Michael Spyres - Contra-Tenor - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

An album with a mission to defy classification, BariTenor is a tour de force for Michael Spyres. It ranges wide, encompassing repertoire normally assigned to both tenors and baritones. Programming 18 arias by 15 composers, it covers three centuries of opera in Italian, French and German, setting mainstream works beside relative rarities, and rediscovering Étienne Méhul's Ariodant, first heard in 1799. Michael Spyres has achieved renown as a multi-faceted tenor, but 'baritenor' is the term he uses to describe his voice, which balances brilliant high notes with a robust lower register. InchHaving started off as a baritone, I spent 10 years turning myself into a tenor. Voices like mine have existed as long as opera has existed, and the entire programme of this album is linked by the baritenor technique. I am making an honest attempt to explore the baritenor as a forgotten vocal phenomenon... For me, this album is more than a dream come true.Inch Joining Spyres are the Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg under it's Chief Conductor Marko Letonja, and the male singers of the chorus of the Opéra du Rhin.

Vinyl LP pressing. Heaven's Pregnant Teens is the first and only studio album by Californian punk band Some Girls. It was their last recording as a band before their break-up in 2007.

Michael Spyres is a singer who challenges and reshapes perceptions - as his albums BariTenor and Contra-Tenor have shown. Now, preparing for his debut at the Bayreuth Festival in Summer 2024, he searches In the Shadows to reveal more about Wagner and the origins of his music dramas. InchWagner evokes a varying spectrum of emotions - awe, ecstasy, even trepidation,Inch explains Spyres. InchThis album endeavours to illuminate the composers who languish in the shadows, who formed the foundation of Wagner's compositions and sculpted the framework of vocal writing for the Wagnerian tenor.Inch In the Shadows culminates with three arias by Wagner - from Lohengrin and the lesser-known Die Feen and Rienzi. Preceding them are early 19 th century arias by composers of the French, German and Italian schools Méhul, Beethoven, Rossini, Meyerbeer, Weber, Auber, Spontini, Bellini and Marschner. Spyres' distinguished companions in his exploration are the players of Les Talens Lyriques and their conductor Christophe Rousset. Michael Spyres's new album seeks to illuminate the composers who Inchlanguish in the shadowsInch those who formed the foundation for Wagner's compositions and sculpted the vocal writing framework of the Wagnerian tenor. In performing and exploring works by pre-Wagnerian composers such as Auber, Bellini, Berlioz, Mehul, Meyerbeer, Rossini, and Spontini, he shines a light on the influences that shaped Wagner into the legendary composer he became. For Michael Spyres, Mehul and Spontini laid the groundwork for Wagner's orchestral and dramatic palette; Meyerbeer, Halevy, and Rossini shaped his understanding of compositional form, overtures, and the structural nuances of storytelling. On the his most recent album, Contra-Tenor, Gramophone wrote Inch... it's an enthralling disc as one might expect, and the best of it is sensational indeed.Inch