Susan Graham Sings Octavian with BSO, New Dead Man Walking, Met Gala & More in 2016-17

Following her summer role debut in Santa Fe as Clairon in Richard Strauss's Capriccio, Grammy Award-winning mezzo-soprano Susan Graham - hailed by Gramophone as "America's favorite mezzo" - launched the 2016-17 season with Renée Fleming and Michael Tilson Thomas performing Rossini songs in the San Francisco Symphony's opening night gala. She reunites with Fleming at the Boston Symphony under the baton of Andris Nelsons, singing Octavian to Fleming's Marschallin in Strauss's Der Rosenkavalier; Graham performs selections from Canteloube's Chants d'Auvergne with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Yannick Nézet-Séguin; and she joins Washington National Opera's revival of Dead Man Walking, making her role debut as the convict's mother.

In May she joins a cast of the world's greatest opera luminaries to celebrate the Metropolitan Opera House's 50th anniversary. She returns to Santa Fe Opera in the plum "trouser" role of Prince Orlofsky, in the company's first new production in 25 years of Johann Strauss II's Die Fledermaus - which she also sang at the Met last season - and sings Erika in Samuel Barber's Vanessa with the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin.

Also in concert, she performs selections from Mahler's Des Knaben Wunderhorn with the Met Orchestra and Esa-Pekka Salonen in Carnegie Hall; and Berlioz's La mort de Cléopâtre with the San Antonio Symphony. In recital, she reunites with regular partner Malcolm Martineau for accounts of "Frauenliebe und -leben: Variations," her wide-ranging program inspired by and centered on Schumann's iconic song cycle, in Santa Barbara, Baltimore, and Portland, Oregon.

A San Francisco Symphony regular, last May Graham joined the orchestra and Michael Tilson Thomas for Berlioz's La mort de Cléopâtre, a signature work that she previously recorded with Sir Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic. When she returned earlier this month for the opening night gala of the new season, along with her friend and collaborator, soprano Renée Fleming, San Jose's Mercury News praised her "characteristically warm and luxuriant sound." In October she and Fleming meet up again at the Boston Symphony under Music Director Andris Nelsons, singing their respective celebrated signature roles of Octavian and the Marschallin in a concert performance of Strauss's Der Rosenkavalier.

In the New Year Graham joins the Philadelphia Orchestra and Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin to sing selections from Canteloube's Chants d'Auvergne in an all-French concert during the orchestra's "Paris Festival." Nézet-Séguin is another of Graham's favorite longtime collaborators, and was recently named the new Music Director of the Metropolitan Opera, to begin in 2020. The mezzo is world-renowned as one of the foremost exponents of French vocal music, and has been awarded the French government's prestigious "Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur"; as the Mercury News put it, "There's no one better in this repertoire." In the spring she will perform in another all-French program, including a reprise of Berlioz's La mort de Cléopâtre, with Sebastian Lang-Lessing leading the San Antonio Symphony.

Graham makes a role debut this season as Mrs. De Rocher in Washington National Opera's revival of Jake Heggie's Dead Man Walking. The mezzo created the role of Sister Helen Prejean in the world premiere production at San Francisco Opera in 2000, when the Los Angeles Times reported that she "brought not just the ravishing beauty of her mezzo-soprano to Sister Helen but seemed to glow onstage." As Graham says: "Dead Man Walking has been in my DNA since its inception ... I'm sure we'll plumb new depths and bring this amazing piece to new life yet again." When the Metropolitan Opera celebrates its 50th anniversary at Lincoln Center in May, Graham will be on hand amongst the greatest stars of the genre from around the world, including Anna Netrebko, Joyce DiDonato, Diana Damrau, Piotr Becza?a, Javier Camarena, Placido Domingo, René Pape, James Morris, and many others. The house opened in its Lincoln Center home on September 16, 1966, with Leontyne Price and Justino Díaz starring in the world premiere of Samuel Barber's Antony and Cleopatra, in what the New York Times called a "crescendo of splendor." The 50th Anniversary Gala follows Graham's triumph at the Met last fall, when she inspired an outpouring of positive press in her role debut as Countess Geschwitz in William Kentridge's hit new production of Berg's modernist masterpiece Lulu. As the New York Observer concluded, she "sang so radiantly [she] made Berg's spiky music sound downright romantic." Graham herself also celebrates a Met anniversary this year, as she, Deborah Voigt and Ben Heppner are the honorees at the Metropolitan Opera Guild's 82nd Annual Luncheon, on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of their respective Met debuts. After winning the 1988 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, her 1991 debut at the house was as the Second Lady in Die Zauberflöte, quickly followed by performances as Meg Page in Falstaff.

In the spring, Graham joins tenor Matthew Polenzani, the Met Orchestra, and conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen, who is also Composer-in-Residence at the New York Philharmonic, to sing excerpts from Mahler's song cycle Des Knaben Wunderhorn in Carnegie Hall. Graham is a noted interpreter of Mahler's vocal works, and her live performance of the Rückert-Lieder with Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony was captured on their 2010 recording of the German master's orchestral songs. San Francisco Classical Voice described Graham as "characteristically poised and radiant," singing with "full, lustrous tone, regal bearing, and keen sensitivity," while the album review on AllMusic found the songs to be "sung almost to perfection."

Last season Graham put together a themed, eight-part recital program that she premiered at Wigmore Hall in London, before taking it to Boston's Celebrity Series, Michigan's Gilmore Keyboard Festival, and venues in Bordeaux and Madrid. With Schumann's iconic song cycle Frauenliebe und -leben as its basis, the program also includes diverse songs by German, French, Scandinavian, Spanish, Russian and English composers from a variety of eras. The mezzo drew raves for the Wigmore Hall debut, with The Telegraph declaring that "Graham exudes an infectious joy in her art." Her pianist in London was Malcolm Martineau, who rejoins her this season for accounts of "Frauenliebe und -leben: Variations" on the West Coast and in Baltimore. As the Financial Times said of the program: "Ecstatically applauded by her fans and superbly partnered at the piano by Malcolm Martineau ... one had to admire [Graham's] sophistication, her impeccable diction, her subtle dynamic scale, her exquisite top notes."

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Susan Graham: upcoming engagements:

Oct 1
Boston, MA
Boston Symphony Orchestra
Andris Nelsons, conductor
Strauss: Der Rosenkavalier (Octavian)

Oct 29
Berlin, Germany
Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin
David Zinman, conductor
Barber: Vanessa (Erika)

Jan 12, 13, 14
Philadelphia, PA
Philadelphia Orchestra
Yannick Nézet-Séguin, conductor
Canteloube: Selections from Chants d'Auvergne

Feb 25, 27; March 3, 5, 8, 11
Washington, DC
Washington National Opera
Michael Christie, conductor
Jake Heggie: Dead Man Walking (Mrs. De Rocher)

April 6-23
Spring recital tour with Malcolm Martineau, piano
"Frauenliebe und -leben: Variations"
April 6: Santa Barbara, CA (Lobero Theater, Community Arts Music Association of Santa Barbara)
April 9: Portland, OR (Lincoln Recital Hall, Friends of Chamber Music)
April 23: Baltimore, MD (Shriver Hall)

May 7
New York, NY
Metropolitan Opera
50 Years at Lincoln Center: a gala celebration
Met Opera Orchestra and Chorus
Selections from Porgy and Bess, Samson et Dalila, Les Troyens, I Lombardi, & Antony and Cleopatra

May 12, 13
San Antonio, TX
San Antonio Symphony
Sebastian Lang-Lessing, conductor
Berlioz: La mort de Cléopâtre
Selections from French operetta and American musical theater

May 31
New York, NY
Carnegie Hall
Met Opera Orchestra
Esa-Pekka Salonen, conductor
Mahler: Selections from Des Knaben Wunderhorn

June 30; July 5, 8, 14; Aug 1, 7, 14, 19, 26
Santa Fe, NM
Santa Fe Opera
Rory Macdonald, conductor
Strauss: Die Fledermaus (Prince Orlofsky)

Photo Credit: B. Ealovega

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