Great Artists Series: Nathan Gunn, baritone and Julie Gunn, piano
Nathan Gunn, baritone
Julie Gunn, piano
May 5, 2017 at 7:30 P.M.
Edison Box Office: 314-935-6543
Program:
“Nathan Gunn commands an operatic baritone whose mighty heft and richness confer an outsize authority on everything he touches.” - The New York Times
Biographies:
Nathan Gunn has made a reputation as one of the most exciting and in-demand baritones of the day. He has appeared in internationally renowned opera houses such as the Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Royal Opera House, Paris Opera, Bayerische Staatsoper, Glyndebourne Opera Festival, Theater an der Wien, Teatro Real in Madrid, and the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie. His many roles include the title roles in Billy Budd, Eugene Onegin, Il Barbiere di Siviglia, and Hamlet; Guglielmo in Cosí fan tutte, the Count in Le Nozze di Figaro, Malatesta in Don Pasquale, Belcore inL’Elisir d’Amore, Ottone in L’incoronazione di Poppea, Tarquinius in The Rape of Lucetia, Danilo in The Merry Widow, and The Lodger in The Aspern Papers.
A noted supporter of new works, Mr. Gunn most recently created the role of Inman in Jennifer Higdon's Cold Mountain at the Santa Fe Opera. He also created the roles of James Dalton in Iain Bell's The Harlot's Progress at the Theater an der Wien, Yeshua in Mark Adamo’s The Gospel of Mary Magdalene at the San Francisco Opera, Paul in Daron Hagen’s Amelia at the Seattle Opera, Alec Harvey in André Previn’s Brief Encounter at the Houston Grand Opera, Father Delura in Peter Eötvös’Love and Other Demons at the Glyndebourne Opera Festival, and Clyde Griffiths in Tobias Picker’s An American Tragedy at the Metropolitan Opera. Because of this dedication to new works, Mr. Gunn is the Director of the American Repertoire Council at the Opera Company of Philadelphia, a steering council focused on advancing the company’s American Repertoire Program which is committed to produce a new American work in 10 consecutive seasons.
Also a distinguished concert performer, Mr. Gunn has appeared with the New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, Münchner Rundfunkorchster, and the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra. The many conductors with whom he has worked include Sir Andrew Davis, Sir Colin Davis, Christoph von Dohnányi, Christoph Eschenbach, Alan Gilbert, Daniel Harding, James Levine, Kurt Masur, Kent Nagano, Antonio Pappano, David Robertson, Donald Runnicles, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Robert Spano, Michael Tilson Thomas, and Mark Wigglesworth.
A frequent recitalist, Mr. Gunn has been presented in recital at Alice Tully Hall and by Carnegie Hall in Zankel Hall. He has also been presented by Roy Thomson Hall, Cal Performances, the Schubert Club, the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, the Vocal Arts Society in Washington, DC, the University of Chicago, the Krannert Center, the Wigmore Hall, and the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie. As a student, he performed in series of recitals with his teacher and mentor John Wustman that celebrated the 200th anniversary of Franz Schubert’s birth.
Mr. Gunn has recently ventured outside the standard opera repertoire with appearances in performances of the the title role inSweeney Todd with the Houston Grand Opera, Camelot and Carousel with the New York Philharmonic (both broadcasted on PBS) and Show Boat at Carnegie Hall and the Lyric Opera of Chicago. He also appeared in the New York Philharmonic’s 80th birthday gala celebration for Stephen Sondheim and appeared with the orchestra in an evening of Broadway classics with Kelli O’Hara. Other engagements have included appearances with Mandy Patinkin in Rochester, the Krannert Center, the Ravinia Festival and on tour in Australia and New Zealand, a series of cabaret shows at the famed Café Carlyle in New York City and at the Segerstrom Center for the Arts in Orange County, as a special guest artist in the Mormon Tabernacle Choir’s annual Christmas with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and Orchestra at Temple Square, and a performance of Sting and Trudie Styler’s work Twin Spirits in the Allen Room at Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Mr. Gunn’s solo album, Just Before Sunrise, was released on Sony/BMG Masterworks. Other recordings include the title role inBilly Budd with Daniel Harding and the London Symphony Orchestra (Virgin Classics), which won the 2010 Grammy Award, the first complete recording of Rogers & Hammerstein’s Allegro (Sony’s Masterworks Broadway), Peter Grimes with Sir Colin Davis and London Symphony Orchestra (LSO Live!) which was nominated for a 2005 Grammy Award, Il Barbiere di Siviglia(SONY Classics), Kullervo with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra (Telarc), and American Anthem (EMI). He also starred as Buzz Aldrin in Man on the Moon, an opera written specifically for television and broadcast on the BBC in the UK. The program was awarded the Golden Rose Award for Opera at the Montreux Festival in Lucerne.
This season, Mr. Gunn appears at both the Dallas Opera and the San Diego Opera in the world premiere of Jake Heggie'sGreat Scott. He also makes a guest appearance in the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra's opening night gala, and appears in recital at Louisville and Emory Universities.
Mr. Gunn was the recipient of the first annual Beverly Sills Artist Award, and was awarded the Pittsburgh Opera Renaissance Award. He is an alumnus of the Metropolitan Opera Lindemann Young Artists Program and was a winner of the 1994 Metropolitan Opera National Council Competition. Mr. Gunn is also an alumnus of the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana where he is currently a professor of voice and the General Director of the Lyric Theater @ Illinois.
Julie Gunn is a pianist, educator, and music director. She has appeared on many prestigious recital series, including the Carnegie Hall Pure Voice Series, Lincoln Center Great Performers, Boston’s Jordan Hall, Brussels’ Theatre de la Monnaie, San Francisco’s Herz Hall, the 92nd Street Y, Toronto’s Roy Thompson Hall, University of Chicago Presents, San Francisco Performances, Oberlin College, Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts, the Ravinia Festival, Manhattan’s legendary Café Carlyle, the Sydney Opera House, and the United States Supreme Court. She has been heard in recital with William Burden, Richard Croft, Elizabeth Futral, Isabel Leonard, Stefan Milenkovich, Kelli O’Hara, Mandy Patinkin, Yvonne Gonzales Redman, Michelle De Young, the Pacifica Quartet, and Nathan Gunn.
Director of Lyric Theatre Studies at the University of Illinois, she produces three main-stage operas or musical theatre works a year at the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts. A faculty member at the School of Music, she enjoys teaching singers, pianists, chamber musicians and songwriters. She has served on the music staff at the Metropolitan Opera Young Artist Program, Wolf Trap Opera, St. Louis Opera Theatre, Southern Methodist University, Opera North, Highlands Opera Studio, Theaterworks!, Chicago Opera Theater, and given master classes at universities and young artists’ programs all over the United States, including the Ryan Young Artists’ Program, Houston Grand Opera Studio, and Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, Santa Fe Opera, the Aspen Festival, the Interlochen Center for the Arts, and the Metropolitan Opera Guild, as well as tenures as artist-in-residence at Cincinnati Opera and the Glimmerglass Festival. She is the founder of the Illinois School of Music Academy, a program for talented pre-college chamber musicians and composers.
Dr. Gunn enjoys working at the intersection of different disciplines and collaborates with artists in the fields of theatre, dance, and design whenever possible. She is committed to new works and in recent seasons has been part of several world premieres, as a co-producer, a pianist, or as a conductor: Twilight Butterfly (Thomas), Dooryard Bloom (Higdon), Polly Peachum (Scheer/Van Horn), Variations on a Summer’s Day (Meltzer,) Letters from Quebec to Providence in the Rain (Gill,) and Bhutto (Fairouz.)
In the upcoming season she looks forward to recitals and cabarets at the Krannert Center (with the Jupiter Quartet), the Van Cliburn series in Fort Worth, the DeBartolo Center at Notre Dame, Georgetown, and to conducting Adam Guettel’s Light in the Piazza for Lyric Theatre @ Illinois.
She has published many arrangements of songs for piano, chamber groups and orchestras, her arrangements have been heard at the Kennedy Center, Carnegie Hall, Chicago’s Symphony Center, and London’s Queen Elizabeth Hall.
-Program Subject to Change
Photo Credit: M Sharkey