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P R O F I L E S | L Y R I C O P E R A O F C H I C A G O
February 22 - March 19, 2016
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A winner of the 2003 Metropolitan Opera
National Council Auditions finals in New York
City, Van Horn holds numerous prestigious
awards, including a 2003 Sarah Tucker Study
Grant and the Richman Award from Opera
Theatre of St. Louis.
JOSHUA HOPKINS
(
Mercutio
)
Previously at Lyric Opera:
Tadeusz/
The Passenger
(2014-15).
The Canadian baritone,
who appears as Olivier/
Capriccio
at The Santa Fe
Opera later this season, has recently starred
in the title role/
The Barber of Seville
(Opera
Lyra Ottawa), the Pilot/Rachel Portman’s
The Little Prince
and Count Almaviva/
The Marriage of Figaro
(both at Houston
Grand Opera). Hopkins’s successes include
numerous performances of three Mozart
roles: Count Almaviva (Glyndebourne,
Dallas, Verbier Festival), Papageno (Santa
Fe, Washington), and Guglielmo (Frankfurt).
Other operatic highlights include Argante/
Rinaldo
(Glyndebourne), Cecil/
Maria Stuarda
(Metropolitan Opera, company premiere),
Marcello/
La bohème
(Houston Grand Opera,
Canadian Opera Company), Sid/
Albert
Herring
(Santa Fe), and Junior/Bernstein’s
A
Quiet Place
(New York City Opera). On the
concert stage, Hopkins has performed with
the New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia
Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony,
Orchestra of St. Luke’s, Cleveland Orchestra,
Canada’s National Arts Centre Orchestra,
Toronto Symphony Orchestra, and Spain’s
Orquesta Sinfónica del Principado de Asturias
(European concert debut). At Carnegie Hall’s
Zankel Hall, Hopkins premiered Michael
Tilson Thomas’s
Rilke Songs
and collaborated
with Ian Bostridge and Julius Drake in music
of Benjamin Britten. The baritone has recorded
a solo CD, “Let Beauty Awake”, featuring
songs of Barber, Bowles, Glick, and Vaughan
Williams. Hopkins is a winner of the Borletti-
Buitoni Trust Award and holds the Sylva
Gelber Foundation Award from the Canada
Council for the Arts.
PHILIP HORST
(
Lord Capulet
)
Previously at Lyric Opera:
Gamekeeper/
Rusalka
(2013-14).
The American bass-
baritone returned to San
Francisco Opera earlier
this season as Kothner/
Die Meistersinger von
Nürnberg
following recent performances with
the company as Panthée/
Les Troyens
, the
Foreman/
Jenůfa,
Kuligin/
Katya Kabanova
and
his debut on 25 minutes notice as Leporello/
Don Giovanni
while still an Adler Fellow.
Among the many other major companies with
which Horst is associated are the Metropolitan
Opera (
The Gambler
,
Francesca da Rimini
,
The Nose
,
Die Frau ohne Schatten
,
La traviata
,
Romeo and Juliet
,
Das Rheingold
,
Capriccio
),
Washington National Opera (Doctor/
Sophie’s Choice
, American premiere), Seattle
Opera and Opera Grand Rapids (Scarpia/
Tosca
), Des Moines Metro Opera (Orest/
Elektra
), Lyric Opera of Kansas City (Bonze/
Madama Butterfly
), Dayton Opera (Ferrando/
Il trovatore
), and Palm Beach Opera (Grech/
Fedora
, Tortsheiner/Ben Moore’s
Enemies, A
Love Story
, world premiere). Internationally,
he has performed at Ireland’s Wexford Opera
Festival (Lieutenant Horstmayer/Kevin Puts’s
Silent Night
, European premiere), New Israeli
Opera (title role/
Wozzeck
), Greek National
Opera (Simone/Zemlinsky’s
Eine florentinische
Tragödie
), English National Opera (Pizarro/
Fidelio
), Berlin’s Komische Oper (Tomsky/
The Queen of Spades
), and Oper Frankfurt
and Theater St. Gallen (Mandryka/
Arabella
).
A former winner of the Metropolitan Opera
National Council Auditions, he holds awards
from the Wagner divisions of the Liederkranz
Competition and the Gerda Lissner
Foundation International Vocal Competition.
MARIANNE CREBASSA
(
Stephano
)
Lyric Opera debut
Following her Lyric debut,
the French mezzo-soprano,
who has recently portrayed
Mozart’s Cherubino in
Vienna and Berlin, will
appear as Dorabella/
Così fan tutte
(Opéra
Municipal de Marseille) and in the title role/
L’enfant et les sortilèges
(La Scala) later this
season. At just 21, while studying musicology,
voice, and piano in Montpellier, Crebassa
was engaged by that city’s opera company for
Schumann’s
Manfred
. She returns annually to
the Opéra de Montpellier and to the Festival de
Radio France Montpellier, where most recently
she sang the title role of Offenbach’s
Fantasio
.
Following her success as Isabella/
Wuthering
Heights
in 2010, Crebassa was engaged by
the Opéra National de Paris’s Atelier Lyrique
two-year program, appearing as Gluck’s
Orphée and Ramiro/
La finta giardiniera
; and
on the Opéra’s mainstage in
Lulu
,
Rigoletto
,
and
Madama Butterfly
. She debuted at the
Salzburg Festival as Irene/Handel’s
Tamerlano
and returned for the role of Cecilio/
Lucio
Silla
and the title role of Charlotte Kann
in Marc André Dalbavie’s
Charlotte Salomon
(world premiere). Further appearances include
Cecilio/
Lucio Silla
(La Scala debut) and
Siébel/
Faust
(Dutch National Opera). The
mezzo-soprano’s extensive concert credits
include performances with the Festival de
Saint Denis, Salzburg’s Mozart Festival, Les
Musiciens du Louvre, L’Orchestre National de
France, and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
DEBORAH NANSTEEL
(
Gertrude
)
Lyric Opera debut
Following her Lyric
debut, the American
mezzo-soprano
will
return to Washington
National Opera for the
Ring
cycle. Nansteel debuted with New York
Philharmonic alongside Eric Owens last fall
in
In Their Footsteps: Great African American
Singers and Their Legacy
. A house favorite
at Seattle Opera, Nansteel has recently
performed the Nursing Sister/
Suor Angelica
,
Ino/
Semele
, Marthe/
Faust
, and Mary/
Der
fliegende Holländer
. She has also portrayed
Nettie Fowler/
Carousel
and Elvira Griffiths/
An American Tragedy
(Glimmerglass Festival)
and created the role of Lucinda/Jennifer
Higdon’s
Cold Mountain
(Santa Fe Opera).
Nansteel is a recent graduate of Washington
National Opera’s Domingo Cafritz Young
Artist Program, where she appeared as Tisbe/
Cenerentola
, Third Lady/
The Magic Flute
, and
Curra/
La forza del destino
, as well as the Cat/
Jeanine Tesori’s
The Lion, the Unicorn, and
Me
. The mezzo-soprano graduated from the
University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory
of Music (Marguerite/
La damnation de Faust
,
Mother Marie/
Dialogues of the Carmelites
,
Bianca/
The Rape of Lucretia
, Mother Goose/
The Rake’s Progress
). She is a former young
artist of Seattle Opera (Giulietta/
Un giorno di
regno
, Maddalena/
Rigoletto
) and San Francisco
Opera’s Merola Opera Program (Berta/
The
Barber of Seville
). A winner in the National
Orpheus Vocal Competition, Nansteel holds
numerous awards, including the Andrew
White Award, the Betty Allen Award, and
second place in Seattle’s Sun Valley Opera
competition.