CHAN 3057 Book Cover.qxd - Chandos

CHAN 3057 BOOK.qxd 13/7/07 3:50 pm Page 30(Il matrimonio segreto) for Opera North,Donna Elvira (Glyndebourne Touring Opera),Anne Trulove (New Israeli Opera and OperaFactory), and Echo (Ariadne auf Naxos) andMadame Silberklang (Der Schauspieldirektor)for Garsington Opera.In 1996 she made her debut at theBBC Promenade Concerts with The RoyalOpera as the Heavenly Voice, and in 1997performed with The Royal Opera at CoventGarden and the Metropolitan Opera, NewYork in Pfitzner’s Palestrina. She created therole of Tina in Jonathan Dove’s Flight forGlyndebourne Touring Opera, repeating therole for Glyndebourne Festival Opera. Shesung the Duchess in Thomas Adès’s Powder herFace for Almeida Opera and at the AldeburghFestival, and also recorded the role for Channel4 television. Mary Plazas has given manyrecitals and concerts including solo recitals atthe Wigmore Hall, Purcell Room, and theKarajan Centre in Vienna. She has alsoperformed at the Cheltenham, Aldeburgh andChester Festivals. Concerts include Haydn’sCreation, Tippett’s A Child of our Time,Mahler’s Symphony No. 8, Mozart’s Requiem,Brahms’s German Requiem, Shostakovich’sSymphony No. 14, Beethoven’s SymphonyNo. 9 and Saint-Saëns’s The Promised Land.Recordings include Mercadante’s Emmad’Antiocchia and Pacini’s Maria Reginad’Inghilterra (both for Opera Rara), Dido andAeneas for Chandos, L’Enfant et les sortilèges,and, for Chandos/Peter Moores Foundation,Marguerite in Faust, and The Elixir of Love.Amanda Holden studied music at Oxfordbefore being awarded a scholarship to London’sGuildhall School, where she subsequentlytaught piano. Since 1987 she has written aboutfifty translations for performance. Operatranslations include (for English NationalOpera) Ariodante, Lohengrin and Il trittico,(for English Touring Opera) The Elixir of Love,The Pearl Fishers and Werther, (for OperaNorth) La bohème and The Marriage of Figaro,and (for Raymond Gubbay’s arena productions)Madam Butterfly, Tosca and Aida. She is thefounder-editor of The Viking/Penguin OperaGuides. Amanda Holden also wrote the librettofor Mark-Anthony Turnage’s opera, The SilverTassie, for which, with the composer, shereceived an Olivier award for ‘outstandingachievement in opera’.Geoffrey Mitchell’s singing career hasencompassed a remarkably wide repertoirefrom early to contemporary music and hastaken him to Scandinavia, Germany, theformer Czechoslovakia, Canada andAustralasia. Early conducting experience withthe BBC led to a wider involvement with hisown singers and in turn to the establishmentof the Geoffrey Mitchell Choir. Earlyrecordings resulted in the Choir’s long-terminvolvement with Opera Rara for which it hasmade over thirty recordings. The Choir isenjoying a growing reputation with furtherwork from the BBC and internationalrecording companies. For Chandos theGeoffrey Mitchell Choir has participated innumerous recordings in the acclaimed Operain English series sponsored by the PeterMoores Foundation.From auspicious beginnings in 1945, when itwas established by Walter Legge primarily as arecording orchestra, the PhilharmoniaOrchestra went on to attract some of thetwentieth century’s greatest conductors.Associated most closely with the Orchestrahave been Otto Klemperer (first PrincipalConductor), Lorin Maazel, Riccardo Muti,Giuseppe Sinopoli, Carlo Maria Giulini, SirAndrew Davis, Vladimir Ashkenazy and Esa-Pekka Salonen. Under current PrincipalConductor Christoph von Dohnanyi and withLeonard Slatkin as Principal Guest Conductorthe Orchestra has consolidated its centralposition in British musical life, not only inLondon where it is Resident Orchestra at theRoyal Festival Hall, but also in the widercommunity through regional residencies.The Orchestra has received several majorawards and won critical acclaim for its vitalityand unique warmth of sound. It has beenpraised as well for its innovative programming,at the heart of which is a commitment toperforming and commissioning new music bythe world’s leading living composers, amongthem its current Visiting Composer JamesMacMillan.The Orchestra tours frequently abroad andis the world’s most recorded symphonyorchestra with well over 1000 releases to itscredit. Among these are, for Opera Rara,several discs of operatic arias as well as elevencomplete operas (Donizetti’s Ugo, conte diParigi, Ne m’oubliez pas, Emilia di Liverpool,L’assedio di Calais, Rosmonda d’Inghilterra andMaria de Rudenz, Meyerbeer’s Dinorah, Mayr’sMedea in Corinto, Mercadante’s Orazi eCuriazi, Pacini’s Maria, regina d’Inghilterra andRossini’s Otello). The Orchestra has recordednumerous discs for Chandos including, in theOpera in English series sponsored by the Peter3031