Jamie Barton Joins Cast of Metropolitan Opera's ANNA BOLENA

Jamie Barton will add a new role to her Met repertory this season when she sings Giovanna Seymour in Donizetti's Anna Bolena, replacing Elena Garana, who has withdrawn due to a death in her family.

Barton will sing the September 26 matinee, October 1, 5, 13, January 5, and January 9 matinee performances; for the latter two dates, she replaces the originally announced Ekaterina Semenchuk. At the October 9 performance, Serbian mezzo-soprano Milijana Nikolic will make her Met debut in the role.

Garana will return to the Met in March to sing Sara in the company premiere of Donizetti's Roberto Devereux.

Jamie Barton first came to prominence as a winner of the Met's National Council Auditions in 2007, a process that was documented in the award-winning film The Audition. She made her Met debut in 2009 as the Second Lady in Mozart's Die Zauberflöte and returned in 2013 to make an acclaimed company role debut as Adalgisa in Bellini's Norma, a role she has since sung with San Francisco Opera. She sang Giovanna Seymour earlier this year at Lyric Opera of Chicago, opposite Sondra Radvanovsky as Anna Bolena. Among her numerous honors are the 2015 Richard Tucker Award and both the Main and Song Prizes at the 2013 Cardiff Singer of the World competition.

Milijana Nikolic's recent performances with other companies include the title role in Bizet's Carmen and Dalila in Saint-Saëns's Samson et Dalila at Finland's Savonlinna Festival; Eboli in Verdi's Don Carlo, Azucena in Verdi's Il Trovatore, Venus in Wagner's Tannhäuser, and Amneris in Verdi's Aida with Opera Australia; Amneris at Detroit's Michigan Opera Theatre; and Cuniza in Verdi's Oberto at La Scala.

Anna Bolena stars Sondra Radvanovsky in the title role and also features Tamara Mumford as Smeton, Stephen Costello and Taylor Stayton as Riccardo Percy, and Ildar Abdrazakov as Enrico VIII. Marco Armiliato conducts.

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