Poppea Cast
Poppea: Yulia
van Doren
Nerone: Ross Hauck
Ottavia: Sarah Mattox
Ottone: José Lemos
Drusilla and Pallade: Catherine Webster
Seneca: David Stutz
Valletto: Linda Tsatsanis
Arnalta, Lucano: Jason McStoots
Nutrice: Kevin Sutton
Amore: Alex Mentzel
Damigella and Reporter: Melissa Plagemann
Liberto and Second Soldier: James Brown
Reporter, Littore, and Consul: Jonathan Silvia
First Soldier, Reporter, and Consul: Stephen Rumph
Directors
Music Directors:
Stephen Stubbs and
Fred Hauptman
Stage Director: Theodore Deacon
Producer: Gus Denhard
Assistant Director: Anna Mansbridge
Set Design: Richard Lorig
Costume Design: Josie Gardner
Lighting Design: Jason Meininger
Stage Manager: Dave Vaught
Set Construction: Seattle Scenic Studios
String Ensemble:
Seattle Baroque Orchestra:
Violins: Ingrid Matthews,
Tekla
Cunningham
Violas: Stephen
Creswell,
Olga Hauptman
Cello: Claire Garabedian
Continuo Ensemble:
Stephen
Stubbs: lute, guitar
Gus Denhard: theorbo, guitar
Elizabeth Brown: archlute, guitar
Maxine
Eilander: harp
Margriet Tindemans: viola da
gamba
Fred Hauptman, harpsichord: organ
 James Brown (Liberto
and Second Soldier), tenor,
is an active
proponent of early and new music. He has performed roles in such diverse
operas as The Ballad of Baby Doe, Il Barbiere di Siviglia,
Carmen, Eugene Onegin, Cosí fan Tutte, Don
Giovanni, Die Zauberflöte, Monteverdi’s L’Incoronazione di
Poppea, Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream and Conrad Susa's
Transformations. Mr. Brown has sung with such opera companies as
New York City Opera, New Orleans Opera, Opera Company of Philadelphia,
Bronx Opera, Rogue Opera (Oregon), Chautauqua Opera, Skylight Opera
Theatre (Milwaukee), Aspen Opera Theater and The Spoleto Festival in
Spoleto, Italy.
James
sang the tenor lead in Handel’s first opera, Almira at the 2004
Amherst Early Music Festival under the musical direction of
internationally acclaimed baroque harpist, Andrew Lawrence King and the
stage direction of Drew Minter. He sang the title roles in New York
State Baroque’s (Ithaca, NY) productions of Rameau’s Pygmalion,
Handel’s Jephtha and Bach’s St. John Passion (Evangelist),
and he
will appear as the title role in
Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo
with
Stony
Brook
Baroque in April, 2007.
Mr.
Brown
is the Chair of Vocal Studies at Pacific
Lutheran
University.
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Ross
Hauck
(Nerone)
tenor, has appeared in concert with the
National Symphony, Cincinnati
 Symphony, Chicago Symphony, and Tanglewood
symphony. Opera roles to his credit include Almaviva in
Barber of
Seville
with
Sacramento Opera,
Belmonte in the
Tacoma Opera’s
Abduction from the Seraglio,
the
title role in Dardanus
with
Wolf Trap Opera, among other notable appearances. He
has been a winner of the Macallister Awards, Florida Grand Opera
competition, Wolf Trap Foundation Grant,
and Opera Performance of the Year award at the Cincinnati Conservatory of
Music.
Mr. Hauck lives in Issaquah, WA with his wife, Laura, and their twin sons,
Daniel and Benjamin.
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 Jose Lemos (Ottone),
counter tenor, is one of
South America’s
rising young artists. Jose is the First
Prize winner and the Audience Prize winner of the 2003 International
Baroque Singing Competition of Chimay, Belgium.
He has appeared with Boston Baroque, Boston Cecilia, Harvard Early
Music Society,
Les
Parlement
de Musique, Buenos Aires Lirica,
Piccolo Spoleto Festival Early Music Series, and the Aldeburgh Snape
Proms in England. Some of
the highlights for the 2006 and 2007 seasons include the release of
his first recording with the Baltimore Consort, entitled
Cancionero, featuring the incredibly beautiful repertoire of the
early music of Spain.
In April 2005 he made his European opera debut in a production of
the Zürich Opera House of Handel's
Giulio Cesare under the
batton of Marc Minkowski. In June of the same year he performed at
the famous Aldeburgh Festival in a production of Purcell's
Faery
Queen under the batton of Harry Bicket, receiving raving reviews
by the London Times.
This summer Jose will debut in the role of Tolomeo in
Handel’s
Giulio
Cesare at the Göttingen Handel Festival directed
by
Nicholas
McGegan, and the role of
Silene in a new
production of Lully’s
Psyche with
the Boston Early Music Festival
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 Michael Maniaci,
originally
cast in the role of Nerone, had to cancel his appearance due to illness. His
role has been taken by Ross Hauck.
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 Sarah Mattox
(Octavia),
mezzo-soprano, is the recent First Prize Winner of
the Belle Voci National Competition, and has sung principal roles with such
companies as Seattle Opera, Cincinnati Opera, Palm Beach Opera, Chicago
Opera Theater, Lyric Opera Cleveland, Tacoma Opera and Amarillo Opera.
Ms.
Mattox made her professional debut with Seattle Opera
as
Feodor
in their acclaimed production of
Boris
Godunov.
The Seattle Times said that “…it was newcomer Sarah Elouise Mattox, in
the ‘pants role’ of Boris’ son Feodor, who raised eyebrows all over the
Opera House with her believable, lifelike acting and her well-schooled
voice.”
Ms.
Mattox can next be heard singing
the title role in
Carmen
for Tacoma Opera.
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 Alexander
Mentzel
(Amore),
boy soprano,
was
born and grew up in Cologne, Germany for the first eight years of his life.
It was here that he made his stage debut at the age of six as “The Mayor” in
the Cologne Cathedral Choir School’s production of The Pied Piper of
Hamlin. Since moving to Eugene, he has kept up a busy schedule appearing
in many community productions. He has appeared at the Actor’s Cabaret
of Eugene as “Tiny Tim” in A Christmas Carol and “Chip” in Beauty
and the Beast. He could be seen flying over the stage as “Michael” in
the Rose Children’s Theatre’s production of Peter Pan and made his
opera debut in 2005 as “Little Joey” in Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi at
the University of Oregon. He was also featured as a singer in I’ll Write
A Love Song, a musical tribute to the composer Whit Ozier created by
Sandra Brown Williams. He was thrilled to be cast as “Dog” in the premiere
performance of an original children’s musical Nisse’s Dream at The
Lord Leebrick Theatre. Recently cast in his first feature film, Alex
played the role of “Billy” in The Feast of Love (2007) directed by
Robert Benton starring Morgan Freeman and Greg Kinnear and filmed on
location in Portland, Oregon. Alex currently attends sixth grade at the
Roosevelt Middle School in Eugene where he participates in the French
Immersion Program.
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 Jason McStoots
(Arnalta, Lucano),
tenor, has been described by critics as
“particularly outstanding” with “a perfect light-opera voice,”
“sweet, appealing tone and real acting ability.”
He has appeared as a soloist with groups around the
United States
including Boston Lyric Opera,
The Handel Choir of
Baltimore, Early Music Guild of Seattle,
Emmanuel
Music,
Granite State Opera and Cape
Cod Opera. An accomplished recitalist,
Mr.
McStoots
has appeared in recital as a fellow with
Tanglewood
Music
Center, Florestan Recital
Project, Boston Vocal Artists, Red House Opera Festival, and the Boston
French Library. He will appear in the Boston Early Music Festival’s
much-anticipated 2007 production of
Lully’s
Psyché.
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 Melissa Plagemann
(Damigella, Seneca's
wife), mezzo-soprano,
performs frequently throughout the Pacific Northwest, and has appeared
with some of the area's finest ensembles, including the Seattle
Symphony, Tacoma Opera, Orchestra Seattle, Seattle Opera Guild, Skagit
Opera, the Seattle Choral Company, Kitsap Opera, and NOISE, among
others. Recent opera roles for Ms. Plagemann include Hänsel in
Humperdinck's Hänsel und Gretel, Carmen in semi-staged scenes
with the Seattle Symphony, Dorabella in Così fan Tutte, Tisbe in
Rossini's La Cenerentola, and both the 2nd and 3rd Ladies in
Mozart's Magic Flute. Equally at home on the concert stage, she
has performed in several recent productions of Mozart's Requiem,
as well as Copland's In the Beginning, and Saint-Saëns'
Christmas Oratorio, among others. Ms. Plagemann has a special
interest in music of the Baroque era, and has performed several
masterpieces of J.S. Bach, including the St. John Passion and
Magnificat in D, as well as several of his Cantatas.
In April
Melissa will perform the role of Melissa in the
Northwest Puppet
Center's staging of Francesca Caccini's sole surviving opera
Liberazione di Ruggiero.
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 Stephen
Rumph
(First
Soldier, Reporter, and Consul),
tenor, has recently
sung Rodolfo in La Boheme
with Tacoma Opera, Don Jose in Carmen
with Skagit Valley Opera, Das Lied von der Erde
with Northwest Mahler Festival, and Mozart’s
Requiem with both Walla Walla Symphony and
Northwest Sinfonietta. Other recent credits include Tamino in
The Magic Flute with both
Skagit Valley Opera and the
University
of Washington,
Beethoven's
Ninth Symphony and
Rachmaninoff's
The Bells with the
Tacoma Symphony, and Bach’s Mass in B Minor
with the Lake Chelan Bach Festival. Upcoming performances include
Messiah with Tacoma
Symphony, and an evening of
Puccini and
Mozart
duets with the Federal Way Symphony.
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 Jonathan
Silva
(Reporter, Littore, and Consul),
bass-baritone,
is a graduate of Lawrence
University in Appleton, Wisconsin, with a degree in Voice Performance
and Pedagogy. Returning to Washington, he has since been involved with a
wide variety of organizations: operatically with Bellevue Opera, Skagit
Opera, Puget Sound Opera, Seattle Opera Guild, The Ladies Music Club,
Seattle Civic Light Opera, Eastside Music Theater, and the University of
Washington, and chorally with Cascadian Chorale, Issaquah Chorale, Annas
Bay Music Festival, and Plymouth Congregational Church. In local opera
he has performed as Luther/Crespel in Tales of Hoffman, Chief of
Police in Amelia Goes to the Ball, Alidoro in Cinderella,
Basilio in Barber of Seville, Colline in La Bohème, and
Mikado in Pearls of the Orient.
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 David Stutz
(Seneca),
bass, has performed in a wide
range of musical genres including contemporary and baroque opera,
Renaissance proto-opera, and medieval mystery plays. Locally, he was a cast
member in the EMG production of Venus and Adonis, and sang Aeneus in
Seattle Baroque's Dido and Aeneus. He premiered the role of Henry
VIII in Garrett Fisher's The Passion of St. Thomas More, and has become a
regular in the Northwest Puppet Center's annual opera productions, including
a Magic Flute in which he simultaneously interpreted the roles of Papageno,
Zarastro, the 3rd boy, and the 3rd lady. He looks forward to singing in
their 2007 production of
Francesca
Cacinni's
The Liberation of
Ruggiero from the Island of Alcina.
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 Kevin
Sutton
(Nutrice),
tenor, a native of
Indiana, received his early training at
Ball
State
University in
Muncie. He went on to earn a Master’s degree in
sacred music from Scarritt
Graduate
School
in Nashville,
Tennessee
in 1988, and has studied at the
University
of North Texas. A
sought after soloist and professional chorister, Mr. Sutton has performed
with the Orchestra of New Spain, The Denton Bach Society and the Dallas Bach
Society, the choir of St. Mark's School of Texas, the Texas Choral Artists,
Musikanten Montana, Voces Intimae, The Orpheus Chamber Singers, Voice of
Change and Atlanta’s New Trinity Baroque.
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 Linda
Tsatsanis
(Valletto),
soprano,
graduated from the
University of
Toronto and continued her education at
Indiana
University’s
Early Music Institute in the studio of
Alan
Bennett, working with faculty such as
Nigel
North,
Elisabeth
Wright,
Paul
Elliott and
Wendy
Gillespie.
While at Indiana University Ms. Tsatsanis was featured as
Venus in Blow’s
Venus and Adonis,
Fanny in
Arne’s The
Cooper, and Arthebuze in Charpentier’s
Actéon.
Since moving to
Seattle
in 2006 she has been featured with Seattle Baroque Orchestra, the
Tudor Choir and the Early Music Guild while co-founding
Dulces Exuviae with lutenist
John
Lenti. The
New York Times described
her performance at the 2005 Boston Early Music Festival as
“ravishing.” |
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 Yulia van Doren (Poppea),
soprano, born
in Moscow, Russia, trained
extensively in classical voice and piano with her Russian mother and in
aural training with her American jazz pianist father, resulting in a
versatile musician with an affinity for many styles of music.
Ms.
Van Doren makes her professional
operatic debut as Poppea in
L'Incoronazione di Poppea with the Early Music Guild of Seattle, as well
as debuts with the Bach Festival of Philadelphia and the Boston Early Music
Festival, and she will premiere a work written for her at Carnegie Hall’s
Weill Recital Hall. She has performed as a soloist under
John
Rutter,
Peter
Sykes, and
Simon
Carrington, and performed the roles
of Discorde in Campra's L'Europe
Galante and
Belinda in
Dido and Aeneas. She recently
began her masters degree studies at Bard College Conservatory, where she is
a full scholarship student in a new graduate vocal program directed by
soprano Dawn
Upshaw.
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 Catherine Webster (Drusilla),
soprano,
is engaged regularly with many leading early music and chamber
ensembles in North America. Deemed one of the finest rising young
singers of baroque repertoire, she has appeared as a soloist with
Tafelmusik, Tragicomedia, Theatre of Voices, American Baroque
Orchestra, Magnificat, Musica Angelica, Camerata Pacifica, El Mundo,
Four Nations Ensemble, Ensemble Masques, Les Voix Baroques (Montreal),
Early Music Vancouver, and in the Berkeley and Boston Early Music
Festivals. Active also in contemporary music, Webster has appeared
with The Kronos Quartet in Terry Riley's Sun Rings and with
Theatre of Voices and the Los Angeles Philharmonic in John Adam's
Grand Pianola Music. Webster is a frequent collaborator with
baroque opera directors Stephen Stubbs and Paul O'Dette, appearing
under their direction in Festival Vancouver's production of
Monteverdi's L'Incoronazione di Poppea and the premiere of
Mattheson's Boris Goudenov for the Boston Early Music Festival.
She has recorded for Harmonia Mundi, Naxos, Musica Omnia, Analekta and
Atma. Catherine holds a Master's in Music from the Early Music
Institute at Indiana University and has been a guest faculty member
and artist for The San Francisco Early Music Society's summer
workshops and the Madison Early Music Festival. She now resides in
Montreal. |
 Theodore Deacon
(Stage Director) has pursued a varied and critically
acclaimed career as a stage director, composer, conductor, musicologist, and
music critic. He received his doctorate in opera studies at the University
of Washington
and served there for many years as Director of Opera.
Deacon has participated in over 100 productions
throughout the United States,
is in demand as a lecturer, and writes for opera journals worldwide. The
London
journal Opera
declared his 1988 production of L’incoronazione
di Poppea “would triumph on any stage in the
world.” His production for the Early Music Guild of Monteverdi’s
Combattimento and
Ballo delle ingrate was
chosen by the Seattle Post Intelligencer as of
“The Year’s Ten Best” and praised as “a
defining moment (for) chamber opera in
Seattle.”
He was also producer for the EMG’s recent presentation of
John
Blow's
Venus
and Adonis. |
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 August Denhard
(Producer), has been Executive Director of the Early
Music Guild of Seattle since 2000, overseeing its opera performances of the
Monteverdi Chamber Operas
and Venus and Adonis.
He has directed and produced baroque opera performances for the Bloomington
Early music Festival, including the Madrigals
of Love and War,
Coronation of Poppea,
Venus and Adonis,
La Purpura de la Rosa,
and Alcina. He
performs with Baroque Northwest, the Concord Ensemble, and other ensembles
devoted to 16th-and 17th-century music. He recently completed his doctoral
studies at the Indiana University Early Music Institute. |
 Fred Hauptman
(Co- Music Director) taught music at City College of
New York from 1965 to 1999.
While on leave in 1998-90 he lived in
Seattle
and was the music critic for Seattle Weekly and music director of the
Versailles Ensemble. Since his return to
Seattle
in 1999 he has served as music director for Town Hall, where he produced
their series of Bach Around the Clock marathons and worked with the Early
Music Guild as a board member and leader for its opera productions, the
Monteverdi Chamber Operas
and
John
Blow’s
Venus and Adonis. |
Richard
Lorig
(Set Design)
 Anna Mansbridge
(Assistant Director), is from the United Kingdom,
where she studied dance for many years.
Anna has
choreographed and performed in many baroque operas in both Europe and the
United States.
In 2000 she founded Seattle Early Dance, the Northwest’s premier early dance
company, of which she is the Artistic Director.
Their performance credits include
Monteverdi’s
Il Ballo
delle Ingrate and
John
Blow’s
Venus
and Adonis with the Early Music Guild,
Baroque
Extravaganza with Gallery Concerts, among
many others. She is currently on the faculty of the Cascade Early Music
Festival, and the
Accademia
d’Amore
and The Seattle Academy of Baroque Opera directed by
Stephen
Stubbs. |
 Ingrid
Matthews
(Orchestra Leader), violin, Music Director of Seattle
Baroque Orchestra, is well established as one of today’s most respected
exponents of her instrument. She won first prize in the prestigious Erwin
Bodky International Competition for Early Music in 1989, and in 1990 joined
Toronto’s Tafelmusik, with whom she performed extensively on three
continents, appearing in venues such as the Proms and the Barbican Center of
London, the Stuttgart Festival, the Utrecht Festival, and the Mostly Mozart
Festival of New York. Matthews also worked with many other leading North
American period-instrument ensembles, including Philharmonia Baroque of San
Francisco, Joshua Rifkin’s Bach Ensemble of New York, and the American Bach
Soloists of San Francisco, before founding the Seattle Baroque Orchestra in
1994 with harpsichordist Byron Schenkman. In addition to her work in
Seattle, she has served as concertmaster for the New York Collegium under
Andrew Parrott and held the same position for the
prestigious Boston Early
Music Festival Orchestra. Among the most-recorded baroque violinists,
Matthews has won international critical acclaim for a discography which
ranges from the earliest solo violin repertoire through the great Sonatas
and Partitas of J.S. Bach. Of the latter recording, the critic for American
Record Guide writes “this superb recording is my top recommendation for this
music… on either modern or period instruments.”
Jason Meininger
(lighting design)
Jason Meininger has been
lighting theatre, dance, and opera for fifteen years on stages big and small
all over Seattle, across the country, and on three continents. Other opera
includes Venus & Adonis, Combattimento… and Il Ballo delle
Ingrate with the Early Music Guild, The Magic Flute, La Finta
Giardinera, and Cosi Fan Tutti at UW Opera, and Seattle
Experimental Opera's world premiere of Floralesque. Theatre includes
Line One, Stage Door and The Changeling for Annex
Theatre, Lovecraft: Arkham and D.O.B. with Open Circle
Theater, and numerous productions with theatre simple including Camino
Real, The Caucasian Chalk Circle, The Big Time and 52
Pick Up. Currently living in London, Jason was the resident assistant LD
at the Seattle Repertory Theatre for two years, and holds an MFA in Lighting
Design from the University of Washington.
 Stephen Stubbs (music director, lute,
theorbo),
born 1951 in Seattle, has
been engaged in music-making since early childhood. Parallel interests in
new and pre-romantic music led him to take a degree in composition at University
and to study the lute and harpsichord. Further years of study in Holland and
England preceded his professional debut as lutenist at the Wigmore Hall,
London in 1976. From 1980 to 2006 he lived in North Germany as professor for
lute and performance practices at the Hochschule für Künste, Bremen.
With his direction of Stefano Landi’s La Morte d'Orfeo at the 1987
Bruges festival, he began his career as opera director and simultaneously
founded the ensemble TRAGICOMEDIA which has since recorded over 20 CDs and
completed tours of Europe, North America and Japan. Stubbs has been invited
to direct opera productions in Europe, the US, Canada and Scandinavia,
including Monteverdi’s Orfeo at the Netherlands Opera in Amsterdam
1997-8 to be revived in 2007, Since 1997 he has co-directed the
bi-annual Boston Early Music Festival opera. The BEMF recording of Conradi’s
Ariadne was nominated for a Grammy this year. Stubbs’ solo lute
recordings include the music of J.S. Bach, S.L. Weiss, David Kellner and the
Belgian lutenist Jaques St. Luc. With baroque harpist Maxine Eilander he has
recorded Sonate al Pizzico, released on ATMA in 2004. Since the inception of
the Dowland Project on ECM he has played on all the group’s recordings.
 Dave Vaught (stage manager)
is delighted to stage manage for The Early Music Guild again. Mr. Vaught
also works in lighting, audio, rigging and production management, and is
currently Production Manager for PNTA’s event services department
working for various clients on special events, fashion shows, theatre,
film and live music. |
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