[This is part of a series profiling the artists making their COC debuts in the 2011/2012 season]
“Little in recent memory has hit the mark so consistently and so truthfully as the simple, traditional storytelling of diva-turned-director Catherine Malfitano.” – What's On Stage
Name: Catherine Malfitano
Range and craft: Beloved by audiences as a soprano, in 2005 she turned her hand to directing. She is making her directorial debut with the COC.
Where she's from: New York City, New York
What she's directing: She'll be making her COC debut directing a new production: a double bill of Zemlinsky's A Florentine Tragedy and Puccini's Gianni Schicchi, from April 26 to May 25.
Where she's been: She's directed Tosca for the English National Opera and Florida Grand Opera, Rigoletto for Washington National Opera, and numerous productions including Madama Butterfly and Lucia di Lammermoor for Central City Opera (Denver). Her career as a singer has taken her to the world's top operatic stages, including the Metropolitan Opera, La Scala, Royal Opera House Covent Garden and the Wiener Staatsoper.
Links
Watch and Listen
In this interview with English National Opera (for which she directed Tosca in 2010), Catherine Malfitano discusses her shift from singing to directing, and her approach to Tosca as a director.
Photo: Catherine Malfitano. © John Swannell
Posted by Cecily Carver / in 2011/2012 / comments (0) / permalink
"The American mezzo-soprano Susan Graham has for the better part of a decade impressed audiences with her creamy singing and chiseled characterizations..." – The New York Times
Name: Susan Graham
Range: Mezzo-soprano
Where she's from: Midland, Texas (where Sept. 5 has been declared "Susan Graham Day" in perpetuity)
What she's singing: Iphigenia in Gluck's Iphigenia in Tauris, at the COC from Sept. 22 to Oct. 12
Where she's been: Iphigenia in Iphigenia in Tauris at the Metropolitan Opera, Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Lyric Opera of Chicago, San Francisco Opera, and Teatro Real Madrid.
Awards:
In the video below, she sings "Parto, parto" (from Mozart's La clemenza di Tito) at a 2006 Metropolitan Opera gala:
Here she is with Renee Fleming and Thomas Hampson, in a chat about auditions. She relates how she once forgot the words (twice) to "Parto, parto" while auditioning for Lotfi Mansouri:
A video of Susan Graham singing "Ave Maria" at U.S. senator Edward M. Kennedy's funeral mass cannot be embedded, but can be viewed here.
And, for something a little different: here she is on the Martha Stewart show! It's in two parts:
Top Photo: Susan Graham. Photo © Dario Acosta
Middle Photo: Susan Graham in a scene from Iphigenia in Tauris at the Lyric Opera of Chicago. Photo by Dan Rest © 2006
Sara Fulgoni in the COC production of Bluebeard's Castle. Photo: Michael Cooper © 2001