Music Toronto | Wallis Giunta with Steven Philcox

Wallis Giunta with Steven Philcox

Thursday, March 1, 2012 – 8:00 pm

Wallis Giunta

Hailed by critics as “vocally outstanding” (Opera News) and “extraordinarily talented” (Globe & Mail), Canadian mezzo-soprano Wallis Giunta joins the Metropolitan Opera Lindemann Young Artist Development Program for the 2011/12 season, singing the role of Phénice in their production of Gluck’s Armide. She also debuts with Fort Worth Opera as Cherubino in Le Nozze di Figaro, Opera Lyra Ottawa as Lola in Cavalleria Rusticana, and with the orchestras of Munich and Nuremberg. Miss Giunta is a 2011 graduate of the Canadian Opera Company Ensemble Studio, where she performed Zweite Dame in Die Zauberflöte, while covering Angelina in La Cenerentola, and Idamante in Idomeneo. During her time there, she debuted with Opera Atelier as Cherubino, with the Brooklyn Academy of Music as Pribaoutki in Stravinsky’s The Nightingale and Other Short Fables, and in recital for The New York Festival of Song and the Caramoor Festival. The recipient of multiple grants from The Canada Council, Miss Giunta completed an Artist Diploma at The Glenn Gould School in 2009. www.wallisgiunta.com

Steven Philcox

Pianist Steven Philcox has quickly established himself as one of Canada’s finest collaborators and has performed with many renowned singers including Richard Margison and Isabel Bayrakdarian. In July 2010 he was appointed Head of Collaborative Piano at the University of Toronto. A graduate of UBC, Mr. Philcox went on to receive his Master of Music Degree from the Manhattan School of Music where he was a student of the renowned pianist, Warren Jones.

Wallis Giunta’s programme will be a celebration of the lives, loves, joys and sorrows of women, and will feature the Canadian premiere of Songs for Lulu: All days are nights, a new cycle by Canadian composer Rufus Wainwright, written to commemorate his mother, the late Kate McGarrigle. Staying within the realm of English song, she will also include works by Britten, Purcell, Niles, Barber, Musto, Coward, and Bolcom, as well as traditional Irish folksong. She is looking forward to performing in her native tongue, and to weaving together these beautiful portraits of women, through English song from the past few centuries