In recent months, Kizart has sung Tosca with Deutsche Oper Berlin and in a new production with Oper Frankfurt, and reprised her starring role in Respighi's Marie Victoire, also in Berlin.  She helped raise 140,000 Euros at Deutsche Oper am Rhein's AIDS gala in D�sseldorf in February.  "One could wax lyrical about the audience's favorite, Takesha Mesh� Kizart," said the Westdeutsche Zeitung critic. "She sang with a soft, dark-toned iridescent voice that glowed in the highs with no register breaks."   

"With a family tree that includes Tina Turner and Muddy Waters, she could have been a soul queen. Instead, American singer Takesha Mesh� Kizart opted for the opera." 

- Read Quantas Airlines feature, April 2011

 

On April 9 Julian Kuerti makes both his New York and New York City Opera debut with Oliver Knussen's Where the Wild Things Are at Lincoln Center, featuring Vocal Fellows from the Tanglewood Music Center. The Canadian conductor, who completed a three-year post last August as assistant conductor to James Levine at the Boston Symphony, spent time with Knussen at Tanglewood last summer and got some first-hand tips from the composer on navigating the lush, colorful orchestration. Read more in this Q&A with Kuerti.

In other news, Kuerti is featured on a new BSO Classics CD, Plain Song, Fantastic Dances. The Boston Globe's reviewer wrote:  "It's hard to know what one admires most in the Boston Symphony Chamber Players' new disc: the choice of music (recent works by American composers who have collaborated with the Boston Symphony Orchestra); the crisp, elegant playing; or the recording itself."  Kuerti conducts the musicians for pieces by Golijov and Foss.  

Later this month the young conductor leads the Atlanta Symphony for the first time.  It's the last stop in a whirlwind season of debuts that has included the Los Angeles and Saint Paul chamber orchestras and the symphonies of Seattle, New Jersey, Vancouver, Rochester, Toledo and Quebec. "Guest conductor Julian Kuerti demonstrated a grace and interpretive confidence that showed why his star is on the ascent," stated the Pioneer Press after Kuerti's Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra debut with soprano Dawn Upshaw.

For more information, visit Julian Kuerti's new web site or the IMG Artists web site.  

The Knights: a quest among musical friends 

Words like "friends" and "camaraderie" come up a lot when describing The Knights, an adventurous New York City orchestra that is grabbing attention with its recordings and appearances in places like Central Park and Le Poisson Rouge as well as festivals from Ravinia to Dresden. The group has what cellist Yo-Yo Ma calls a "vibrant, energetic, collaborative culture."

In late March, a  Mozart CD led by their 28-year-old conductor, Eric Jacobsen, won a Canadian "Classical Album of the Year" JUNO Award. "There's a fresh energy that feels as if they had just happened upon the scores for the first time, and were really getting off on reading through them," said Gramophone. "Together, these gifted young players have created a flawless recording," noted Strings magazine.

Founded by brothers Colin and Eric Jacobsen, The Knights boasts a diverse, active roster of musicians that includes all four founding members of Brooklyn Rider, the violinist and indie-pop singer Christina Courtin, as well as performers with Alarm Will Sound, Silk Road Ensemble and Rufus Wainwright's band, among others.   Catch The Knights at Lincoln Center's Kaplan Penthouse on May 25.   

"If we are to talk about the future of classical music in America, sooner or later, the Knights will come up ... musicians with a modern sensibility, a wide repertory of works new and old, along with a crusading musical mission."

         --Los Angeles Times [Mark Swed]

For more information, visit TheKnightsNYC.com, The Knights on YouTube or the Opus 3 Artists web site.    

"It's fun to be the bad guy," James Valenti confessed last month in a

News-Telegram preview as he prepared to sing the Duke of Mantua in Dallas Opera's current production of Rigoletto. Audiences and critics are eating up his portrayal, too.   

"Applause and bravos for Verdi's masterpiece Rigoletto shook the Winspear Opera House last night," stated the Dallas Examiner's reviewer.  "Tenor James Valenti (the Duke of Mantua) is not only a rising international opera star, he also has striking leading man looks. His Duke of Mantua is a believable scoundrel."  View video excerpt of Valenti's "La donna e mobile".

This is the 33-year-old New Jersey-born tenor's first appearance in Dallas since receiving the company's Maria Callas Debut Artist of the Year Award in 2009 for his ardent portrayal of Rodolfo in La boh�me.  His fast-rising career has since included debuts at the Met, Covent Garden, La Scala, and most recently Paris Opera, where he sang another scoundrel signature role, Lt. Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly. The 2010 Richard Tucker Award winner reprises the Duke in Detroit with Michigan Opera Theatre next month and returns to London's Covent Garden (June 25 - July 15) to woo and abandon soprano Patricia Racette's Cio-Cio San.  

For more information, visit JamesValenti.com, his YouTube channel or the IMG Artists web site.    

Joshua Roman at TED 

The Twitterverse was buzzing last month after cellist Joshua Roman gave his TED U talk and performance, for which he received the first standing ovation of the TED2011 conference in Long Beach, CA.  "Beauty in its purest form," effused one Tweeter. "Joshua Roman takes your breath away." Read the 27-year-old cellist's Huffington Post profile as a 2011 TED Fellow, and view video from the John Lennon Bus, where he hopped on to play Bach.

Roman's upcoming concert engagements include a double feature of Haydn and Tchaikovsky with the Indianapolis Chamber Orchestra on April 16.  He joins the JACK Quartet on May 3 to play arrangements of Gesauldo madrigals at Seattle's Town Hall, where he is artistic director of the TownMusic series, and gives a master class and performs Brahms's "Double Concerto" in Washington state. Then, ever the musical ambassador, he travels to Norway to perform at the Oslo Freedom Forum.

"Remember his name: it will be in the pantheon of Jacqueline du Pr�, Pablo Casals, and Yo-Yo Ma, all performers of this great work." [Elgar Cello Concerto]

- Greenwich Times, 2/6/11

For more information, visit JoshuaRoman.com, his YouTube channel, or the Opus 3 Artists web site.