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Home , Aldeburgh Festival, Benjamin Britten, Curlew River, David Parry (conductor), Early Opera Company, Mariss Jansons

Friday, November 14, 2014, 8pm Saturday, November 15, 2014, 2pm Zellerbach Hall

Curlew River: A Parable for Church Performance

Music by by , after Jūrō Motomasa

Britten Sinfonia & Voices Soloists from the Academy

Curlew River is a co-production of the , ; Cal Performances; Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, New York; and Carolina Performing Arts.

These performances are made possible, in part, by Patron Sponsors Annette Campbell-White and Ruediger Naumann-Etienne. Cal Performances’ 8679–867: season is sponsored by Wells Fargo.

CAL PERFORMANCES PROGRAM

CuRLEw RIVER: A PARABLE FOR CHuRCH PERFORMAnCE ( 1964 )

Music Benjamin Britten (1913–1976) Libretto Willi am Plomer (1903–1973), after Jūrō Motomasa (1395–1431) Direction, Design, Costume, Video Netia Jones Lighting Design Ian Scott

CAST Madwoman , Abbot Jeremy White, Traveller Neal Davies, Ferryman , bass-baritone Spirit of the Boy David Schneidinger Altar Servants Jeroen Breneman, Sivan Faruqui, Louis Pecceu Music Director Martin Fitzpatrick

PROduCTIOn TEAM Video and Production Lightmap Production Manager Rachel Shipp Tour Manager Eoin Quirke Video Technician Dori Deng Costume Supervisior Jemima Penny Hair and Makeup Designer Susanna Peretz Production Manager Steve Wald Stage Manager Beth Hoare-Barnes Deputy Stage Manager Jane Andrews Britten Sinfonia Management Nikola White Curlew River U.S Tour Management Askonas Holt

Please note that there is no interval in this performance.

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BRITTEn SInFOnIA (ORCHESTRA ) Martin Fitzpatrick, Director Flute Karen Jones Clare Finnimore Harp Hugh Webb Horn Richard Wainwright Ben Russell Percussion Scott Bywater

BRITTEn SInFOnIA VOICES (CHORuS ) Eamonn Dougan, Director Tenor Andrew Dickinson Thomas Herford Daniel Joy Baritone Gabriel Gottlieb Thomas Kennedy Douglas Nairne Bass Oliver Hunt Louis Hurst

CAL PERFORMANCES dIRECTOR’S nOTE

A nOTE FROM THE dIRECTOR from the self.” Zeami elucidates: “When they are bereaved mothers, the heroines are repre - Clear as a sky without a cloud sented as abnormally sensitive and particu - May be a mother’s mind, larly susceptible to their surroundings and fall But darker than a starless night into fits of poetic exaltation which expresses With not one gleam, not one, itself by frenzied gestures. When their lost No gleam to show the way. ones are found, their temporary madness —William Plomer, Curlew River leaves them.” In Curlew River , the lucidity that (after Jūrō Motomasa) follows the resolution of the drama is trans - lated into the medieval idea of spiritual en - dEAS OF dARKnESS And LIGHT , obscurity lightenment—the darkness of madness and Iand illumination are at the heart of confusion recedes into the clarity of under - Benjamin Britten and William Plomer’s ex - standing, and, perhaps, redemption. traordinary “parable for church performance,” “There is nothing specifically Japanese left Curlew River . The drawing together of in the parable that William Plomer and I have Japanese theater and the English medieval written,” asserted Britten. But the features that mystery play creates an entirely unique and lu - so attracted him to the noh performances that minous work, quite unlike any other. Here, the he witnessed—“the touching story, the econ - concept of light takes separate forms: natural omy of style, the intense slowness of the action, light—the physical manifestation of light or the marvelous skill and control of the per - absence of it—metaphysical radiance or di - formers, the beautiful costumes, the mixture of vine light, and spiritual revelation or enlight - chanting, speech and singing which, with the enment. The interplay between darkness and instruments, made up the strange music”—are light is both literal and metaphorical, at once fundamental to Curlew River . Contrast and op - narrative and abstract—daylight and night, position, opacity and transparency are woven seeing and not seeing, clarity and confusion. through the libretto, and create a slow, subtle, Aspects of both ancient Oriental and but intense accumulation of tension. The blend English medieval theater are reflected in every of ritual and spontaneity of noh theater, com - part of the piece: stillness, ritual, visual rich - bined with the communal nature of enactment ness, and gestural economy. Here human suf - of the medieval mystery makes for a work fering is represented not literally, but with a which is both removed and extremely intimate. degree of abstraction that reveals a deeper Here medieval concepts of illumination and truth. Suffering is pared down to its most ex - spiritual enlightenment are presented in hu - treme expression—a mother made mad with mane terms, both universal and heartbreak - grief for her lost son. In the traditions of noh ingly individual, in music of profound beauty theater, as described by Zeami Motokiyo, the and the deepest expressiveness. 14th-century noh master, madness is “a highly spiritual state accompanied by a separation © 2014 Netia Jones

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CURLEW RIVER BACKGROund However, neither The Rape of nor Curlew River attempts to synthesize the VIRTuOuS wIFE raped by the vicious son European past and present or East and West; Aof a Roman tyrant; a Japanese mother, both are simultaneously and separately present maddened by grief perhaps, in search of her in each work and are somehow brought to - abducted son. How much can The Rape of gether within the performance itself. Indeed, Lucretia and Curlew River have in common? “performance” may be said to act as a bridge be - For a start, there’s a span of 18 years between tween these two worlds. So the principal action the first performances of each work, during of the church parable has the Madwoman and which time Benjamin Britten’s interests the Traveller being ferried across the Curlew moved in different directions. Then The Rape River, while in the chamber Tarquinius of Lucretia is described as an opera, while must ride from his army camp outside Rome Curlew River was subtitled “A Parable for into the heart of the city to ravish Lucretia. Church Performance.” It’s true that both works Britten was always alert to creative worlds tell their tales within a specifically Christian beyond his native shores. As a young man ex - framework, with the man and woman of the cited by the music of Mahler he had hoped to chorus in Lucretia struggling to relate her rape study with in . His journey and eventual suicide to Christian ideas about to America in 1939 may have been largely for suffering and redemption, and the history of personal and political reasons, but he evi - the Madwoman in Curlew River performed by dently relished the possibility of becoming a a cast of medieval monks in a work that be - part of a different musical culture. Indeed, it gins and ends with plainchant. was in the United States that he first encoun - But look and listen again. The Rape of tered the music of the , which would Lucretia was composed hot on the heels of the become such a distinct accent in his own triumph of in 1945 , while Curlew music after a holiday to Bali in 1956. River was first performed in 1964 , four years In February of that year Britten, together with after A Midsummer Night’s Dream . And both his partner , had been invited to per - would seem to anticipate that late masterpiece form in Tokyo by the Japanese broadcaster . What all three works share is NHK and the British Council. Up to this point a desire to rethink both the form and, perhaps, the composer’s relationship with Japan had not the function of music drama after the com - been a happy one. I n 1940, at the age of 26, he poser had demonstrated (in Peter Grimes , and five other European composers (includ - , , and The Turn of the ing and Jacques Ibert) had Screw ) his mastery of larger-scale works which been invited to write a piece celebrating the sit relatively comfortably within the tradition 2,600th anniversary of the founding of the of European opera. Japan ese empire. Britten’s resulting work— More significantly, both Sinfonia —composed in memory of and Curlew River look to cultures that are either his parents, was unacceptable to the Japanese. It at the edge of the Western tradition or outside it: was, a court official told him, unsuitably to Rome when it was ruled by kings and to me - Christian and too “gloomy” to celebrate the dieval Japan. Yet both set their stories within the birthday of a dynasty. dominant Western tradition of Christianity. If Matters were much improved in 1956. Britten intends to revise our notion of what con - Britten and Pears gave a recital that included stitutes music drama in both of these works, he the Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo together is also, perhaps, a child of his time; an artist who, with the composer’s arrangements of British for all his deep curiosity about other cultures, folk songs. Nine days later Britten conducted was grounded in the tradition set in train by the the NHK Symphony Orchestra in a perform - Enlightenment, that West was probably best. ance of Les illuminations , with Pears as the

CAL PERFORMANCES PROGRAM nOTES soloist, and, for the first time in Japan, the understood without study—it would be wrong . to equate noh with Western opera. It makes de - In the meantime, the two men were steep - mands on actors and audiences that are a great ing themselves in traditional Japanese culture, deal more challenging than an evening spent with recitals of traditional geisha singing, vis - in the company of Mozart, Verdi, Wagner, or its to kabuki and noh theater and a perform - Berg. An actor sitting still and silent on stage ance of , Japanese court music. On for 90 minute s is a challenge for both the per - Februa ry 11, the compose r seems to have ex - former and those who are watching. Noh is a perienced something of an epiphany at a per - kind of ritual. As Donald Keene, a historian of formance of the noh play Sumidagawa . So Japanese theatre has written, “the purpose of moved was he by the story of the madwoman noh is not to divert on the surface but to move who has traveled the land in search of a son profoundly and ultimately to transcend the who had been abducted a year before that he particular and touch the very springs of asked to see the play again on the day that he human emotion.” Character and action are was to leave Japan. scarcely present on the noh stage, which, as an - Two years later Britten reflected on what he other commentator reminds us, is “a sacred had seen that day in a talk for NHK. “I count space where the meeting of our world with the [the performance of Sumidagawa ] among the other dimension is represented.” greatest theatrical experiences of my life. Of The ritual element in noh undoubtedly would course it was strange to start with, the language have appealed to Britten. The chanting chorus, and especially the curious kind of chanting the actors wearing their all-important masks and used. But we were fortunate in having an ex - the onstage musicians—just four of them—a cellent literal translation of the poem and we flautist and three drummers. He was also lucky soon became accustomed to the haunting in the particular play that he saw performed by sounds. The deep solemnity and selflessness of the Kanze school of noh . It belongs to a group of the acting, the perfect shaping of the drama plays called kyō-jomono (“drama of mad - like a great Greek tragedy coupled with women”). Generally these stories have a happy the…universality of the story is something ending, with the lost child or the vanished hus - which every Western artist can learn from.” band or lover eventually restored to the woman, Here was a story that stretched out from its who then recovers her sanity. Sumidagawa is dif - roots in a traditional form of Japanese theater ferent in that the son is already dead. At the end to appeal to an English composer in search of the madwoman can only hear his voice and see creative bridges between his own cultural pat - his spirit. Britten must have been as much rimony and its “other.” And it doesn’t require moved by the death of innocence—an abiding much effort to see this fascination between the theme in his work—as he was by the sorrowing self and the other as the central motif of mother in what is sometimes called a drama of Britten’s own personal life as well as that of his madness— monoguruinoh . : the homosexual in a society where it was a It seems likely that on his return to Europe criminal offence for almost all of his adult life Britten shared his excitement about what he and a man overwhelmingly attracted to boys had seen with the poet William Plomer, who who was thus imprisoned in his own chastity. would write the libretto for what became Noh is not the most yielding of theatrical Curlew River . But two years later in 1958 it forms for a Western audience; indeed, many was still an “idea” rather than a definite proj - Japanese have difficulties with this form of ect as a letter from the composer to Plomer drama, which can trace its roots back to the makes clear. “The Sumidagawa doesn’t come 14th century. And although music and dance into any immediate plans. I’d rather put it to play a central role in noh and its starting point the back of my mind. But any time that you is a text—albeit in a Japanese that is not easily feel that you’d like to talk about it can be

PLAYBILL PROGRAM nOTES brought forth again. It is something that I am However, when you listen to Curlew River , deeply interested in and that I am determined you hear unmistakable echoes of the music that to do sometime. Isn’t it a curiously moving Britten heard in Japan in 1956 , though always and disturbing story?” wonderfully bent to his own creative purposes. Plomer did want to talk about it and, more The very particular use of the chamber organ importantly, to start writing. So by the end of and the gradually accelerating tremolando of the summer of 1958 there was a draft libretto. the drums seem to come from gagaku , the Daisaku Mukai, who has studied this first draft, Japanese court music which he had heard in points out that the work is a long way from its Tokyo. And it was in the Japanese capital that final form at this stage, being an English-lan - Britten acquired his own sho , a kind of mouth guage version of the original play. And it is still organ used in gagaku . The sho has 17 bamboo very Japanese, with Japanese place names re - pipes, and in court music it plays complex tained and the story beginning with the chords. Britten seems to have adapted what he Ferryman rather than the entry of the monks heard on the sho to be played on the chamber and their formal robing prior to the beginning organ in Curlew River . of the drama proper. As for the end, the spirit of As Daisaku Mukai has suggested, “het - the dead child actually appears and when the erophony characterizes the musical language mother and the chorus pray for him they use of Curlew River [and] is also common to the words of a Buddhist prayer. At this stage the Japanese traditional music—we hear this in work was called Sumida River . the entrance of the Abbot after the prelude. In It seems likely that Britten and Pears, who this entry music the opening plainchant was to create the tenor role of the Madwoman, theme is played in unison by all the instru - were anxious that they might be creating a ments but each line is slightly delayed to cre - Western pastiche of a Japanese noh play. So ate a kind of echo-like effect suitable for the they dropped the Japanese names, and visionary nature of the piece.” miyakodori —the Japanese word for gulls—be - Whereas other composers might have writ - came curlews, giving the work its final title. ten these things into their score as so many ex - It’s at this point that the specifically Christian otic calling cards, they are intrinsic to Britten’s framework is created, with the play becoming work and its meanings. Through the heart of a parable to be performed in a medieval this Parable for Church Performance runs a church in East Anglia by an abbot and his river that must be crossed, Curlew River , a monks in order to instruct their congregation. frontier between “two kingdoms,” as the So the piece begins with the plainsong hymn Ferryman tells us. “On this side the Land of Te lucis ante terminum , and “from it the whole the West, on the other, the Eastern Fens.” East piece may be said to have grown,” as Britten Anglia certainly, but also it is the Japanese indicated in the preface to the published score. other, life and death too, darkness and light, As drama Curlew River would seem to have despair and hope…all these things are written distanced itself now from its noh origins. In into the monks drama. And when we are al - noh only the protagonist wears a mask, but in most at the end, as the chorus chant Custodes Curlew River and the Traveller hominum psallimus Angelos , the hymn for are also masked; in this church parable the Vespers for the feast of angels, characters “act” their emotions and are rarely the stately progressing chords sound strikingly static as in noh ; and while the chorus still treat Japanese, while the solo flute, representing the us to the kind of monophonic singing that is soaring curlew, belongs to the English Fens. an essential part of noh drama, they are ac - East and West, other and self, are held in bal - companied by seven musicians rather than ance in the moment of performance. four, and who produce a more highly colored sound than the Japanese hayashi ensemble. © www.barbican.org.uk

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take her across the water and they argue. However, the Traveller and the pilgrims per - suade him to give her passage. As they begin their , the Ferryman stops poling his boat. “Today,” he tells his pas - sengers, “is an important day, the people are assembling in memory of a sad event.” He continues poling. One year ago, a young boy arrived in the area with a vicious master who had kidnapped him from his home near the Black Mountains. The boy was badly beaten by this master and then abandoned by the river. Local people cared for the sick child, who, clearly dying, made a last request. “Please bury me here, by the path to this chapel. Then, if Travellers from my dear country pass this way, their shadows will fall on my grave, and plant a yew tree in memory of me.” For the people who live along the river the boy’s grave is sacred, “some special grace is there, to heal HE PARABLE is told by a quartet of charac - the sick in body and in soul.” Tters who in the tradition of noh theater are All now understand the boy who died is the all men: the Abbot, who is the narrator, the son for whom the Madwoman is searching. “O Ferryman, the Traveller, and the Madwoman. Curlew River, cruel Curlew, where all my hope Eight pilgrims form the chorus. The action is swept away.” During the crossing, the takes place in a church by a river in the Ferryman tries to console her. “Your sad Fenlands in the early medieval period. search is ended.” And he and the Pilgrims lead Curlew River opens with the Abbot and his the grief-stricken mother to her son’s tomb. monks processing into the center of the As all pray the voice of the dead boy sud - church singing the hymn Te lucis ante ter - denly echoes their chant , Custodes hominum minum . The abbot, his monks and the musi - psallimus Angelos . Alone now, the mother sud - cians take their places and at a cue from the denly sees the spirit of her son. “Go your way organ the abbot tells his congregation of a in peace, mother. The dead shall rise again and time not long ago, when “a sign was given of in that blessed day we shall meet in heaven.” God’s grace…in our reedy Fens…[where] the Freed from her grief and with her wits re - Curlew River runs.” The monks who are to stored, the Mother kneels in a prayer that ends play the Ferryman, the Traveller, and the with a joyous emblematic “Amen,” the final Madwoman are ceremonially dressed in their note of which resolves into a long-delayed robes, the pilgrims take their places and the unison with the full cast—a signal of her re - story begins. turn and acceptance. The Traveller and the Madwoman have The actors in the drama are disrobed and as come to cross the river that “flows between monks now hail “a sign of God’s grace.” “In two realms, on this side the land of the West, hope, in peace, ends our mystery,” intones the on the other the Eastern Fens.” The Abbot. And the company process away from Madwoman, who is clearly nobly born, has the centre of the church once again singing the journeyed from the Black Mountains in search hymn Te lucis ante terminum . of her child, who was abducted twelve months previously. The Ferryman seems unwilling to © 2013 Christopher Cook

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Orchestra under conductors including , Sir Andrew Davis, , , , Seiji Ozawa, Sir , Sir , and Donald Runn icles. In 2010, he gave the world première of Henze’s Opfergang with the Accademia Santa Cecilia in Rome under Mr. Pappano, and in March of this year sang Stravinsky’s Oedipus rex with and HK Gruber in Manchester Ian Bostridge (tenor, Madwoman )’s interna - and Vienna. tional recital career has taken him to the During the 2013 Britten centenary celebra - , Edinburgh, , Vienna, tions, Mr. Bostridge has been a major presence , and Schwarzenberg Schubertiade worldwide, with appearances at the Aix-en- festivals and to the main stages of Carnegie Provence, Brighton, Aldeburgh, and Salzburg Hall and , Milan. He has held artistic festivals; and Britten residencies at the residencies at the Vienna Konzerthaus and Laeiszhalle Hamburg, the Philharmonie Schwarzenberg Schubertiade (2003–2004), a Cologne, New York’s , the Carte-Blanche series with Thomas Quasthoff Barbican, Birmingham Symphony Hall, and the at the Amsterdam (2004– Moscow Conservatory (including the Moscow 205), a Perspectives series at Carnegie Hall première of Death in Venice under Gennady (2005–2006), the Barbican (2008), the Rozhdestvensky). He performed in the Berlin Luxembourg Philharmonie (2010–2011), and Philharmonie on Britten’s birth date and also (2011–2012). appears with the Warsaw Philharmonic under His operatic appearances have included Roberto Abbado, the Santa Cecilia Orchestra Lysander ( A Midsummer Night’s Dream ) for under Sir Antonio Pappano, the London at the Edinburgh Festival; Philharmonic Orchestra under Vladimir Tamino and Jupiter ( ) for English Jurowski, and the Amsterdam Concertgebouw National Opera; and Quint ( The Turn of the Orchestra under . Screw ), Don Ottavio, and Caliban (Thomas Mr. Bostridge was appointed a Commander Adès’s ) for . For of t he Most Excellent Order of the British the he has sung Nerone Empire in the 2004 New Year’s Honors. He is (L’incoronazione di Poppea ), Tom Rakewell Humanitas professor of at the (The Rake’s Progress ), and Male Chorus ( The University of Oxford. His book, Schubert’s Rape of Lucretia ); and Don Ottavio for the Winter Journey: Anatomy of an Obsession , will . He has sung Aschenbach be published by in the United (Death in Venice ) for Kingdom and Knopf in the United States in and in Brussels and Luxembourg. early 2015. Mr. Bostridge’s recordings, encompassing repertoire from Handel to Henze and netia Jones (direction, design, costume, video ) is Schubert to Adès, have won all the major in - a director and video designer in opera and ternational record prizes and been nominated staged concerts. She is director of Lightmap, a for 13 Grammy Awards. mixed media partnership with which she has He has worked with the Berlin, London, created performance, installation, and film proj - Los Angeles, New York, Rotterdam, and ects in the , Europe, and the orchestras, the BBC, United States. Work as director and designer Boston, Chicago, and London symphony or - includes Kafka Fragments (Kurtág) for the chestras, and the Royal Concertgebouw , Linbury Theatre; Where

PLAYBILL ABOuT THE ARTISTS the Wild Things Are and Higglety Pigglety Pop! Recent seasons have included Béthune in Les (Knussen) for the Barbican, Los Angeles vêpres siciliennes at Dutch National Opera; Philharmonic, , and Dansker in Billy Budd for Glynde bourne Tanglewood Con temporary Music Festival; Festival Opera and in New York; Parsons in Everlasting Light , The Way to the Sea , and 1984 at La Scala and in Valencia; Kecal in The Before Life and After —all site-specific per - Bartered Bride , Sourin in The Queen of Spades , formances for the Aldeburgh Festival; Alfred Snug in A Midsummer Night’s Dream , and (Arne) and (Handel) for the Royal Lignière in Cyrano de Bergerac for Royal Opera Opera House, Linbury Theatre; Susanna and House; the title role in , and Flavio for the Queen Elizabeth Hall with the Pluto in Orfeo for English National Opera; Early Opera Company; Handel’s Acis, Galatea Where the Wild Things Are with the Berlin e Polifemo for the Batignano Festival, Italy; Philharmonic; L’enfance du Christ at the BBC Poulenc’s La voix humaine for ; Proms under ; Achilla in and Blow’s Venus and Adonis and Handel’s Giulio Cesare for the Grand-Théâtre de Acis and Galatea and Il Trionfo del e del Bordeaux; and Rocco in , Superintendent Disinganno with Transition/Lightmap. Budd in Albert Herring , Il Re in Aïda , Dikoy in Other Transition/Lightmap projects include Kát’a Kabanová , and Talbot in Giovanna d’Arco works by Schoenberg, Berg, Purcell, Stravinsky, for Opera North. Bartók, Britten, Dowland, Berio, and Couperin, Upcoming performances at the Royal and other recent work includes The Seafarer , an Opera House include Daddy Hogan in Anna installation around Louange à l’Éternité de Jésus Nicole , Schmidt in Andrea Chénier , Bonze in from Messiaen’s Quatuor pour la fin du temps , Benoît in La bohème , and (Southbank Centre); O Let Me Weep , a per - Marquis d’Obigny in La traviata . Mr. White formance installation for Opera North; A Living appears by kind permission of the Royal Thing , a performance with film created for the Opera House. tenth anniversary of the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Walt Disney Concert Hall; and neal davies (bass-baritone, Traveller ) studied at Castiglioni’s Inverno In-ver for the New World King’s College, London, and the Royal Academy Symphony in Miami and Chicago. of Music and won the Lieder Prize at the 1991 Cardiff Singer of the World Competition . He Born in Liverpool and educated at Oxford, has appeared with the Philharmonic under Jeremy white (bass, Abbot ) enjoys an , the BBC Symphony Orchestra international career in opera, concert, and under , the Cleveland and recording, with repertoire ranging from early Philharmonia orchestras under Christoph von music to contemporary compositions. He has Dohnányi, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe worked with numerous esteemed conductors, under , Orchestra of the including , Andrew Parrott, Age of Enlightenment under Frans Brüggen, Iván Fischer, Harry Chris tophers, Pierre Gabrieli Consort under Paul McCreesh, the Boulez, and Hans Graf, and has appeared with Hallé Orchestra under Sir Mark Elder, , Arvo Pärt, and in Köln under Ivor Bolton, Scottish their own works. Concert tours have taken Chamber Orchestra under Ádám Fischer, him to most of the major European venues as Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra under Edward well as to the United States, Brazil, and . Gardner, and the London Symphony and Mr. White performs frequently on the opera Vienna Philharmonic orchestras under Daniel stage, including at the Aix-en-Provence Harding. He has been a regular guest of the Festival, , and Royal Edinburgh Festival and the BBC Proms. Opera House, , where he has His wide-ranging discography includes appeared each season since his début in 1991 . Messiah, Theodora, , and The Creation

CAL PERFORMANCES ABOuT THE ARTISTS

(which won a Gramophone Award in 2008) Orchestra under Andris Nelsons; and under McCreesh, Jenůfa , and The Makropulos Kurwenal ( ) with the London Case under Mackerras, Barber’s Vanessa under Symphony Orchestra under Daniel Harding. Leonard Slatkin, Messiah under René Jacobs, On the opera stage, his engagements this Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony under Osmo year have included the title role in Don Vänskä, Schubert Lieder with Graham Johnson, Giovanni for both and and Britten’s Billy Budd under Mr. Harding, ; Mountjoy ( ) at which won a Grammy Award in 2010 . the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden; the Operatic appearances have included Giulio Count ( ) for his début Cesare and the title role in The Marriage of at Cologne Opera; and for the Figaro for the Royal Opera, Covent Garden; , Hamburg State Opera, L’Allegro , Zebul ( Jephtha ), Publio ( La and New Zealand Opera. clemenza di Tito ), Ariodates ( Xerxes ), and His many appearances at English National Kolenaty ( The Makropoulos Case ) for English Opera have included the title role in Don National Opera; Radamisto for Opéra de Giovanni , the Count ( The Marriage of Figaro ), Marseille; with the Gabrieli Consort; Guglielmo, Marcello ( La bohème ), Figaro ( Il Leporello ( Don Giovanni ) for Scottish Opera barbiere di Siviglia ), Enrico ( Lucia di Lammer - and Montreal Opera; Curlew River at the moor ), Silvio ( ), Chou-en-Lai ( Nixon in Edinburgh Festival; Guglielmo and Don China ), and Prince Yamadori in Anthony Alfonso ( Così fan tutte ), Papageno ( The Magic Minghella’s production of Madama Butterfly . Flute ), Leporello, Dulcamara ( L’elisir d’amore ), In the United States he is a regular guest at Zebul, and Sharpless ( Madama Butterfly ) for the Philadelphia Opera, where his roles in - ; and for the clude Ford ( ), Germont père ( La travi - Deutsche Staatsoper, Berlin. ata ), the title role in , and, He made his début with Lyric Opera of most recently, Papageno ( ). Chicago as Major General ( The He has also sung Guglielmo in Santa Fe. Pirates of Penzance ) and returned as Ko-Ko In concert, he has appeared with Lorin (The Mikado ) with Sir Andrew Davis. With Maazel, Vladimir Jurowski, Xian Zhang, William Christie and Les Arts Florissants, Michael Schønwandt, , Paul Mr. Davies has sung in Theodora (Paris and Goodwin, and James Judd. A keen recitalist, Salzburg) and in the Aix-en-Provence Festival he has sung in New York at Carnegie’s Weill production of Charpentier’s David et Jonathas Hall; in London at the Wigmore Hall and (Aix, Edinburgh, and New York), which is St. John’s, Smith Square, as well as at the Oxford available on DVD. Lieder, Canterbury, and Buxton festivals. His recordings include (ex - Mark Stone (baritone, Ferryman ) was born in tracts) under Sir Antonio Pappano, Les London and studied mathematics at King’s Troyens under Colin Davis , Billy Budd under College, Cambridge, and singing at the Mr. Harding, Bellini’s under Guildhall School of Music and Drama . In , and Mozart arias with the 1998, he was awarded the Decca Priz e at the Classical Opera Company. His solo recital Awards. discs of Quilter, Butterworth, and Delius have His operatic engagements this season include received widespread acclaim. Ned Keene ( Peter Grimes ) with the London Philharmonic Orchestra under Vladimir Britten Sinfonia is one of the world’s most Jurowski and at the Beijing International celebrated and pioneering ensembles. The or - Festival; the Count ( The Marriage of Figaro ) for chestra is acclaimed for its virtuoso musi - Tampere Opera; Faninal ( ) cianship, an inspired approach to concert with the City of Birmingham Symphony programming, which makes bold, intelligent

PLAYBILL ABOuT THE ARTISTS connections across 400 ye ars of repertoire, conductors including Sir Mark Elder, David and a versatility that is second to none. Britten Hill, and Andreas Delfs. Sinfonia breaks the mould by not having a Highlights this season include concerts cel - principal conductor or director, instead ebrating Sir ’s 80th birthday, choosing to collaborate with a range of the a tour of Bach’s St. John Passion , and the group’s finest international guest artists from across début at the Wigmore Hall in a new work by the musical spectrum, resulting in perform - as part of the Britten ances of insight and energy. Sinfonia’s award-winning lunchtime series. Britten Sinfonia is an Associate Ensemble at the Barbican and has residencies across the Martin Fitzpatrick (music director ) studied at east of in , Brighton, and Balliol College Oxford as , the Cambridge, where it is the University’s or - Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and the chestra-in-association. The orchestra also National Opera Studio in London. He has performs a series at the worked as assistant conductor, chorus, master, Wigmore Hall and appears regularly at major or coach for numerous companies, including U.K. festivals, including Aldeburgh and the the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, BBC Proms. The orchestra’s growing interna - Festival, Scottish Opera, Spoleto tional profile includes regular tours to Mexico, Festival in Italy, and La Monnaie in Brussels. South America, and Europe. In 2012, Bri tten He was head of music at the Royal Danish Sinfonia made its North American début at Opera ( 1998–2001 ), where he conducted New York’s Lincoln Center. , L’elisir d’amore , Die Zauberflöte , and Founded in 1992 , the orchestra is inspired Le nozze di Figaro . Elsewhere he has conducted by the ethos of Benjamin Britten through Die Zauberflöte and La traviata for English world-class performances, illuminating and Touring Opera and La bohème , Così fan tutte , distinctive programs where old meets new, and the world première of Alec Roth’s opera for a deep commitment to bringing outstanding children All Summer in a Day , and The Barber music to both the world’s finest concert halls of Seville for Opera North, for whom he also and the local community. Britten Sinfonia is a translated Luisa Miller . He was appointed head BBC Radio 3 br oadcast partner and regularly of music at English National Opera in 2003 , records for Harmonia Mundi and Hyperion. and has since conducted Die Zauberflöte , Falstaff , La belle Hélène , Early Earth , La Britten Sinfonia Voices is a professional vocal bohème , The Mikado , , ensemble that reflects the artistic vision and , La traviata , Madama Butterfly , and range of Britten Sinfonia. Don Giovanni for the company. He has also Britten Sinfonia Voices is made up of some translated Così fan tutte , The Pearl Fishers , and of the finest professional voices—both emerg - La traviata , and has completed a new edition ing talent and experienced singers—a combi - of The Pearl Fishers . nation in keeping with Britten Sinfonia’s ethos. The group is equally adept at perform - Eamonn dougan ( Britten Sinfonia Voices di - ing repertoire from the Baroque to the latest rector ) read music at New College, Oxford, be - new music and is directed by acclaimed fore continuing his studies at the Guildhall choral conductor and singer Eamonn School of Music and Drama. He now pursues Dougan, who carefully selects and prepares a busy career as conductor and singer. the Voices for each project. The ensemble has He is the first Associate Conductor of The performed a range of works including Sixteen and has directed the ensemble to con - Mendelssohn’s Elijah and Berlioz’s L’enfance siderable acclaim in concerts across England du Christ , as well as premièring new works by and Europe. He made his début at the Nico Muhly and Ēriks Ešenvalds under Concertgebouw, Amsterdam, in a celebration

CAL PERFORMANCES ABOuT THE ARTISTS of James Mac Millan’s 50th birt hday and co- As a singer, he has appeared on disc and the directed The Earth Resounds . Other high - concert platform throughout the world with lights with The Sixteen have included the many of Britain’s leading ensembles and is a world première of Gabriel Jackson’s Ave regina member of the multi-award-winning I Fagiolini. cælorum at the opening of Kings Place, a recording with Icelandic ensemble Sigur Rós Pacific Boychoir Academy (PBA) is a Grammy and the closing concert of the Henry VIII Award –winning, independent school for 500th-anniversary celebrations at the Royal boys in grades four through eight, with seven Naval Chapel, Greenwich. after-school for boys in pre-kindergarten He is Chorus Director of Britten Sinfonia through high school. PBA provides a richly di - Voices and a regular guest conductor with verse community, focusing on excellence in Wrocław Philharmonic Choir, Madrid’s Coro music education, academics, and performance. de la Comunidad, and the St. Endellion Founded in Oakland, Cali fornia, in 1998 by Festival Orchestra and Chorus. Artistic Director Kevin Fox, PBA serves over With the Britten Sinfonia and Britten 170 choristers a season, has released seven in - Sinfonia Voices, he has conducted two recent dependent albums, tours internationally each world premières: Nico Muhly’s Looking Forward year, and has garnered three Grammy Awards for the ensemble’s 20th birthday at the Barbican with the San Francisco Symphony. The only and Ešenvalds’s Aqua in Cambridge. U.S. boychoir school outside of the East Coast, In September 2008 , he was appointed a vis - PBA offers unique and rigorous choral and ac - iting professor to the Guildhall School of ademic programs, producing confident, en - Music and Drama, where he teaches ensem - gaged young men and artists. Hear, watch, and ble singing and directs the Guildhall Consort. learn more at pacificboychoir.org.

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