Sunday 27 September 2009, Strovolos Municipal Theatre, Lefkosia, 20:30
Monday 28 September 2009, Rialto Theatre, Lemesos, 20:30
Soloist: Katerina Miná, soprano
Conductor: Orlando Jopling
Stage Director: Stuart Barker
Stage & Costume Designer: Andy Bargilly
Programme :
D. Milhaud: Le boeuf sur la toit
A. Roussel : Le marchand de sable qui passe
F. Poulenc: “La Voix Humaine” (One-act Opera for one character, Libretto by Jean Cocteau)
Ticket prices:
Adults €12 and Pensioners €7
Free entrance for students, soldiers and EURO<26 card holders
In collaboration with the French Embassy and the French Cultural Centre in Cyprus
Originally a pianist and a music teacher, Katerina Mina completed a BMus (Hons) Degree and a PGDip (Opera) at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama. Her opera studies were sponsored by the Corporation of London, the A.G. Leventis Foundation, and the Guildhall School of Music & Drama. The Greek Cypriot soprano is a prize winner in two major singing competitions, the “1st Concorso Vocale Internazionale di Musica Sacra” in Rome, and the “7th Julian Gayarre International Singing Competition” in Spain, and the winner of the Madame Figaro “2008 Singer of the Year Award”. Katerina lives in London where she continues her vocal studies with soprano Janice Chapman. She also works with conductor Peter Robinson and opera coach Anthony Legge. Katerina has given numerous recitals and concerts in the UK, Germany, Finland, Italy, France, Cyprus and Greece, and has recorded music for ERT, CyBC Radio and Television. Her performance venues include, amongst others, the Athens Concert Hall, St. John’s Smith Square, Hackney Empire, Buxton Opera House, Sheldonian Theatre, De Montfort Hall, Leighton House Museum, London Hellenic Centre, the “Juhlasali” of the Helsinki City Hall, Saint-Louis Cathedral at Les Invalides, the Athens Athenaeum Concert Hall, the Theocharakis Foundation of Fine Arts, and all major theatres in Cyprus. Katerina represented Cyprus at the Celebratory Concert for the accession of Cyprus to the Euro Area with Christos Pitta’s symphonic works Helen and Rime d’Amore (world-premiere), and was nominated to represent Cyprus at the 2nd World Delphic Games in Saratov; she gave a recital at the “Roman River Music” Festival in Essex with pianist Simon Crawford-Phillips; concerts with pianist Elena Mouzala in Paris and Athens, took part in the 1st “Greek Festival of Youth Arts” EKON in London and the Annual Festival “Around the Piano” in Athens. Also, Katerina was selected to participate in a Masterclass led by Tenor, Maestro José Cura, organised by British Youth Opera.
After a music degree from Cambridge University, Orlando Jopling studied with Sir Colin Davis, George Hurst and Colin Metters at the Royal Academy of Music and Diego Masson at Dartington. In his twenties he assisted Sir Colin Davis with his versions for chamber orchestra of all the late Beethoven Quartets, Wyn Davies for Scottish Opera, and André Previn on A Streetcar Named Desire, working with the London Symphony Orchestra. He now regularly conducts the English Chamber Orchestra both in the recording studio (recording works by Schubert, Schumann and Rachmaninov) and on the concert platform. He has also recently appeared with the London Mozart Players, Sinfonia Viva and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. He is a fearless champion of living composers, and a particular advocate of Sibelius, Janacek, Ravel, lesser-known British composers and the Viennese waltz and operetta tradition. Other recent repertoire has included Elgar’s 2nd Symphony and Stravinsky’s Song of the Nightingale, Prokofiev, as well as stylistically enlightened performances of Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert and Brahms. Orlando is a graduate of the National Opera Studio in London where he won the first Leonard Hancock scholarship. He also founded Tête à Tête, who have commissioned operas and presented the modern world première of Vivaldi’s lost opera Orlando finto pazzo. Over the last six years he has built up Stanley Hall Opera into an established Annual Festival with an enviable reputation. With them he has cast and conducted Così fan tutte, Figaro, Don Pasquale, Falstaff, Cenerentola and the first ever professional production in English of Rossini’s La Pietra del Paragone. Other opera work includes Figaro for Savoy Opera, The Merry Widow for Carl Rosa, La Scala di Seta for Independent Opera, and Don Giovanni in Vienna with the Schonbrunn Orchestra. He now has a particular reputation for the middle-late bel canto tradition. Orlando Jopling is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.
