Saturday
21st October 2023
7:30pm
Performance Ends 9:45pm Approximately
Sunday
22nd October 2023
5:00pm
Performance Ends 7:15pm Approximately
Pre-Performance Talk: Introduction to the Opera
One hour before each performance, an informative free talk will be given to ticket holders for the performance. The talk will last 25mins approximately and will be given by our host, George Fleeton. No booking is necessary and will be held in the Carolan Suite. Admission is FREE.
The National Concert Hall, Dublin
Box Office: +353 (0) 1 417 0000 or www.nch.ie
Libretto by Adelheid Wette after the fairytale Hänsel und Gretel by Jacob Ludwig and Wilhelm Carl Grimm
Premiére:
Hoftheater, Wienmar, 23 December 1893
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Impoverished and starving, Hänsel and Gretel are at home playing when their stepmother returns home and scolds them for not doing their chores. She sends them to the dark and evil forrest to pick strawberries… but they soon get lost.
Alone in the forrest they soon realise they have lost his way and become very afraid. A sandman arrives and helps them go to sleep. When they awake, they stumble upon a gingerbread house made of everything a child could want. They are coaxed into the house by a wicked witch who wants to fatten Hansel up to eat. Through trickery on the children’s part- they eventually push the witch into the oven and kill her.
Shortly after, Hänsel and Gretel’s stepmother and father rescue them and all live happily every after.
Sarah Richmond
Sarah Richmond
Winner of the 2021 Toronto Mozart Vocal Competition and finalist at the 2022 Montserrat Caballé Competition in Teatro Real, Sarah Richmond is a rising star, also winning Terzo Premio at Concorso Lirico Arturo Toscanini and Lied Prize at Donauwelle International.
In 2024 Sarah performs Argene L’Olympiade with Irish National Opera in Switzerland, Ireland and ROH Linbury Theatre. Favourite roles include Komponist Ariadne auf Naxos (Mousaverse), Willie Gugliemo Rathcliff (Wexford Festival Opera), Mezzo Spell Book (Longborough Festival Opera), Rosina Barber of Seville (Ulster Touring Opera), Mercédès Carmen (North West Opera/Cairo Opera) and La Zia Principessa Suor Angelica (Random Opera). Opera galas include English National Opera OPERA WORKS at Sadlers Wells.
Prominent conductors of solo engagements include Michael Collins MBE, Paul Daniel CBE and Sir Mark Elder. Amongst extensive UK and Ireland concerts are Elgar’s Sea Pictures, Brahms’ Alto Rhapsody, Rossini’s Petite Messe Solennelle and Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire. With The Ulster Orchestra she has performed Respighi’s Il Tramonto, de Falla’s El Amor Brrujo, Handel’s Messiah and BBC Invitation Concerts. International concert credits include Monte Carlo and Soriano nel Cimino. Recital appearances incorporate Royal Opera House, Oxford Lieder Festival and Cameratina with Roderick Williams OBE. Sarah is supported by the National Lottery through the Arts Council of Northern Ireland.
Hansel
Eiméar Harper
Eiméar Harper
Eiméar Harper is a Wicklow-born soprano with a wealth of experience performing across a range of genres. Eiméar graduated with a Bachelor of Music from TU Dublin Conservatoire in 2021, and is continuing her studies on the Master in Music programme, studying under Mairéad Buicke and Aoife O’Sullivan.
She has cultivated a love of chamber music, regularly collaborating with other musicians in duos and ensembles. Eiméar’s roles include Mary Crawford in the Irish premiere of Dove’s Mansfield Park, Cousin Madama Butterfly and Yum-Yum The Mikado at the National Concert Hall, as well as singing chorus in Wallace’s Lurline.
Recently, she gave recitals at Boyne Music Festival and Boyle Arts Festival. Eiméar sang soprano solo in both Handel’s Messiah and Scarlatti’s St. Cecilia’s Mass.
Gretel
Dan D'Souza
Dan D’Souza
In 2023 Irish-British baritone Dan D’Souza sang Mohammed Nobody/Somebody (Northern Ireland Opera), Flemish Deputy Don Carlo (Royal Opera, Covent Garden) and Cirillo/Boroff Fedora, Rabbit Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Ebn-Hakia Iolanta (If Opera). In 2021/22 he sang Schaunard La bohème (Mid Wales Opera), Sacristan Tosca (Diva Opera), Silvio Pagliacci (Iford Arts Young Artists) and covered Boatswain HMS Pinafore for English National Opera.
Other roles include Papageno Die Zauberflöte, Demetrius A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Royal Academy Opera), Riff West Side Story (Edinburgh International Festival), Conte Perrucchetto La Fedeltà Premiata (The Royal Opera, Mumbai), Escamillo Carmen (King’s Head Theatre), Starveling A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Harašta The Cunning Little Vixen (cover) (Royal College of Music International Opera School). He has performed new operas for Tête à Tête, Gestalt Arts, and the King’s Head Theatre, most recently creating the roles of Hendrik Christian Andersen The Master (Wexford Festival Opera), Beast Beauty and the Seven Beasts (The Opera Story) and Crane Powder Down (Shadwell Opera, recorded in 2021). In 2019 he made his debuts at the Paris Philharmonie and the Sala Santa Cecilia singing High Priest in Handel Semele under Sir John Eliot Gardiner, and at Cadogan Hall singing Monteverdi Vespers under Ivor Settlefield.
Father
Carolyn Holt
Carolyn Holt
Carolyn Holt, praised for her “rich and seductive mezzo-soprano” (Bachtrack), is from a farming background in Kildare. Recent engagements for the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, include the role of Bianca The Rape of Lucretia and the covers of Mrs Sedley Peter Grimes and Margret Wozzeck. Other notable engagements include Mrs Grose The Turn of the Screw for Garsington Opera, Madame Larina Eugene Onegin as a Garsington Alvarez Young Artist, Charlotte Werther with Lyric Opera Ireland (Dublin), Annina Der Rosenkavalier with Irish National Opera, Minskwoman Flight with Opera Collective Ireland, Sister Helen Prejean Dead Man Walking – UK staged premiere and cover with WNO and Mary The Flying Dutchman with OperaUpClose.
She was the winner of the Dermot Troy Prize for the best Irish singer in the 2019 Veronica Dunne International Singing Competition, and was awarded the top prize in their inaugural bursary in 2020. She has been a semifinalist in many international competitions including the Virgilijus Noreika Competition and the Elizabeth Connell Prize, both in 2023.
In concert, Carolyn has sung Mahler’s Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen with the Esker Festival Orchestra, Elgar’s Sea Pictures with Lambeth Orchestra and Messiah at the Waterfront Hall, Belfast with the Ulster Orchestra.
Mother
Aimee Kearney
Aimee Kearney
Aimee Kearney is an Irish Soprano currently studying with Virginia Kerr and Andrew Synnott in The Royal Irish Academy of Music.
Aimee had her opera debut in RIAM’s performance of King Arthur by Purcell in the Samuel Beckett Theatre. She has performed major operatic roles including Suor Genovieffa Suor Angelica with Berlin Opera Academy and the title role in the Irish premiere of Elisabeth Maconchy’s The Sofa as Prince Dominic in January 2023.
Aimee has performed as a soloist in many concerts and recitals, including The Newpark Festival Gala Concert and the Feis ceol concert series in the Kevin Barry room of The National Concert Hall. She had performed solo lunchtime recitals all over Ireland including Belfast, Killaloe, Co. Clare and Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin. She has performed in recitals in the Charles Wood festival of music in Armagh for many years.
Aimee is a frequent competition winner in Ireland and abroad; most recently she is the winner of the Audience Prize at the Dean and Chadlington singing competition in the UK, and the winner of the Irish Prize in the Charles Wood International song competition.
Sandman
Samantha Brady
Samantha Brady
Samantha Brady is a soprano who has just graduated from the BMus Vocal Performance degree at RIAM, studying with Owen Gilhooly and Andrew Synnott. Samantha has taken part in productions such as Humperdinck’s Hänsel und Gretel with Berlin Opera Academy, performing the role of Sandmännchen, Francesa Caccini’s La liberazione di Ruggiero dall’isola di Alcina with the RIAM, performing the role of Damsel, Purcell’s King Arthur with the RIAM, performing the role of Merlin and Beethoven’s Fidelio with Lyric Opera Ireland, performing in the chorus.
She enjoys performing chamber music and at this year’s Chamber Fest Dublin she performed Judith Weir’s Nuits D’Afrique, winning the overall Chamber Music Prize. She also recently performed this work in the Young Artist’s concert in the Music for Wexford Series at St.Iberius Church. Samantha recently took part in the Camerata Ireland Academy in August and had the pleasure of working with other young musicians and guest artists, culminating in a performance in the Young Musicians Showcase Gala. Samantha looks forward to continuing her studies this year at the RIAM on the Professional Mentorship Programme.
Dew Fairy
Rhonda Browne
Rhonda Browne
Rhonda Browne’s passion for singing began with the New Zealand Youth Choir. Following her relocation to London she was awarded the London Wagner Society’s Bayreuth Bursary and Audience Prize, and studied on the Singers of Tomorrow programme at the National Opera Studio. Her operatic appearances include Erda Das Rheingold and Siegfried, and Schwertleite Die Walküre (Longborough Festival Opera); Filipyevna Eugene Onegin (West Green House Opera); Lady Bertram Mansfield Park (Opera South); Baba The Turk The Rake’s Progress (Bury Court Opera); Mistress Bentson Lakmé (Swansea City Opera); Witch Hänsel und Gretel (Pop-Up Opera, Iford Arts, Opera in Space, Open Door Opera}; Duchess of Plaza Toro The Gondoliers, Ludmila The Bartered Bride, Gudrun Thelma (Surrey Opera); Zia Principessa Suor Angelica (Talent Unlimited, Giornata Opera); and Auntie Peter Grimes (Nottingham Philharmonic). Concert engagements include Mozart Requiem (New Zealand Symphony Orchestra); Mahler Das Lied von der Erde (English National Ballet – Royal Opera House, London Coliseum); Elgar Sea Pictures (Sheffield Symphony Orchestra); and Wagner Wesendonck Lieder (Manukau Symphony Orchestra, Auckland). Next season she makes her debut with The Royal Opera.
The Witch
Toby Purser
Toby Purser
Head of Conducting at London’s Royal College of Music, Toby Purser’s unique combination of passion and intellect, poetry and drama led in 2019 to his work being nominated for an Olivier Award (Best New Opera Production – Britten The Turn of the Screw with ENO/Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre) and an International Opera Award (Best Rediscovered Work – Stanford The Travelling Companion with New Sussex Opera.
He is founding Musical Director of the Vienna Opera Festival and Academy, launched in Summer 2019, for whom he has conducted Così fan tutte, Don Giovanni and Hänsel und Gretel. His inspirational music-making has prompted invitations from Classical Opera, Chelsea Opera Group, English National Opera, Grange Park Opera, Opera della Luna, Pimlico Opera, as well as the Royal Philharmonic and Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestras and regular concerts for Raymond Gubbay Ltd.
Toby Purser was awarded a prize by The Peace & You Movement in recognition of his cultural initiatives between the UK and Middle East, and for his work as Artistic Director of the Peace and Prosperity Trust.
Toby Purser is delighted to be returning to Lyric Opera, Dublin, for whom he most recently conducted Fidelio.
Conductor
Vivian J. Coates
Vivian J. Coates
Returning from abroad having worked with most of the opera companies in the UK, Vivian Coates has spent much of his career in Ireland nurturing young Irish talent on stage and guiding them on their first professional rung of the ladder. He has presented countless fully staged operas in Ireland through his company Lyric Opera, and is recognised for the tireless work he has done in keeping core opera alive in this city.
He is privileged to work across opera and musical theatre, directing and designing in most of the main theatres in Ireland; The Gaiety Theatre, Dublin, The Grand Opera House, Belfast, The National Opera House, Wexford and the National Concert Hall, Dublin. Opera productions include Aida , Il Trovatore, Don Giovanni, Hansel und Gretel, I Due Foscari, La Traviata, Carmen, Nabucco, Macbeth, La Bohéme. Turandot, Suor Angelica, The Turn of the Screw, Rusalka, Cavalleria Rusticana, Madama Butterfly and Attila among others. His musical theatre credits include Annie, The Sound of Music, Oliver!, Fiddler on the Roof, Carousel, 9 to 5, Camelot and many more.
Mr. Coates has received many international accolades for his work. In 2007 he was honoured with a Knighthood and title of Cavaliere by the Italian Government for his work in presenting Italian opera in Ireland. In 2015 he designed for The Music of Northern Ireland, which received 4 EMMY’S in the 2016 roll of honour. And his recent productions with The 2018 International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival in Harrogate UK played to extraordinary acclaim, garnering five star reviews.
Recent productions include Sweeney Todd (The National Opera House), La Bohème,
Il Barbiere di Siviglia and Fidelio (NCH). Future productions include The Barber of Seville and The Sound of Music.
Director/Designer
Jack Redman
Jack Redman
Jack is a freelance pianist, singer and composer based in London. He recently completed a masters in piano accompaniment at the Royal Academy of Music, studying with Michael Dussek and James Baillieu. Graduating with a DipRAM and Regency prize, he won the Marjorie Thomas Art of Song Prize in competition. A thoroughly rewarding two years at the Academy produced many highlights with some extremely talented soloists. He has earned a place on the Oxford Lieder Young Artist’s programme with soprano Clara Orif, performed as part of the Academy’s Song Circle, and performed at Wigmore Hall with trombonist Isobel Daws.
Jack has acted as repetiteur for a range of productions, most recently Werther and Madama Butterfly for Lyric Opera Ireland, and elsewhere with productions of Carmen, L’enfant et les sortilèges, and Adam Gorb’s 2018 opera The Path to Heaven. He also sings professionally for choirs and opera chorus, including under Carlo Rizzi for Opera Rara’s performance of Mercadante’s Il Proscritto at the Barbican, and as a member of the Voices of St Martin-in-the-Fields.