Schubert Club Song Recitals

A renowned figure in the world of Baroque music, French soprano Sandrine Piau performs regularly with such celebrated conductors as William Christie, Philippe Herreweghe, Christophe Rousset, Gustav Leonhardt, Sigiswald Kuijken, Ton Koopman, René Jacobs, Marc Minkowski, Fabio Biondi, Michel Corboz, Josep Pons and Louis Langrée.

Ms Piau embraces both the lyric and Baroque repertoire, and performs roles such as Pamina from Mozart's Die Zauberflöte, Titania from Britten's A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Servilia from Gluck's La Clemenza di Tito.

Previous engagements have taken her to the Grand Théâtre de Genève to perform the role of Ismène in Mitridate, Re di Ponto. She has also been to the Théâtre des Champs Elysées to sing Pamina in Die Zauberflöte, Servilia in La Clemenza di Tito and Aennchen in Weber's Der Freischütz. At the Théâtre du Châtelet, she was Ismène, Nerine in Rameau’s Les Paladins and Wanda in Offenbach’s La Grande Duchesse de Gerolstein.

Ms Piau has been invited by Opéra National de Bordeaux to sing Titania in Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream, Teatro Lirico di Cagliari to sing Pamina, by Opéra de Montpellier, Dresden Festival to sing in Handel's Xerxes (Rousset/Hampe), Drottningholm Festival to sing Asteria in Handel's Tamerlano (Rousset/Audi) and Bayersiche Staatsoper and Opéra National de Bordeaux to sing Konstanze in Die Entführung aus dem Serail.

Recent opera projects include singing Donna Anna (Don Giovanni) and Atalanta at Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, Nanetta (Falstaff) at Grand Théatre de Bordeaux, , Sophie in Massenet's Werther at both the Capitole de Toulouse and the Théâtre du Châtelet., both Pamina and Cleopatra at La Monnaie Brussels and Titania, A Midsummer Nights Dream at the Opera National de Lyon……

Ms. Piau appears regularly in concert. In recent years she has performed at the Salzburg Festival, Covent Garden Festival and Montreux Festival, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Teatro Communale in Florence, Teatro Communale di Bologna, and with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra and Orchestre de Paris.

Sandrine Piau takes great pleasure in the art of recital. As a singer of both French and German repertoire, she has performed with many renowned recital accompanists, such as Jos van Immerseel, Myung-Whun Chung, Georges Pludermacher, Roberto Negri, Billy Eidi, David Selig, Christian Ivaldi, Alexandre Tharaud, Jérôme Hantaï and Corine Durous. Recital appearances include Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord in Paris, The Wigmore Hall and Carnegie Hall, New York.

Ms Piau has an exclusive recording contract with the record company Naïve. Her disc of Mozart Arias, accompanied by the Freiburger Barockorchester met with an extremely enthusiastic critical response and was awarded the Prix Charles Cros. Her second album on the Naïve label, Debussy Mélodies, accompanied by Jos van Imserseel, was awarded the ‘Prix Ravel’ at the Orphée Awards in Paris. Handel’s Arias Seria with Christophe Rousset and Les Talens Lyriques was awarded Editor’s Choice by Gramophone in January 2005 and won the Stanley Sadie Handel Recording Prize 2005.

In 2008, she released a Franco-German recital programme entitled “Evocations” based on texts making reference to women in the third person. It was again awarded Editors Choice by Gramophone and “Diamant d’Opéra” by Opera Magazine. Ms. Piau gave her Carnegie Hall debut recital based on this disc. The New York Times wrote ‘superb French soprano sang with a clear and deeply expressive voice, nuanced phrasing and immaculate control’. This recital was followed by a series of recitals across Europe.

2009 saw two new Handel recordings in her continued collaboration with Naïve. The first an eclectic selection of duets with the contralto Sara Mingardo; and the second, Between Heaven and Earth, met with popular and critical acclaim (MIDEM Classical Album of the Year 2010).

In 2010-2011, Sandrine Piau sings in L’Incoronazione di Poppea in Köln, in La Finta Giardiniera (Sandrina) at la Monnaie Brussels and gives several recitals including Wigmore Hall.

Sandrine Piau’s star is on the rise. Hers is the bewitching soprano from the hit film HOME. Recently Sandrine was awarded the Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres from the French Ministry of Culture and 2009 she received the ‘Opera Singer of the Year’ award at Les Victoires de la Musique awards.

Paul Appleby is a third-year member of the Metropolitan Opera’s Lindemann Young Artist Development Program and a 2011 winner of the Richard Tucker Career Grant and the George London Foundation Award. A recipient of an Artist Diploma from the Opera Studies Program at the Juilliard School of Music, he recently performed the role of Jenik in The Bartered Bride in a co-production between the Metropolitan Opera and the Juilliard School conducted by James Levine and directed by Stephen Wadsworth.

Highlights of the past include a Metropolitan Opera debut as Brighella in Ariadne auf Naxos under the baton of Fabio Luisi, Agenore in Il Re Pastore with Opera Theatre of St. Louis under the baton of Jean-Marie Zeitouni, Lysander in A Midsummer Night’s Dream conducted by Steven Osgood at Wolf Trap Opera, and, with the Juilliard Opera, the Chevalier de la Force in Dialogues des Carmélites under the baton of Anne Manson, Martin in Copland’s The Tender Land conducted by David Effron, and Fenton in Falstaff conducted by Keri-Lynn Wilson. The artist has performed Gomatz in Zaïde first at Wolf Trap Opera conducted by Gary Thor Wedow and then at Carnegie Hall with Ensemble ACJW conducted David Robertson.

On the concert stage, Paul Appleby has made his European debut in a performance of Haydn’s Die Schöpfung at the Wolfegg Festival under the baton of Manfred Honeck and a Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra debut in Bach’s St. Matthew Passion conducted by James Conlon at the May Festival. Other recent debuts include a program of Schubert and Haydn with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra conducted by Thomas Zehetmair, and Beethoven's Christus am Ölberge with Kent Tritle on the Sacred Music in a Sacred Space series at the Church of St. Ignatius Loyola, New York.

Mr. Appleby continues to perform extensively with pianist Steven Blier and the New York Festival of Song and recently presented the world premiere of Beautiful Ohio, a song cycle written for the artist by Pulitzer nominee Harold Meltzer. He has performed recitals at the Kennedy Center under the auspices of the Vocal Arts Society, for the Marilyn Horne Foundation, the Aspen Music Festival, the Caramoor Festival, Music@Menlo, the Judith Raskin memorial concert, the Joy in Singing Foundation, and A Prairie Home Companion, and has recently made an Alice Tully Hall recital debut in a performance of Schubert’s Die Schöne Müllerin accompanied by Brian Zeger.

Engagements of the present season include a return to the Metropolitan Opera as Demetrius in the Baroque pastiche, The Enchanted Island, conducted by William Christie and directed by the team of Phelim McDermott and Julian Crouchand a European operatic debut as Tom Rakewell in The Rake’s Progress with Oper Frankfurt in a new production by Moritz Nitsche, conducted by Constantinos Carydis. Symphonic debuts include Mozart’s Mass in c minor with the New York Philharmonic conducted by Alan Gilbert and a program of opera arias with the Deutsche Radio Philharmonie Saarbrücken Kaiserslautern conducted by Christoph Poppen. The artist returns to the New York Festival of Song for programs in New York and Washington, D.C. and brings Schubert’s Die Schöne Müllerin accompanied by Brian Zeger to the Schubert Club of St. Paul and to New York’s Rockefeller University.

Mr. Appleby is a National Winner of the 2009 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and a recipient of a 2009 Sara Tucker study grant from the Richard Tucker Music Foundation. He received a Master’s Degree from Juilliard and a Bachelor’s Degree in English Literature and in Music from the University of Notre Dame.