Countertenor Jakub Józef Orliński Breakdances & Sings For Pepsi Beat

Breakout opera-star Jakub Józef Orliński dances and adds vocals to a new track called "Never Alone" (Nigdy Sam) in a newly-released music video from Warner Music Poland. Known for his high-flying vocal ornamentations of undiscovered Baroque music, the young countertenor is also a well-skilled breakdancer. He puts his beat skills to the test in the high-energy track. Launched to fame with a YouTube performance that went viral (currently at nearly 6 million views...) of Vivaldi's "Vedrò con mio diletto" from Il Giustino, the Juilliard School of Music alumni has become a darling of Europe performing on several tours with Il Pomo d'Oro with whom he has recorded two albums. Check out the discs here. During the time of COVID-19, the Polish singer has done a recital for Aix-en-Provence and concerts with Capella Cracoviensis in Świdnica. Upcoming engagements include a pastiche project staged by Robert Carsen at Dans les Jardins de William Christie Festival in Thiré, France, and a charity concert at Teatr Wielki Opera Narodowa in September.

"Never Alone" (Nigdy Sam) is the second, after the hit 'Where You,' the musical version of the Pepsi Taste The Beat project. Sir Mich again took up the production  and invited a line-up that could only be created on this platform. The first element of this surprising puzzle is Sarius, a top Polish rapper who has taken the Polish scene by storm in recent years. Another is BARANOVSKI, a discovery and great hope for ambitious pop. This absolutely magical trio is complemented by the participation of the repeatedly awarded and delighting countertenor - Jakub Józef Orliński. 'Never Alone' is a pulsating kaleidoscope of talents infecting with positive energy. The publisher of the song is Warner Music Poland and Papaya Films is responsible for the production of the clip directed by  Marcin Starzecki."

"Pepsi Taste The Beat is a timeless music project for those who love music, have their own taste, value their taste and are energized by the energy that lies in beating. This is where we break with the routine, discover the undiscovered, appreciate our sights, cultivate spontaneity and follow our passions! Meet the non-obvious collaborations of artists and a surprising mix of sounds over genres. Get to know a new phenomenon on the Polish music scene. Get carried away by the urban sound. Try this unconventional approach to the subject. This is lifestyle. This is what the city sounds like. This is what Pepsi sounds like. Listen to your taste."

Watch the full video for "Never Alone," the famous "Vedrò" clip, and other videos Jakub has worked on during the quarantine time, after the jump.

[Source, Source, Source]

Puerto Rican Soprano Ana María Martínez Gets High Ranking

Viva Latina: Soprano Ana María Martínez
(Photo: Tom Specht)

"Now it is Ana María Martínez’s turn, a soprano singer that the London’s Opera Magazine ranks among the current top lyric sopranos. She is a Grammy Award winner with an international career that spans the world’s most important opera houses and concert halls. With a repertoire that encompasses opera’s most intriguing and diverse leading female roles, she engages her audiences time and time again with signature roles and captivating recordings. Ana María was born in San Juan, Puerto Rico, the daughter of Puerto Rican opera singer Evangelína Colón and Ángel Martínez, a Cuban psychoanalyst. She moved with her parents to the United States and grew up a few blocks north of the Lincoln Center in New York, spending summers in Puerto Rico. Her first stage experience was in Puerto Rico, as Laurey in a high school production of Oklahoma! Ana María went on to study music in the prestigious Juilliard School, graduating in 1993, and rose to prominence when she won the Plácido Domingo International Voice Competition Operalia 1995. She went on to work with the Houston Grand Opera studio, which gave her a platform from which to launch an international career. Today, Martínez has sung every major lyric role (including Mimi in La Bohème, Violetta in La Traviata, Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni, and the Countess in Le Nozze di Figaro) in venues such as the Metropolitan Opera, Teatro alla Scala, the Vienna Staatsoper, the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Lyric Opera of Chicago, and the San Francisco Opera." [Source]

Hei-Kyung Hong Eyes Madama Butterfly As Next Career Challenge

Opera Veteran: Hei-Kyung Hong (Photo: J. Henry Fair)

"Prima donna Hei-kyung Hong beamed at reporters of the JoongAng Ilbo’s bureau in New York after learning she was the winner of the 2014 Ho-Am Prize for her contribution to the arts. 'I am so glad that I’ve achieved my goal,' said Hong, who has been an established international opera star for the past three decades. 'When I went to New York to study in the Juilliard School back in the 1970s, I was the only Korean kid in the entire class. Asians were still marginalized in U.S. society at that time, and explicit discrimination was all around,' recalled the virtuoso. 'At that time, I had this feeling I was representing Asian society as a whole; so I wanted to become a formidable soprano who would gain everyone’s respect, regardless of the color of their skin.' Hong is known as a pioneer in Korea because she paved the way for musicians junior to her. After she made her astounding debut in 1984 at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City, many young, aspiring musicians in her home nation dreamed of following her. Though she has become a national icon for opera music in 21st-century Korea, her path wasn’t initially rosy. Having a remarkable debut was not enough to beat competitors. 'I didn’t win a big title as soon I first started my career in New York. It did not come immediately,' Hong said. 'I guess practicing self-control definitely helped me. Some young vocalists merely accept all the requests of international producers, hoping to become big stars in the opera world,” she continued. “But if you are not ready for the stage, you should be brave enough to say no to the offer.' After having performed on stage more than 350 times at the Met, Hong, who will celebrate her 55th birthday in July, notes that it has been tough to maintain the quality of her voice. 'In Juilliard, I saw so many talented vocalists losing their gifted talents due to overstraining their voice,' said Hong, adding that she has done her best to preserve her vocal chords. A female soprano’s voice reaches its peak between the mid-40s to 55 years old, according to Hong. 'As she becomes 55, she needs to step down from the throne,' she said. But Hong still wants to take on other operatic roles, such as Giacomo Puccini’s Madama Butterfly. 'When I was younger, I deliberately avoided Madama Butterfly’s character because I did not want to conform to the rigid stereotype that Asians should play Asian roles,' the prize laureate said. 'But now, I dream to show the best version of Butterfly, or Cio-cio san, as a veteran soprano.'” [Source] Watch a stunning video of Hei-Kyung Hong's artistry by clicking here.

Joyce DiDonato Shares Touching Story In 2014 Juilliard Speech

"I want to share with you a quick email from a soldier on the front lines of our Arts: an elementary/middle school teacher from Salt Lake City, Ms. Audrey Hill, who is fighting the great fight! She brought her students to the recent HD telecast of La Cenerentola, and wrote the following note to me: 'One of my boys...a 5th grader...wrote in his review this morning that one of his favorite parts (besides the spaghetti food-fight scene) was where at the end you were singing about getting revenge, and how he really liked that your revenge was going to be forgiveness. This boy was new to our school this year, has a beautiful singing voice, and has been teased a lot. I have seen him getting more and more angry as the year was coming to a close and today it seemed like all that had disappeared. It was very moving for me to experience.'" [Source] The Juilliard School’s 109th Commencement Speech by Joyce DiDonato can be read here in its entirety or watch the video after the jump.

2014 Honorees: front row - Lar Lubovitch, Viola Davis, Frank Owen Gehry, Philip Glass; back row: Marcus Roberts, Bruce Kovner, Suzanne F. Kovner, Joyce DiDonato, Juilliard President Joseph W. Polisi
(Photo: Nan Melville/Facebook)

Edith Wiens Teaches After Leaving Opera Stage A Decade Ago

The soprano today spreads
knowledge through teaching

"The world-renowned soprano has been feted in Berlin, Vienna, London and Buenos Aires. She can now add her hometown to that list. Wiens returned to the city this fall for the first time in 'quite a while' to receive her honorary doctor of letters from the University of Saskatchewan. 'It was just fabulous. It made me feel very patriotic,' Wiens said. Although she retired from performing 10 years ago and now teaches at the prestigious Juilliard School in New York, Wiens sang at the TCU Place ceremony this fall. 'I love to teach, but there’s nothing like singing,' she said. Wiens has taken on some of the most challenging pieces by Mozart, Wagner, Brahms and others. For her work, she won a Grammy Award and was installed as an officer of the Order of Canada. Born in Saskatoon in 1950 to Mennonite parents, Wiens later attended bible college in Vancouver and earned a master’s degree in music at Ohio’s famed Oberlin College, the first U.S. post-secondary institution to regularly admit female and African-American students. Her singing career was launched after a first-place showing at a European competition in 1979. Over the next two decades,

Edith Wiens with conductor Kurt Masur in earlier days

she would perform with the top symphonies and opera companies in the world, including 14 appearances with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. Wiens, whose husband and two sons are acclaimed musicians, accepted a position in New York at the Juilliard School several years ago to teach others. Several of them have already achieved high honours at global competitions. Wiens is spending six weeks in at a Munich fine arts school, evaluating and hosting auditions for 120 applicants vying for the 15 spots. In 2014, she’s scheduled to teach “master classes” in Frankfurt, London and Zurich." [Source]

Video: Paul Appleby Debuts in "The Juillard Sessions"

(Photo: Dario Acosta)

Watch a video from EMI Classics, featuring Paul Appleby in performance excerpts from the new "Juilliard Sessions," after the jump.

Juilliard Forges Partnership with EMI Classics for iTunes

More information after the jump.

David Daniels Joins Shakespeareans at Juilliard: Listen Live!

For one night only at Juilliard, on Monday, June 13 at 7 PM, actors Sir Derek Jacobi, Richard Clifford, and Juilliard alumna Monica Raymund perform selected readings from Shakespeare’s The Tempest, complemented by 17th–century songs and instrumental highlights inspired by Shakespeare’s play and compiled into an early operatic version. Countertenor David Daniels and baritone Bob McDonald are featured vocalists, performing with Juilliard415, the School’s highly praised student historical performance group. Public radio station WQXR 105.9 will host a live stream of this special performance. An encore presentation on Classical 105.9 FM WQXR, featuring largely the musical portions of the performance, will air on Sunday, June 26 at 4 PM. Juilliard’s June 13 performance is a benefit for the Juilliard Drama Division. A limited number of benefit tickets remain for the performance and post-performance dinner, ranging from $1,000 - $50,000. Performance-only benefit tickets range in price from $75 - $125. For Benefit Ticket Information, call (212) 799-5000 ext. 329. A very limited number of non-benefit balcony seats priced at $50 are available at the Janet and Leonard Kramer Box Office at Juilliard; may be purchased online at http://events.juilliard.edu; or by calling CenterCharge (212) 721-6500. Juilliard is located at Lincoln Center, at 155 West 65th Street, just west of Broadway. Adapted and directed by Mr. Clifford, this presentation of The Tempest with period music was first performed in 2010 by the Folger Consort, early music ensemble-in-residence at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC, with mostly the same cast. Robert Eisenstein was musical director. Thought to have been written by Shakespeare about 1610, The Tempest is among the great plays of his late period. Frequently adapted in performance, it also has been the inspiration for operatic treatments, tone poems, and numerous song texts. At Juilliard, the benefit reading includes a setting of Shakespeare’s text from a 1674 staging of The Tempest as well as other period works; the composers are Matthew Locke, John Banister, Pelham Humfrey, Georg Frideric Handel, and Antonino Reggio. [Source]

Timing Is Everything: Juilliard Presents Opera With Stutterer

Open-air performance of Bride at Waldtheater,
 Zoppsot, near Danzig, around 1913.

The Bartered Bride, aka Die Verkaufte Braut née Prodaná nevěsta, is the first hybrid production between the Metropolitan Opera's Lindemann Young Artist Development Program and the Juilliard School of Music's Opera Center. Smetana's opera, performed at the Peter Jay Sharp Theater, was a chance for young artists from both institutions to take on lead roles and get real stage experience while having the expertise of Maestro James Levine at the helm in the orchestra pit. Students also had the benefit of J.D. McClatchy (translating the Czech libretto into English), Stephen Wadsworth (director) and Benjamin Millepied (choreographer). So why pull out all the stops? The Metropolitan Opera will present this production, perhaps with a few

Czech poster for The King's Speech

enhancements, in the 2014-15 season. Ironically the work was presented in performance just as the Hollywood film The King's Speech was sweeping all the awards ceremonies around the globe. The movie depicts the heavy stutter of King George VI and his attempts to overcome it. Vašek, one of the characters in The Bartered Bride, is a stutterer and unlike many who lose their affliction when they sing he is given two arias ("Má ma-ma-ticka" and "To-to mi v hlave lezí") that serve only to act as a plot to make him seem less than equal to his rival Jeník. This character joins a long list of stutterers in opera including Don Curzio (Le Nozze di Figaro - Mozart), Cochenille (Les contes d'Hoffmann - Offenbach), Billy Budd (Billy Budd - Britten), Demo (Il Giasone - Cavalli) and Flacco (La caduta dei Decemviri - Leonardo Vinci). The opera world hosted one of

Robert Merrill (far right) with Leontyne Price and 
William Schumann at the topping out of the Metropolitan 
Opera House on January 20, 1964. Schumann was president
of Juilliard 1945-62 and head of Lincoln Center 1962-69.

the most famous baritones of the 20th century with a stutter, Robert Merrill. There are even works in opera that follow stuttering-like patterns in opera (some written only to fill out the rhythm) like the duet between Papageno and Papagena in Mozart's Die Zauberflöte "Pa-pa-pageno, Pa-pa-pagena!" Andrew Kuster also points to Nixon in China (John Adams) and Einstein on the Beach (Philip Glass) as using stuttering devices. Whatever the ploy, the synopsis of the opera follows a typical charade of love and misunderstanding (ala Donizetti's Don Pasquale). Zachary Woolfe reviewed the MET/Juilliard production for the New York Observer: