Maxine Robertson Management

June 2009 - newsletter 9



MRM New Signing
We are pleased to announce the signing of piano accompanist Simon Lepper. Simon partners established and emerging singers and instrumentalists.  

Recent highlights include performances of the Schubert Song Cycles with Mark Padmore; a recital with Angelika Kirchschlager at the Verbier Festival; a performance of Harawi with Gweneth-Ann Jeffers as part of the South Bank Messiaen Festival and at the BBC Proms; recitals with Sally Matthews at the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam; Jonathan Lemalu and Allan Clayton at the City of London Festival and Wigmore Hall recitals with Karen Cargill and Malin Christensson. He will return to the Wigmore Hall in 2010 to play Chausson's Chanson Perpetuelle with Angelika Kirchschlager and the Belcea Quartet as part of a European tour.

He has recorded works by Feldman, Zimmerman, Xenakis and Schoenberg with the violinist Carolin Widmann on ECM and made a disc of Warlock Songs with the tenor Andrew Kennedy for Landor Records.

Simon is a professor of piano accompaniment at the Royal College of Music, London.  He is also the official accompanist for the BBC Singer of the World Rosenblatt Song Prize and Yehudi Menuhin Violin Competition and plays regularly for the Thomas Quasthoff masterclasses at the Verbier Festival in Switzerland.


MRM Artists jump in
Pär Lindskog jumped in to sing the title role in Siegfried for Zurich Opera on 25th March.

Karen Cargill flew to Paris on 25th March for two performances of Mendelssohn's Elijah with the Ensemble Orchestral de Paris.


MRM Announcement
Polish bass Lukas Jakobski will join the Jette Parker Young Artist Programme at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden.  In his first season he will sing Flemish Deputy Don Carlo; Aged Gambler The Gambler; Pietro Simon Boccanegra and will cover Bes Tsarina's Slippers; King Aida and Nick Shadow The Rake's Progress.


MRM Artists success in the press
Mark Padmore/Bach St Matthew Passion - Royal Festival Hall/April
But it was the astonishing Mark Padmore, whose every performance as the Evangelist seems to exceed the one before, who propelled the piece to a different spritual plane. Intense, almost disembodied from his task, he narrated the familiar story with a wonder, reverence and urgency that held the audience spellbound, transported by the sheer beauty of his sound.
The Independent.


MRM Artists at the BBC Proms
Mark Padmore takes the role of Uriel in Haydn's Creation with the Gabrieli Consort under Paul McCreesh on 18th July and returns to the Royal Albert Hall on 20th August for Handel's Samson with the English Concert under Harry Bicket.

Andrew Foster-Williams sings in Purcell's Fairy Queen with the Glyndebourne Festival Opera and William Christie on 21st July.

Karen Cargill sings in Stravinsky's Pulcinella with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra under Yannick Nézet-Séguin on 31st July.

Sally Matthews performs Mendelssohn's Symphony No. 2 'Lobgesang' with the Hallé Orchestra and Sir Mark Elder as they launch the bicentenary cycle of Mendelssohn's symphonies on 30th July.

Thomas Walker sings in Birtwistle's Mask of Orpheus with the BBC Symphony Orchestra under Martyn Brabbins on 14th August.

Viktor Rud appears on 22nd August as Don Fernando in Beethoven's Fidelio with the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra under Daniel Barenboim.

More details about these concerts can be found at:  www.bbc.co.uk/proms/2009


MRM Artists forthcoming highlights
Ingela Bohlin
On 09, 12, 14, 17, 20, 24 June, Ingela sings Susanna in Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro at La Monnaie. Following this she makes her role debut at Drottningholm singing the title role in Monteverdi's Poppea from 25th July - 8th August.

Katherine Broderick gives a Britten song recital at the Aldeburgh Festival on 23rd June with Malcolm Martineau.  A debut then at the Edinburgh Festival as Lady in Waiting in Verdi's Macbeth with the BBC Scottish Symphony  Orchestra on 21st August.

Karen Cargill debuts at the Mostly Mozart Festival in New York singing in Stravinsky's Pulcinella at the Lincoln Center on 4th and 5th July with the Festival Orchestra under Yannick Nézet-Séguin.  

Andrew Foster-Williams sings throughout the summer at Glyndebourne in Purcell's Fairy Queen (from June 20th).  There is also a performance at the Barbican of Handel's Jephtha with Paul McCreesh and the Gabrieli Consort and Players (24th June).  Another summer highlight is Schubert's Winterreise at the Chester Festival on 13th July.

Stephan Loges sings in new production by Katie Mitchell of James Macmillan's Partenogenesis at Covent Garden on 11, 13, 15, 17 and 18 June.  A concert of Mozart arias at the East Neuk Festival on 2nd July with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra is followed by a Schubert recital there with Christian Zacharias, and then on 21st August he sings Haydn's Creation at Dartington under Sir Charles Mackerras.

Sally Matthews sings with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra in Gilbert & Sullivan's Iolanthe - performances 18-21 June.  A late summer highlight at the Lucerne Festival is Schumann's Paradies und die Peri (August 23rd) with Daniel Harding

Edgaras Montvidas
From 23rd June to 7th July, Edgaras sings Alfredo in Verdi's La Traviata with the Opera National de Lyon.

Mark Padmore gives a unique and experimental performance of Schubert's Winterreise using the poems of Samuel Beckett at the Queen Elizabeth Hall on 3 June.  Later in the month, performances of Birtwistle's The Corridor and Semper Dowland at the Aldeburgh Festival (12, 15, 17, 18 June) with further dates at the Southbank Centre in London 6 and 7 July and at the Bregenz Festival on 1 August.

Viktor Rud  takes the role of Don Fernando in Beethoven's Fidelio with Daniel Barenboim and the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra with performances in Seville and Salzburg Festival as well as the Proms (see above).

Andrew Tortise sings Jenik in Janacek's Makropulos Case at Netherlands Opera with performances from 18th May to 12th June.  This is followed by a Britten song recital at the Aldeburgh Festival on 14th June with Malcolm Martineau.

Fflur Wyn is Barbarina in Mozart's Figaro at La Monnaie in June. Later in the summer, a short European tour with Cappella Amsterdam and Daniel Reuss as Michal in Handel's Saul:- Cracow on 22nd and 23rd August, Utrecht on 30th August and Bremen on 6th September.  

Thomas Walker has performances throughout June at Grange Park Opera singing Cavalli's Eliogabalo wtih Christian Curnyn then to Drottningholm for the tenor roles in Monteverdi's Poppea from 25th July to 8th August.  Finally, Thomas sings in Handel's Saul with Cappella Amsterdam (dates as above for Fflur Wyn).

Simon Lepper  performs Schubert's Schöne Müllerin with Mark Padmore on 2nd July in Switzerland at the Fribourg Festival of Song.