 and 2; Anne of Green Gables: A New Beginning; Salem Witch Trials (C.B.S.); Sound and the Silence (C.B.C./P.B.S.); Road to Avonlea; Glory Enough for All; six of these are Gemini winners. Feature Film: One Tough Cop; Entries in a Diary. Upcoming: Revival of Intermezzo New York City Opera..
Ms. Mann is a founding member of the Associated Designers of Canada and the Canadian Alliance of Film and Television - Costume Arts & Design. Her favourite novel is still Ms. Potter’s The Tailor of Gloucester. Like designers everywhere, she’s still waiting for the mice to come out at night and finish the work.
Bonnie Beecher
Lighting Designer
Bonnie Beecher has designed lights for over 160 productions in theatre, opera and dance with companies that include The National Ballet of Canada, the Canadian Opera Company, Shaw Festival, Stratford Festival, New Zealand Opera, Pacific Northwest Ballet, Canadian Stage, Soulpepper Theatre Company, Opera Atelier, Opera Lyra, The National Arts Centre, The Royal Shakespeare Company and Ballet Mannheim. Upcoming projects include St. Carmen of the Main with the NAC/Canadian Stage, a world premiere with Ballet Mannheim and Hosannah at the Stratford Shakespeare Company.
Bonnie lives in Toronto with her husband Glenn Davidson and sons Oliver and Jacob.
Jennifer Parr
Fight Director
Jennifer has been Opera Atelier's Fight Director since 1989, for productions including The Loves of Mars and Venus, Venus and Adonis, Don Giovanni, The Marriage of Figaro, Medée, Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, Iphigénie en Tauride, and Persée (also on film). With OA's artistic directors she has also taught at Le Centre de la Musique Baorque de Versailles in Paris. Film and television fight credits include Le Mozart Noir, and appearing on the Discovery channel as the famous female pirate captain Anne Bonny. Jennifer holds an M.A. in Renaissance Drama (University of Warwick), and recently directed acclaimed productions of the world premiere of Dean Burry's opera Pandora's Locker and Mozart's Cosi Fan Tutti at the Royal Conservatory of Music.
