“Operatic Jewels of the Gilded Age†at Ventfort Hall
Members of the Theatre Street Productions company of Binghampton, NY, will perform “Operatic Jewels of the Gilded Age” at Ventfort Hall Mansion and Gilded Age Museum on Saturday, October 11 at 7:30 pm. A wine and cheese reception with the singers will follow the performance.Featured on the Columbus Day weekend program will be excerpts from Carmen, Faust, Rigoletto, La Traviata, The Mikado, The Pirates of Penzance and more. The performers will be Michael Callas, bass-baritone; Andrea Gregori, soprano; Steven Nanni, tenor; Kasey Stewart, mezzo-soprano, and Margaret Reitz, pianist.
Callas, hailed as a “precociously powerful young singer,” bows this season with the Tri-Cities Opera as Monterone in Rigoletto and Balthazar in Amahl and the Night Visitors. Callas was recently heard with the same company as Basilio in Il Barbiere di Siviglia and Zuniga in Carmen and with the Boston Lyric Opera as Antonio in Le Nozze di Figaro and Samuel in Un Ballo in Maschera. He has also appeared with the Utah Festival Opera Company, the Opera Theatre of St. Louis, and in Moscow and St. Petersburg, Russia.
Gregori has been described as having “a beautiful voice springing from a haunting beauty with a knack for balancing pathos and humor.” She began her career as a dancer/choreographer, but moved into opera, concert and musical theater, including performances with the Casals Festival in Puerto Rico, Tri-Cities Opera, Ash Lawn Opera, and Central Florida Lyric Opera in a wide variety of roles, including Josephine in HMS Pinafore, Phyllis in Iolanthe, Rose Maybud in Ruddigore and Mabel in Pirates of Penzance with the Binghampton Summer Savoryards. Other roles include Micaela in Carmen and Adele in Die Fledermaus. She is the founder and artistic director of Theatre Street Productions.
Nanni was described as “an up and coming world class bel canto tenor” for his role as Count Almaviva in IlBarbiere di Siviglia. For his performance as Ferrando in Cosi Fan Tutte he was given the accolade of “a very musical, exciting and brilliant tenor” singing Mozart “with ease and elegance.” Other roles include Tito in La Clamenza di Tito, Nemorino in L’Elisir d’Amore and Alfredo in La Traviata. His oratorio repertoire includes the tenor solo in Bach’s B-Minor Mass and St. Matthew Passion among others.
For The Singing Actor’s Studio in Binghamton, NY, for which she is a founding member, Stewart has sung the role of Zita in Gianni Schicchi, the Third Lady in Die Zauberflote and Sally in A Hand of Bridge. She has also had leading roles in such musicals as Chicago, A Little Night Music and Fiddler on the Roof and has been a featured artist with the Binghampton Summer Savoyards. Last summer she originated the role of Female Redwood in the world premiere of Randall Eng’s opera Florida with Opera Cleveland.
Reitz specializes as a piano accompanist, having appeared throughout the United States, England, South America and at the American Institute of Musical Studies in Graz, Austria. She was a winner of the 1997 Artistic Ambassadors Program by the United States Information Agency in partnership with the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. She is also the official pianist for a number of international competitions and musical conferences.
Attendance for the Ventfort Hall performance and wine and cheese reception is $25 per person and may be reserved by calling 413-637-3206. The historic Gilded Age mansion is located at 104 Walker Street in Lenox, MA.
An Official Project of Save America’s Treasures, Ventfort Hall Mansion and Gilded Age Museum offers tours of the historic mansion, as well as lectures, concerts, teas, theater and other programs. This elegant Elizabethan-Revival Berkshire “cottage,” listed on the National Register of Historic Places, is open to the public year-around and is available for private rental. Built in 1893 for George and Sarah Morgan (sister of the financier, J. P. Morgan), Ventfort Hall has undergone substantial restoration, which continues.
