Special Guest Performers 2019-20
October 5, 2019 - The Gathering Storm
Sophie Shao, Cello
Cellist Sophie Shao, winner of the Avery Fisher Career Grant and top prizes at the Rostropovich and Tchaikovsky competitions, is a versatile and passionate artist whose performances the New York Times has noted as “eloquent, powerful” and the Washington Post called “deeply satisfying.”
Shao has appeared as soloist throughout the United States, Europe, Asia, and performed the UK premiere of Howard Shore’s concerto “Mythic Gardens” with Keith Lockhart and the BBC Concert Orchestra. Other recent concerto performances include Haydn and Elgar Concerti with Lockhart and the BBC Concert Orchestra, Beethoven’s Triple Concerto with Hans Graf and the Houston Symphony, Richard Wilson’s “The Cello Has Many Secrets” with the American Symphony Orchestra, and Saint-Saens’s “La muse et la poete” at the Bard Music Festival.
Shao has given recitals in Suntory Hall in Tokyo, the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, Middlebury College, and the Phillips Collection, as well as the complete Bach Suites at Union College and in New York City. Her dedication to chamber music has led to her “Sophie Shao and Friends” groups which have toured from Brattleboro, Vermont to Sedona, Arizona. She was a member of Chamber Music Society Two, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s program for emerging young artists. She is also committed to the music of our time and collaborations with living composers.
Shao’s recordings include the Complete Bach Suites, Andre Previn’s Reflections for Cello and English Horn and Orchestra on EMI Classics; Richard Wilson’s Diablerie and Brash Attacks and Barbara White’s My Barn Having Burned to the Ground, I Can Now See the Moon on Albany Records; and Howard Shore’s original score for the movie The Betrayal on Howe Records. Her performance of Howard Shore’s “Mythic Gardens” at the KKL in Lucerne was released in 2017 on Sony Classical along with Lang Lang’s performance of “Ruins and Memory.”
A native of Houston, Texas, Shao was a student of Shirley Trepel, former principal cellist of the Houston Symphony. She also studied with David Soyer at the Curtis Institute of Music, and with Aldo Parisot at Yale College, where she received a BA in religious studies. Shao received her MM from the Yale School of Music, where she was enrolled as a Paul and Daisy Soros Fellow. She is also on the faculty of University of Connecticut Storrs and Rutgers University and plays on a cello made by Honore Derazey from 1855 once owned by Pablo Casals.
Cellist Sophie Shao, winner of the Avery Fisher Career Grant and top prizes at the Rostropovich and Tchaikovsky competitions, is a versatile and passionate artist whose performances the New York Times has noted as “eloquent, powerful” and the Washington Post called “deeply satisfying.”
Shao has appeared as soloist throughout the United States, Europe, Asia, and performed the UK premiere of Howard Shore’s concerto “Mythic Gardens” with Keith Lockhart and the BBC Concert Orchestra. Other recent concerto performances include Haydn and Elgar Concerti with Lockhart and the BBC Concert Orchestra, Beethoven’s Triple Concerto with Hans Graf and the Houston Symphony, Richard Wilson’s “The Cello Has Many Secrets” with the American Symphony Orchestra, and Saint-Saens’s “La muse et la poete” at the Bard Music Festival.
Shao has given recitals in Suntory Hall in Tokyo, the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, Middlebury College, and the Phillips Collection, as well as the complete Bach Suites at Union College and in New York City. Her dedication to chamber music has led to her “Sophie Shao and Friends” groups which have toured from Brattleboro, Vermont to Sedona, Arizona. She was a member of Chamber Music Society Two, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s program for emerging young artists. She is also committed to the music of our time and collaborations with living composers.
Shao’s recordings include the Complete Bach Suites, Andre Previn’s Reflections for Cello and English Horn and Orchestra on EMI Classics; Richard Wilson’s Diablerie and Brash Attacks and Barbara White’s My Barn Having Burned to the Ground, I Can Now See the Moon on Albany Records; and Howard Shore’s original score for the movie The Betrayal on Howe Records. Her performance of Howard Shore’s “Mythic Gardens” at the KKL in Lucerne was released in 2017 on Sony Classical along with Lang Lang’s performance of “Ruins and Memory.”
A native of Houston, Texas, Shao was a student of Shirley Trepel, former principal cellist of the Houston Symphony. She also studied with David Soyer at the Curtis Institute of Music, and with Aldo Parisot at Yale College, where she received a BA in religious studies. Shao received her MM from the Yale School of Music, where she was enrolled as a Paul and Daisy Soros Fellow. She is also on the faculty of University of Connecticut Storrs and Rutgers University and plays on a cello made by Honore Derazey from 1855 once owned by Pablo Casals.
March 21, 2020 - Voice of Deliverance
Indiana University Choral Department- Craig Denison, Assoc. Dir. of Choral Studies and Music
Emily Misch, Soprano
A coloratura soprano praised for her “scintillating precision” (Opera News), Emily Misch is establishing herself as a clear voiced, versatile, and intelligent performer. In 2019, she joins the Glimmerglass Festival, where she will sing the role of Florestine in The Ghosts of Versailles, and Sarasota Opera, where she will cover the Queen of the Night in Die Zauberflöte.
Her 2017-2018 season included the Grand Finals of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, Olympia in Les Contes d’Hoffmann and Ruth Bader Ginsburg in Derrick Wang’s Scalia/Ginsburg with Opera North, soprano solos in Mozart’s Requiem and Haydn’s Paukenmesse with Huntington Choral Society, and the soprano solo in Carmina Burana with Altoona Symphony Orchestra. Other recent engagements include the Ravinia Festival’s Steans Music Institute (Vocal Fellow), Valeria in the workshop of Tom Cipullo’s Mayo at the National Opera Center, Leah in Joel Mandelbaum’s The Dybbuk at Queens College, Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 (Mater Gloriosa) with Berkshire Choral International, Carmina Burana with the Westchester Choral Society, and Exsultate, jubilate, K. 165 with the Greenville Symphony Orchestra. Her 2015-2016 season included Zerlina in Don Giovanni with Opera in Williamsburg and Le feu, La princesse, and Le rossignol in L’enfant et les sortilèges with Opera on the Avalon. She is a graduate of Mannes College of Music, where she was heard as the Controller in the New York premiere of Jonathan Dove’s Flight and Lucia in The Rape of Lucretia.
A 2018 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions National Finalist, she has also been awarded prizes from the Schuyler Foundation for Career Bridges, the Gerda Lissner Foundation in association with the Liederkranz Foundation, Mannes College, and Yale University, and has participated in young artist training programs at Wolf Trap Opera Company, Opera North (NH), and Opera on the Avalon. She received a BA in Music from Yale University, where she graduated magna cum laude.
A coloratura soprano praised for her “scintillating precision” (Opera News), Emily Misch is establishing herself as a clear voiced, versatile, and intelligent performer. In 2019, she joins the Glimmerglass Festival, where she will sing the role of Florestine in The Ghosts of Versailles, and Sarasota Opera, where she will cover the Queen of the Night in Die Zauberflöte.
Her 2017-2018 season included the Grand Finals of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, Olympia in Les Contes d’Hoffmann and Ruth Bader Ginsburg in Derrick Wang’s Scalia/Ginsburg with Opera North, soprano solos in Mozart’s Requiem and Haydn’s Paukenmesse with Huntington Choral Society, and the soprano solo in Carmina Burana with Altoona Symphony Orchestra. Other recent engagements include the Ravinia Festival’s Steans Music Institute (Vocal Fellow), Valeria in the workshop of Tom Cipullo’s Mayo at the National Opera Center, Leah in Joel Mandelbaum’s The Dybbuk at Queens College, Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 (Mater Gloriosa) with Berkshire Choral International, Carmina Burana with the Westchester Choral Society, and Exsultate, jubilate, K. 165 with the Greenville Symphony Orchestra. Her 2015-2016 season included Zerlina in Don Giovanni with Opera in Williamsburg and Le feu, La princesse, and Le rossignol in L’enfant et les sortilèges with Opera on the Avalon. She is a graduate of Mannes College of Music, where she was heard as the Controller in the New York premiere of Jonathan Dove’s Flight and Lucia in The Rape of Lucretia.
A 2018 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions National Finalist, she has also been awarded prizes from the Schuyler Foundation for Career Bridges, the Gerda Lissner Foundation in association with the Liederkranz Foundation, Mannes College, and Yale University, and has participated in young artist training programs at Wolf Trap Opera Company, Opera North (NH), and Opera on the Avalon. She received a BA in Music from Yale University, where she graduated magna cum laude.
Evan Bravos, Baratone
Evan Bravos, Greek-American baritone, has been praised by the Chicago Tribune for his “strong singing and acting” and marked as “a young talent to watch.” The V irginia Pilot distinguished him as “a fine-singing charmer” and Broadway Review championed his “nimble precision and notable range,” saying that, “…if the future of opera sounds like Bravos, the art boasts a bright future indeed”.
In the summer of 2019, Mr. Bravos will perform the role of Inman in Jennifer Higdon’s Cold Mountain at Music Academy of the West. Directed by James Darrah and conducted by Daniela Candallari, the International Opera Award-winning piece written by the Pulitzer-Prize winning composer will make its West Coast premiere.
Mr. Bravos’ 2018-2019 season included a return to Virginia Opera to sing the roles of Mr. Jones in Kurt Weill’s Street Scene and Masetto in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, and a company debut at Sarasota Opera, where he covered three roles, Papageno (Die Zauberflöte), Count (Il Segreto di Susanna) and Gasparo (Rita). In 2018, at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, he created the roles of Pvt. Johnson and Sgt. Brown in the world premier of Huang Rao’s An American Soldier and performed the role of John Bagtry in Regina alongside mezzo-soprano, Susan Graham. Previously at Saint Louis, he covered the role of Tom Joad in Ricky Ian Gordon’s The Grapes of Wrath. Other operatic credits include: Opera Santa Barbara, Central City Opera, Aspen Music Festival, and Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Unlimited series.
Concert work in the 2018-2019 season included Mendelsohn Elijah with the Milwaukee Symphony and Orff Carmina Burana with the Chippewa Valley Symphony. In 2016, he joined the Colorado Symphony Chorus as baritone soloist on Faure Requiem in Paris, Strasbourg and Munich and the following summer was featured at the Horto Music Festival in Pelion, Greece. Concert repertoire favorites include Jesus in Macmillan St. John Passion, Brahms Requiem, and Vaughan Williams Five Mystical Songs. An avid song recitalist, Bravos was heard last season as a Vocal Fellow at the Ravinia Steans Music Institute. In 2018, he was featured with the Collaborative Arts Institute of Chicago.
Awards include Pasadena Opera Guild, Central City Opera, and the Metropolitan National Council Auditions. He holds degrees from Lawrence University Conservatory and Northwestern University’s Bienen School of Music.
Evan Bravos, Greek-American baritone, has been praised by the Chicago Tribune for his “strong singing and acting” and marked as “a young talent to watch.” The V irginia Pilot distinguished him as “a fine-singing charmer” and Broadway Review championed his “nimble precision and notable range,” saying that, “…if the future of opera sounds like Bravos, the art boasts a bright future indeed”.
In the summer of 2019, Mr. Bravos will perform the role of Inman in Jennifer Higdon’s Cold Mountain at Music Academy of the West. Directed by James Darrah and conducted by Daniela Candallari, the International Opera Award-winning piece written by the Pulitzer-Prize winning composer will make its West Coast premiere.
Mr. Bravos’ 2018-2019 season included a return to Virginia Opera to sing the roles of Mr. Jones in Kurt Weill’s Street Scene and Masetto in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, and a company debut at Sarasota Opera, where he covered three roles, Papageno (Die Zauberflöte), Count (Il Segreto di Susanna) and Gasparo (Rita). In 2018, at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, he created the roles of Pvt. Johnson and Sgt. Brown in the world premier of Huang Rao’s An American Soldier and performed the role of John Bagtry in Regina alongside mezzo-soprano, Susan Graham. Previously at Saint Louis, he covered the role of Tom Joad in Ricky Ian Gordon’s The Grapes of Wrath. Other operatic credits include: Opera Santa Barbara, Central City Opera, Aspen Music Festival, and Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Unlimited series.
Concert work in the 2018-2019 season included Mendelsohn Elijah with the Milwaukee Symphony and Orff Carmina Burana with the Chippewa Valley Symphony. In 2016, he joined the Colorado Symphony Chorus as baritone soloist on Faure Requiem in Paris, Strasbourg and Munich and the following summer was featured at the Horto Music Festival in Pelion, Greece. Concert repertoire favorites include Jesus in Macmillan St. John Passion, Brahms Requiem, and Vaughan Williams Five Mystical Songs. An avid song recitalist, Bravos was heard last season as a Vocal Fellow at the Ravinia Steans Music Institute. In 2018, he was featured with the Collaborative Arts Institute of Chicago.
Awards include Pasadena Opera Guild, Central City Opera, and the Metropolitan National Council Auditions. He holds degrees from Lawrence University Conservatory and Northwestern University’s Bienen School of Music.
