Stephen Costello News

American baritone Quinn Kelsey will sing the role of Giorgio Germont in the first three performances of La Traviata tonight, December 11 and December 16 & 19, replacing Ludovic Tézier who is ill. Tézier is expected to return to the role for the remaining performances.

Tucker Award-winning tenor Stephen Costello returns to New York's Metropolitan Opera this Thursday (Dec 11) to make his house role debut as Alfredo in La traviata, when he gives the first of five performances in Willy Decker's celebrated production. Costello has already sung Verdi's hero in high-profile productions on both sides of the Atlantic. This summer, his performances of the role at San Francisco Opera included a simulcast in the company's Opera in the Ballpark series, which was attended by an audience of more than 25,000 people.

American baritone Quinn Kelsey will sing the role of Giorgio Germont in Verdi's La Traviata on December 22, 27 matinee, 30, January 7 and 10, replacing Ludovic Tézier, who is continuing to recover from an illness. Tézier is expected to return to the role January 14 for the opera's final four performances this season.

La Traviata will return to the Met stage December 11 with two rotating casts of stars, all of whom are singing their first company performances of the principal roles. Latvian soprano Marina Rebeka, who made a notable debut as Donna Anna in the 2011 new production of Mozart's Don Giovanni, brings her acclaimed Violetta to the Met for the first time in the opening performances, with American tenor Stephen Costello as her impetuous lover Alfredo. Later performances will feature Bulgarian soprano Sonya Yoncheva—currently starring in her first-ever staged performances of Mimì in Puccini's La Bohème—as Violetta, opposite Italian tenor Francesco Demuro as Alfredo. The role of Giorgio Germont, Alfredo's father, will be shared by American baritone Quinn Kelsey and French baritone Ludovic Tézier. Marco Armiliato will lead all performances of Verdi's romantic tragedy this season. Willy Decker's acclaimed production had its Met premiere in 2010.

American baritone Quinn Kelsey will sing the role of Giorgio Germont in the first three performances of La Traviata on December 11, 16, and 19, replacing Ludovic Tézier who is ill. Tézier is expected to return to the role for the remaining performances.

On February 6, Richard Tucker and Plácido Domingo Award-winner Ailyn Pérez makes her house debut at New York's Metropolitan Opera in a star-studded production of Bizet's Carmen. This marks a major milestone for the American soprano, and comes at a key moment in her burgeoning career. Having achieved star status in Europe with a string of successes at the opera houses of London, Vienna, Milan, Berlin, and Moscow - her title role performance in Verdi's La Traviata this past spring at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden made history with the company's first live streaming of a complete opera, and she made her debut at La Scala opposite Plácido Domingo in Simon Boccanegra - Pérez recently scored twin triumphs closer to home. This past summer, her Warner Classics album debut, Love Duets, was an 'irresistible' (Gramophone) Billboard bestseller, and earlier this fall she took Houston by storm in her house and role debuts as Desdemona in Houston Grand Opera's Otello, where she supplied 'white hot passion...in spades' (Houston Press).

Tenor Norman Reinhardt will sing the role of Ferrando in Houston Grand Opera's production of Così fan tutte, it was announced today by HGO Artistic and Music Director Patrick Summers. He replaces Stephen Costello, who has withdrawn due to illness. Mr. Reinhardt is in Houston to perform the role of Cassio in Verdi's Otello and will play Ferrando concurrently. Otello opens October 24, and Cosi fan tutte opens October 31.

New York, NY - On Sunday, October 12th at 6:30 pm, the New York Choral Society (NYCS) returns to Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center for its twenty-first performance as guest artist at the Richard Tucker Music Foundation Gala, one of the most highly anticipated events of the opera season. Tenor Michael Fabiano, 2014 winner of the prestigious Richard Tucker Award and widely considered one of the greatest young tenors in the world today, will join such luminaries as Anna Netrebko, Joseph Calleja, Marcello Giordani, Ildar Abdrazakov, and previous Tucker Award laureates Angela Meade, Isabel Leonard, and Stephen Costello in a star-studded program of favorite arias and ensembles led by Emmanuel Villaume, Music Director of the Dallas Opera. Like last year's gala, which celebrated the centennial of legendary tenor Richard Tucker, the concert offers a unique opportunity to hear what the New York Times styled 'a dream team of opera singers,' and will be recorded for later broadcast on Live from Lincoln Center on PBS.

Angela Meade - the face of Opera News's forthcoming annual "Diva" issue - dominates the New York cultural scene this season. In concert, the American soprano makes her New York Philharmonic debutunder Alan Gilbert's direction in Verdi's Requiem (Jan 15-17), and gives two performances at Carnegie Hall, first joining the Philadelphia Orchestra for Mahler's "Resurrection" Symphony (Oct 31), and then starring in Rossini's William Tell with Italy's Teatro Regio di Torino led by Gianandrea Noseda (Dec 7), in the penultimate stop on their North American tour.

The Richard Tucker Music Foundation holds its annual gala, one of the most highly anticipated events of the opera season, on Sunday, October 12 at Avery Fisher Hall in New York's Lincoln Center.

Washington National Opera (WNO) presents An Evening with Stephen Costello and Ailyn Pe?rez, featuring the celebrated husband-and-wife stars of last season's production of The Elixir of Love, tonight, September 10, 2014 in the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater. Accompanied on piano by Danielle Orlando, Costello and Pe?rez will perform songs, arias, and duets from popular works by Verdi, Puccini, Hahn, Tosti, Falla, Heggie, and more.

The 'red hot' Ailyn Perez-Stephen Costello duo, having been likened to rock star couples, rarely perform together.

Stephen Costello looks forward to a number of important firsts in 2014-15. Besides creating the role of Michele in San Francisco Opera's world premiere production of Two Women, the Tucker Award-winning tenor returns to the Metropolitan Opera for a pair of house role debuts, reprising his star turn as Alfredo -- also seen this season at the Vienna State Opera -- in La traviata, and singing Camille in Susan Stroman's new staging of The Merry Widow. He makes his professional role debut as Ferrando in Così fan tutte at Houston Grand Opera, and house debuts at both Austin Lyric Opera, in the title role of a new Roméo et Juliette, and London's Wigmore Hall, where he launches the season with a solo recital in the prestigious Rosenblatt Series. Costello also joins his wife, soprano Ailyn Pérez, for romantic duets from their recent hit album, Love Duets, with the BBC Symphony at London's Barbican Hall, and on a U.S. duo recital tour to the opera houses of Washington, Dallas, San Diego, and Philadelphia.

On a U.S. duo recital tour this September, Stephen Costello and Ailyn Pérez -- the husband-and-wife team dubbed “Pérello” by the BBC and “the Jay-Z and Beyoncé” of opera by Vanity Fair -- sing romantic favorites from their hit album release, Love Duets.

Described by Opera News as the “lyric soprano who truly seems to have it all,” Ailyn Pérez takes the stage at leading opera houses on both sides of the Atlantic in 2014-15 for an exciting new season that features house debuts at both the Metropolitan Opera and Houston Grand Opera, the latter also serving as a role debut for Pérez as Desdemona in Verdi's Otello.

Houston Grand Opera's 2014–15 season, the company's 60th anniversary season, includes the world premiere of A Christmas Carol by Iain Bell—the company's 55th new commission —from award-winning Dickens authority Simon Callow; the continuation of HGO's first Ring cycle, with the American premiere of La Fura dels Baus's groundbreaking take on Die Walküre; the American premieres of Sir Nicholas Hytner's The Magic Flute and Lee Blakeley's Sweeney Todd; a 60th Anniversary Gala Concert featuring mezzo-soprano (and HGO Studio alumna) Joyce DiDonato; and a host of career-shaping role debuts that speak to Patrick Summers's gift for casting. Together with the company's first presentation of John Cox'sOtello, and the returns of Göran Järvefelt's beloved Così fan tutte and Michael Grandage's hit staging of Madame Butterfly, these rich offerings serve once again to illustrate some of the ways that HGO—still the only opera company with two Grammys, two Emmys, and a Tony—epitomizes “one model of what a forward-looking opera company could be” (Greg Sandow, Arts Journal).

Described by Opera News as the “lyric soprano who truly seems to have it all,” Ailyn Pérez takes the stage at leading opera houses on both sides of the Atlantic in 2014-15 for an exciting new season that features house debuts at both the Metropolitan Opera and Houston Grand Opera, the latter also serving as a role debut for Pérez as Desdemona in Verdi's Otello.

Ailyn Perez, born and bred in Chicago, returns to her hometown's famous Ravinia Festival for two performances (Aug 14 & 16) as Zerlina in Mozart's Don Giovanni - a role that the Dallas Morning News has said shows her to be 'a singer of considerable nuance.' LA Opera Music Director James Conlon leads the Chicago Symphony Orchestra for the run, which also features baritone Christopher Maltman in the title role, baritone David Bizi? as Leporello, soprano Tamara Wilson as Donna Anna and tenor Saimir Pirgu as Don Ottavio. The Chicago Tribune praised Perez's 2012 appearance at Ravinia, as Pamina in Die Zauberflote, as 'show-stopping…all floating pianissimos and diminuendos and delicate pathos, which roused the sold-out crowd to a long, well-deserved ovation.'

Tickets go on sale today, August 13, for Opera Philadelphia's 40th Anniversary Season, featuring a stellar cast of international opera stars in five new productions at the Academy of Music and the Perelman Theater.

On a U.S. duo recital tour this September, Stephen Costello and Ailyn Pérez -- the husband-and-wife team dubbed “Pérello” by the BBC and “the Jay-Z and Beyoncé” of opera by Vanity Fair -- sing romantic favorites from their hit album release, Love Duets.