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Kara Guggenmos
Kara Guggenmos received her Bachelor of Music Degree in Sacred Voice Performance
from Moody Bible Institute in 1996 as a student of Dr. Terry Strandt and
received her Master of Music Degree in 2001 in Vocal Performance from
the University of Colorado studying with Julie Simson and Dr. Robert Harrison.
Ms. Guggenmos has also been a Metropolitan Opera National Council Regional
Finalist, the Metropolitan Opera National Council Colorado/Wyoming District
winner in 1999 and 2002, and a Denver Lyric Opera Guild competition finalist.
Awards and achievements include winning the National Association of Teachers
of Singing Artist Award Competition in 2002, which led to her Carnegie
Hall solo recital debut in June of 2003.
Operatic roles include Donna Anna in Don
Giovanni with Opera Fort Collins, the Countess in Le nozze di Figaro,
Hannah in the Merry Widow, and Gretel in Hansel und Gretel as a resident
artist with Opera Colorado. Ms. Guggenmos has coached with such prestigious
singers and coaches as Benita Valente, Martin Isepp, and Ashley Putnam.
Recent engagements include singing with the Littleton Symphony and Colorado
Springs Philharmonic as well as giving recitals and teaching Master Classes
at various colleges in the United States. Kara, her husband Neil, and
their three sons reside in Longmont, Colorado where Kara is currently
the Worship Director at Calvary Church and maintains a private voice and
piano studio.
Marcia Ragonetti
Recognized as one of the Rocky Mountain region’s most celebrated
artists, Marcia Ragonetti has been associated with Opera Colorado since
its inception in 1982, for an unprecedented 24th appearance, as Mercèdés
in Carmen. She was also among the star-studded cast of singers to inaugurate
the opening of the new Ellie Caulkins Opera House in September 2005. Other
notable roles with Opera Colorado include Cherubino (Le nozze di Figaro),
Rosina (Il barbiere di Siviglia), and Die Zweite Dame (Die Zauberflöte)
among many others. Equally well-known to Colorado Springs audiences, Ms.
Ragonetti has appeared at the Opera Theatre of the Rockies, the Historic
Tabor Opera House in Leadville and the Wheeler Opera House in Aspen. She
added stage director to her list of accomplishments with Opera Theatre
of the Rockies’ production of Gianni Schicchi. She made her first
mainstage appearance in Central City Opera’s sold-out 2004 production
of The Student Prince. With Opera Fort Collins she recently appeared in
the title role Carmen and will be featured as Desirée Armfeldt
in an upcoming production of Sondheim’s A Little Night Music.
She appeared numerous times with the Colorado
Symphony Orchestra, mostly under the baton of Marin Alsop, in works ranging
from Mozart’s Great Mass in C minor and Rossini’s Stabat Mater
to Richard Einhorn’s Voices of Light and Falla’s El amor
brujo. Most recently, she appeared as the mezzo soloist in the Verdi Requiem
with the Colorado Springs Philharmonic. She sang with the San Antonio
Symphony, Utah Symphony, Crested Butte Music Festival, Colorado Music
Festival, National Repertory Orchestra in Breckenridge, Greeley Philharmonic,
Boulder Philharmonic & Sinfonia, Boulder Bach Festival, Cheyenne Symphony,
Jefferson Symphony Orchestra and Bravo! Colorado Music Festival in Vail.
She can be heard on the Gothic recording of Honegger’s King David
with the St. John’s Episcopal Church choir.
Jack Delmore
Dr. Jack Delmore, lyric tenor, has an extensive background in all areas
of performance. Dr. Delmore holds a Masters of Vocal Performance from
the New England Conservatory of Music, and a Doctorate of Musical Arts
from the University of Arizona, Tucson. He is currently a full professor
of music/voice & vocal performance at Mesa State College.
Dr. Delmore has performed such diverse chamber
works as Britten’s Canticles, Winter Words, Schumann’s Dichterliebe,
Faure’s La Bonne Chanson, and Poulenc’s Telle Jour Telle Nuit.
He has also studied and performed the Russian repertoire of Tchaikovsky,
Rachmaninov and The Mighty Five as well as more obscure early 20th- Century
American and British art song.
Dr. Delmore is a frequent soloist with the
Grand Junction Symphony and the Western Colorado Chorale, Casper Symphony
and the Tucson Masterworks Chorale. He has performed numerous works with
these organizations including Bach’s B Minor Mass, Verdi’s
Requiem, Carmina burana, and The Creation and Messiah. Dr. Delmore also
premiered the chamber opera, In the Shadow of the Glen, by acclaimed American
composer Nancy Van de Vate. In 2001, he traveled to Vienna and Bratislava
to record this same work.
As a full professor at MSC, Dr. Delmore
frequently serves two active departments, Music and Theatre and has directed
and/or coached many musicals, operettas, and, as of late, operas. For
example, he has directed many main-stage musicals, Purcell’s Dido
and Aeneas and Menotti’s Amahl and the Night Visitors. More recently
he directed Gilbert & Sullivan’s charming fairy-tale operetta,
Iolanthe, and Barber’s A Hand of Bridge and Menotti’s The
Teleophone. In the spring of 2008 he will also direct Benjamin Britten’s
charming one act Noye’s Fludde (Noah’s Flood).
Christopher Job
Mr. Job is a Southern California native who has established himself as
an
important talent in the American opera scene. His recent interpretations
of the operatic and concert repertoire have been praised by critics and
the public alike. He is the Second Place Winner in the 2006 Metropolitan
Opera Competition for the Rocky Mountain Region, and the 2005 Grand Prize
Winner of the Denver Lyric Opera Guild Competition. Another honor has
been to create the role of General Godofredo de la Barca in the world
premier of La Curandera, an opera in one act by Robert Xavier Rodriguez,
commissioned by Opera Colorado.
Mr. Job was seen last season in Die Zauberflöte,
Un Ballo in Maschera, L’Elisir d’Amore, Carmen, and Die Entführung
aus dem Serail, all with Opera Colorado. He was also recently seen as
Ramfis in Aïda and Il Commendatore in Don Giovanni with Opera Fort
Collins. He has performed with such companies as Opera Omaha, Opera Pacific,
Des Moines Metro Opera, Aspen Opera Theatre, Opera Theatre of the Rockies,
Chautauqua Opera of New York, and Glimmerglass Opera.
In concert, he performed as bass soloist
in Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis, Verdi’s Requiem and Handel’s
Messiah. This past summer he sang roles Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo
ed Euridice, and Philip Glass’ Orphée with Glimmerglass Opera
of New York. He will be in residence at the Minnesota Opera throughout
their 2007-2008 season.
LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN
b Bonn, December 17, 1770
d Veinna, March 26, 1827
Overture to Leonore No. 3
Beethoven painstakingly approached his compositions as a perfectionist,
reworking his masterpieces until completely satisfied. None of his compositions
represent this trait more than his only opera Fidelio. In all, he composed
four overtures to the opera. The first three have the alternate name of
the opera, Leonore. The Leonore No. 3 ranks as the mightiest and most
significant of all. Richard Wagner called it “no longer an overture but
the most powerful of dramas in itself…a wondrous tone poem.” This overture
sums up the action and the passionate sentiments of the entire Fidelio
story. Its very breadth and length have made it unsuitable as an overture
to the opera, which is a fact that Beethoven realized and therefore composed
the shorter Fidelio overture.
The story of Fidelio takes place in Seville,
Spain. It is a typical “rescue drama,” popular in France during the revolution
of 1789. The heroine, Leonore, is impersonating a man named Fidelio in
order to gain entry into the prison in which her husband, Florestan, is
interned. The barbarous ruler, Pizarro, maintains that Floristan has died,
but Leonore never loses hope and eventually saves her husband just as
he is about to be stabbed by Pizzaro.
The Oveture portrays the passionate characters
of Fidelio: the heroic Leonore, the helpless Florestan and the evil Pizarro.
As in the opera, the trumpet call provides the overture’s most dramatic
moment. It sounds from far in the distance, halting the murderer’s advance.
Then we hear in the strings Florestan’s song of thanksgiving and deliverance.
The trumpet call is repeated which leads into the tumultuous rejoicing
heard in all the instruments.
Symphony No. 9
Beethoven’s sketches of material eventually used in the Choral
Symphony appear as early as 1817, but his real composition of this final
symphony took placed between 1822 and 1824. It was first performed in
the Kärntnerthor Theater in Vienna on May 7, 1824. By this time Beethoven
was way too deaf to consider conducting, but he stood in the middle of
the orchestra and tried to follow the performance with his score. Not
being able to hear, he lost his place and was oblivious to the tremendous
applause at the symphony’s conclusion. Fräulein Karoline Unger, one of
the soloists, related that she induced him to turn and face the audience
“who were still clapping their hands and giving the greatest demonstrations
of pleasure…the sudden conviction thereby forced on everybody that he…could
not hear what was going on acted like an electric shock on all present,
and a volcanic explosion of sympathy and admiration followed.”
The decade that elapsed between Beethoven’s
eighth and ninth symphonies was very trying for Beethoven. In addition
to the obvious difficulties of his deafness, other personal difficulties
caused him much personal anguish. The major ones were the frustrated passion
between himself and Antonie Brentano, “the Immortal Beloved,” and the
drawn-out litigation over the custody of his nephew Karl, which he was
eventually awarded. This was also the time of the French Revolution, and
the eventual defeat of Napoleon. Musically he was constant reworking of
his only opera, Fidelio, and its suffered through its difficult premieres.
But it also had some successes, with the completion of his Missa solemnis,
various piano sonatas including the Hammerklavier and the Diabelli Variations,
and other works.
Organizing the first performance of the
Ninth Symphony was also no easy task. Beethoven was annoyed with Vienna
and entertained the idea of presenting the first performance in Berlin.
He had the endless difficulties on engaging a conductor, soloists, the
remainder of the program, not to mention the budget and finances. But
he was eventually pleased with choice of soloists and conductor, and the
arrangement of having him present on stage. Though a tremendous artistic
success, the concert was a financial catastrophe for Beethoven.
Michael Steinberg expressed the opinion
that this symphony “traces a path from darkness to light, and of this
process and of the struggle for clarification.” It opens very dramatically
with two very soft notes (E and A), with this open interval reappearing
in various contexts. An intense crescendo develops with these two notes
giving way to a D, the key of the symphony but beginning in the minor
mode. The exposition is not repeated and following the development instead
of the expected D minor, but an astonishing D major.
The second movement opens with “hammer-blow”
octaves giving way to the main theme. It is a schezo-based in part on
themes from the first movement, with a rustic trio. The Adagio is a welcome
break from the drama of the first two movements. The “leaning tones” of
the main theme are poignant and profound, giving it a yearning sentiment.
The lengthy introduction of the Finale recalls
the principal themes of the preceding movements. It is a gigantic set
of variations culminating on the Friedrich von Shiller’s famous Ode to
Joy, only first stated without words in the cellos and basses. The recitative,
with words by Beethoven himself, is begun by the baritone soloist, with
the ensuing quartet and chorus joining in. Beethoven had been acquainted
with Shiller’s works since boyhood, and he had considered setting the
text “An die Freude” for some thirty years. This famous song overcomes
the darkness and turmoil of life with what Edward Downes wrote: “musical
splendor past description. The Symphony ranks as one of the greatest achievements
of the human spirit.”
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eethoven's
colossal Ninth Symphony will fill the air as the Grand Junction Symphony
Orchestra is joined by a full symphony chorus and four extraordinary vocal
soloists - celebrating 30 years of music in the Grand Valley.
