Contact:Gretchen Miller Basso
Public Relations Director
The Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra
Phone: 407/896-6700 x 223
Fax: 407/896-5512
gmiller@orlandophil.org
www.orlandophil.org
Orlando, FL – March 5, 2010 — Internationally acclaimed soprano Marquita Lister will sing the role of Bess in George Gershwin’s classic American opera, Porgy and Bess, with the Orlando Philharmonic on Friday, April 9th at 8:00 p.m. and Sunday, April 11th at 2:00 p.m. Joining her at the Bob Carr Performing Arts Centre will be Alvy Powell as Porgy. Music Director Christopher Wilkins conducts.
Considered by many to be the best ever in the role, Ms. Lister enjoyed enormous success this past summer at the Hollywood Bowl’s concert production of the Gershwin classic. Moreover, her performance as Bess in New York City Opera’s PBS broadcast of the opera prompted the prestigious opera house to award her its “Diva Award” for 2002. The Atlanta Journal Constitution, noting Ms. Lister as “tall and charismatic,” claimed her large voice matched the character’s emotional range: “…purring in the middle range, glassy on top…”
“I’ve had a long love affair with Porgy and Bess and have sung with the great Porgys of my generation, even though I came into the piece as Clara and sang 75 performances in that role,” Ms. Lister says. “It is a timeless musical journey that we still love. The music is so versatile, it can be sung in with a classical or blues jazz voice, and it’s probably the most popular American opera, with songs that are fixtures of the American songbook: Summertime, I Got Plenty O’ Nothin’, and Bess, You is My Woman Now. But it’s just one of the roles I enjoy singing in an extensive repertoire.”
Ms. Lister can be heard as Bess on the 2006 critically acclaimed Decca CD recording of The Gershwins’ Porgy & Bess that reflects the final changes made for the work’s 1935 Broadway premiere.
Also this past year, the super-soprano sang the role of Cassandre in Les Troyens at Brazil’s Teatro Amazonas Opera House, as well as the title role of Dvorak’s Rusalka at the Boston Lyric Opera, where she received both critical and popular acclaim.
Winner of the 1983 New England Regional Metropolitan Opera Auditions, Ms. Lister has attained praise for her performances of Aida, Porgy and Bess and Don Giovanni
with Berlin, Stuttgart, Houston Grand, Boston Lyric and New York City Opera.
In October of last year, Ms. Lister performed American classics for over 1,000 singers and teachers at Oklahoma City University’s (OCU) Wanda L. Bass School of Music, where she is a distinguished alumna of the year. She also sang the award-winning song cycle Life is Fine, by Edward Knight, OCU composer in residence. Ms. Lister recorded the cycle, inspired by poetry of Langston Hughes, for Albany Records.
For the past two decades, Ms. Lister has won raves for her expressive portrayals of operatic roles. She earned her graduate degree from Oklahoma City University, winning several singing competitions before joining Houston Grand Opera Studio. She went on to sing the role of the High Priestess in Wortham Theater Center’s inaugural production of Aida with Mirella Freni and Placido Domingo.
A Washington, D.C. native, the award-winning Lister has been praised by world critics for her enormous versatility. Also recognized for her poignant, precise, and intelligent technique, exquisite voice, and determination to dare the utmost of her performances, she continues to win praise as one of the world’s leading artists.
