Media Contact: Dan Ludden, Boston Baroque [email protected] 617-987-8600 For Immediate Release:
Boston Baroque presents Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea featuring soprano Amanda Forsythe in the title role and Anthony Roth Costanzo as Nero April 26 and 28 at NEC’s Jordan Hall.
Boston Baroque presents Monteverdi’s final opera, L’incoronazione di Poppea, on Friday, April 26th at 7:30pm and on Sunday, April 28th at 3pm at New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall. These will be the first performances of a new performing edition of the opera by Boston Baroque founder and Music Director Martin Pearlman. The all-star cast includes soprano Amanda Forsythe in the title role and countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo making his Boston Baroque debut as Nero.
Single tickets range from $25-$105, with discounts for students and seniors, and can be purchased at bostonbaroque.org and 617-987-8600.
The opera’s cast is a roster of world-class singers who grace opera and concert halls around the world: soprano Amanda Forsythe in the title role of Poppea; countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo in his Boston Baroque debut as Nero; contralto Emily Marvosh as Ottavia; Ryan Belongie making his Boston Baroque debut as Ottone; tenor Brian Giebler making his Boston Baroque debut as Arnalta; bass Kevin Langan as Seneca; soprano Maggie Finnegan making her Boston Baroque debut as Damigella; tenor Jonas Budris as Lucano; soprano Sonja Tengblad as Drusilla; and Tara Faircloth stage directing in her Boston Baroque debut.
Boston Baroque’s semi-staged operas have become a celebrated annual tradition, as Boston’s acoustical jewel, Jordan Hall, is transformed with sets and lighting for one weekend. Boston Baroque has performed all three of Monteverdi’s operas—in 2014 it performed and recorded Monteverdi’s Il ritornio d’Ulisse in patria; the recording, released on Linn records, was nominated for two GRAMMY® awards in the categories of Best Opera Recording and Best Engineered Album.
Boston Baroque’s performances will use a new performing edition by Martin Pearlman. No original manuscript of Monteverdi’s I’incoronazione di Poppea has survived; performers and scholars use a combination of extemporaneous copied manuscripts that originated in Venice and Naples during Monteverdi’s lifetime. In Pearlman’s performing edition, he uses the Venice manuscript—which was developed by Francesco Cavalli, the celebrated opera composer and boy soprano for Monteverdi in the choir St. Mark’s Basilica—as his inspiration. The resulting edition promises to bring Monteverdi’s vision to brilliant and evocative musical life for today’s audiences.
ABOUT ANTHONY ROTH COSTANZO (NERO)
Countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo began performing professionally at the age of 11 and has since appeared in opera, concert, recital, film, and on Broadway.
Recently named 2019 Musical America Vocalist of the Year, this season Mr. Costanzo produces and stars in Glass/Handel, an operatic art installation, at Opera Philadelphia's O18 Festival and subsequently co-presented by National Sawdust and St. John the Divine in New York. He returns to the English National Opera in his acclaimed performance of the title role in Akhnaten. He also appears in concert with Les Violons du Roy in eight cities, the New York Philharmonic, Philharmonia Baroque at Lincoln Center, Mercury, and the NDR at the Elphiharmonie, and was presented in recital by Celebrity Series of Boston.
Mr. Costanzo is an exclusive recording artist with Decca Gold, and his first album, ARC: Glass/Handel—a collection of arias by Handel and Phillip Glass with Les Violons du Roy—was released in September 2018.
Costanzo has appeared with many of the world's leading opera houses including the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, San Francisco Opera, English National Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Opera Philadelphia, Los Angeles Opera, Canadian Opera Company, Glyndebourne Opera Festival, Dallas Opera, Teatro Real Madrid, Spoleto Festival USA, Glimmerglass Festival and Finnish National Opera. In concert he has sung with the New York Philharmonic, Berlin Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, London Symphony Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, and National Symphony Orchestra, among others. He has performed at a wide-ranging variety of venues including Carnegie Hall, Versailles, The Kennedy Center, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, National Sawdust, Minamiza Kyoto, Joe's Pub, The Guggenheim, The Park Avenue Armory, and Madison Square Garden.
A champion of new work, Mr. Costanzo recently created roles in the world premieres of Jimmy Lopez' Bel Canto at the Lyric Opera of Chicago and Jake Heggie's Great Scott at the Dallas Opera. He has also premiered works written for him by Matthew Aucoin, Paola Prestini, Gregory Spears, Suzanne Farrin, Bernard Rands, Scott Wheeler, Mohammed Fairouz, Steve Mackey, and Nico Muhly.
Mr. Costanzo has begun working as a producer and curator in addition to a performer, creating shows for National Sawdust, Opera Philadelphia, the Philharmonia Baroque, Princeton University, WQXR, The State Theater in Salzburg, Master Voices and Kabuki-Za Tokyo. He played Francis in the Merchant Ivory film, A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries, for which he was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award, and Simon in Brice Cauvin's De particulier a particulier. He is the first countertenor to host a Met Opera Live in HD Broadcast.
AMANDA FORSYTHE (POPPEA)
Beloved by audiences in Boston and around the world, Amanda Forsythe returns to Boston Baroque as Poppea. Equally at home on the concert platform and on the opera stage, in recent seasons Amanda Forsythe’s major engagements have included Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream with the Boston Symphony under Andris Nelsons and the Los Angeles Philharmonic under Susanna Mälkki, Handel’s Sileti venti and Laudate pueri with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Nicholas Kraemer, Messiah with Seattle Symphony, Bach's Magnificat and concert performances as Marzelline Fidelio with the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia under Sir Antonio Pappano.
She is a regular soloist with the highly acclaimed baroque ensembles Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra (PBO), Apollo’s Fire, Handel and Haydn Society, Boston Baroque, Pacific Musicworks, the Boston Early Music Festival, and the Monteverdi Choir and Orchestra. She sang the title role of Teseo with PBO at the Tanglewood and Mostly Mozart Festivals under Nicholas McGegan, and made her début at the Oregon Bach Festival in Bach’s Mass in B Minor and Magnificat under Matthew Halls.
Amanda Forsythe made her USA stage début with the Boston Early Music Festival. Having made her début at Seattle Opera as Iris in Semele, Amanda Forsythe recently returned there to sing Pamina in Die Zauberflöte. She made her European operatic début in the role of Corinna in Il viaggio a Reims at the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro, subsequently returning to perform Rosalia in L’equivoco stravagante, and Jemmy in Guillaume Tell. Major European opera house engagements have included Dalinda in Ariodante in Geneva and Munich and Barbarina in Le nozze di Figaro, Manto in Steffani’s Niobe, regina di Tebe, Amour in Gluck’s Orphée and Nannetta in Falstaff at London’s Royal Opera House.
Amanda Forsythe’s recordings include Venus and Adonis, Lully’s Psyché, and Lully’s Thésée with the Boston Early Music Festival (all for CPO), Steffani's Niobe with BEMF (Erato), the title role in Handel’s Teseo with Philharmonia Baroque (PBO’s own label), Bach's St. John Passion and Messiah with Apollo’s Fire (Avie), Handel’s Orlando with Early Music Vancouver (ATMA) and Haydn’s Creation with Boston Baroque (Linn). She also sings on the DVD recordings of the Pesaro productions of L'equivoco stravagante and Guillaume Tell as well as Manto in the Royal Opera production of Steffani’s Niobe (Opus Arte).
ABOUT MARTIN PEARLMAN, FOUNDING MUSIC DIRECTOR AND CONDUCTOR
Boston Baroque founder, music director, and conductor Martin Pearlman is one of this country’s leading interpreters of Baroque and Classical music on period and modern instruments. In addition to Boston Baroque’s annual concert season, Pearlman tours in the United States and Europe and has produced twenty-five major recordings for Telarc and Linn Records. Mr. Pearlman’s completion and orchestration of music from Mozart’s Lo Sposo Deluso, his performing version of Purcell’s Comical History of Don Quixote, and his new orchestration of Cimarosa’s Il Maestro di Cappella were all premiered by Boston Baroque.
Highlights of his work include the complete Monteverdi opera cycle, with his own new performing editions of L’incoronazione di Poppea and Il ritorno d’Ulisse, the American premiere of Rameau’s Zoroastre, the Boston premiere of Rameau’s Pigmalion, the New England premieres of Gluck’s Iphigénie en Tauride and Alceste, and an exploration of the Beethoven symphonies on period instruments. Pearlman is also known for his internationally acclaimed series of Handel operas including Agrippina, Alcina, Giulio Cesare and Semele.
Pearlman grew up in Oak Park, Illinois, where he received training in composition, violin, piano and theory. He received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Cornell University, where he studied composition with Karel Husa and Robert Palmer. In 1967–68, he studied harpsichord in Amsterdam with Gustav Leonhardt on a Fulbright Grant and in 1971, he received his Masters of Music in composition from Yale University, studying composition with Yehudi Wyner and harpsichord with Ralph Kirkpatrick. In 1971, he moved to Boston and began performing widely in solo recitals and concertos. From 2002-2016, he was a Professor of Music at Boston University’s School of Music in the Historical Performance department.
ABOUT BOSTON BAROQUE
Boston Baroque is the first permanent Baroque orchestra established in North America and, according to Fanfare Magazine, is widely regarded as “one of the world’s premier period- instrument bands.” The ensemble produces lively, emotionally charged, groundbreaking performances of Baroque and Classical works for today’s audiences performed on instruments and using performance techniques that reflect the eras in which the music was composed.
Founded in 1973 as “Banchetto Musicale” by Music Director Martin Pearlman, Boston Baroque’s orchestra is composed of some of the finest period-instrument players in the United States, and is frequently joined by the ensemble’s professional chorus and by world-class instrumental and vocal soloists from around the globe. The ensemble has performed at major music centers across the United States and performed recently in Poland for the 2015 Beethoven Festival, with sold-out performances of Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610 in Warsaw and Handel’s Messiah in Katowice.
Boston Baroque reaches an international audience with its twenty-five acclaimed recordings. In 2012, the ensemble became the first American orchestra to record with the highly-regarded UK audiophile label Linn Records, and its release of The Creation received great critical acclaim. In April 2014, the orchestra recorded Monteverdi’s rarely performed opera, Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in patria, which was released on Linn Records and received two nominations at the 2016 GRAMMY® Awards.
Boston Baroque's recordings have received six GRAMMY® Award Nominations: its 1992 release of Handel's Messiah, 1998 release of Monteverdi's Vespers of 1610, 2000 release of Bach's Mass in B Minor, 2015 release of Monteverdi's Il Ritorno d'Ulisse in patria, and 2018 release of Biber's The Mystery Sonatas.
BOSTON BAROQUE 2019-2020 CONCERT SEASON AT-A-GLANCE
October 25, 2019 at 8pm October 27, 2019 at 3pm NEC’s Jordan Hall Mozart and Haydn
Featuring Amanda Forsythe, soprano
Mozart: “Linz” Symphony No. 36 in C Mozart: "Barbaro, o Dio, mi vedi" from Il re pastore Mozart: "Ruhe sanft, mein holdes Leben" from Zaide Mozart: "Bella mia fiamma, addio" Haydn: "Anna, m'ascolta” from Il ritorno di Tobia Haydn, Symphony No. 102 in B flat
December 6, 2019 at 7:30pm December 7, 2019 at 7:30pm NEC’s Jordan Hall
Amanda Forsythe, soprano Ann McMahon Quintero, mezzo-soprano Thomas Cooley, tenor Andrew Garland, baritone
Handel: Messiah
December 31, 2019 at 8pm January 1, 2020 at 3pm Sanders Theatre at Harvard University New Year’s Eve and First Day Gala Concerts with Maggie Finnegan, soprano
Corelli: Concerto Grosso, Opus 6, No. 6 in F Bach, Concerto in D Major for three violins (after BWV 1064) Vivaldi: Motet, “Nulla in mundo pax sincera” Rameau: Orchestral Suite Bach: Orchestral Suite No. 4 in D
March 27, 2020 at 8:00pm March 29, 2020 at 3:00pm NEC’s Jordan Hall
Featuring Christina Day Martinson, violin
Vivaldi: The Four Seasons Vivaldi: Gloria for Chorus and Orchestra Monteverdi: Beatus Vir
April 24, 2020 at 7:30pm April 25, 2020 at 7:30pm NEC’s Jordan Hall
Paula Murrihy, Ariodante Kiera Duffy, Ginevra Sonja Tengblad, Dalinda Ann McMahon Quintero, Polinesso Rufus Müller, Lurcanio Nathan Berg, Re di Scozia Jonas Budris, Odoardo
Opera Handel: Ariodante