Tenor Matthew
White recently made
critically acclaimed
debuts as Roméo
in Gounod’s Roméo
et Juiliette with Cincinnati
Opera and
Pinkerton in Puccini’s
Madama Butterfly
with the Princeton
Festival.
This season he performs
the Duke in
Verdi’s Rigoletto with
Edmonton Opera, the tenor soloist in Stravinsky’s
Pulcinella with Dallas Opera, Rodolfo in La bohème
with Opera Naples, and a return as B.F. Pinkerton in
Madama Butterfly with Tulsa Opera.
A recent graduate of Philadelphia’s prestigious
Academy of Vocal Arts, White performed Roméo
in Roméo et Juliette, the title role in Massenet’s
Werther, Roberto in Puccini’s Le Villi, Edgardo in Lucia
di Lammermoor, Avito in Montemezzi’s L’amore
THE FLORIDA OR 50 CHESTRA | 2019-2020
dei tre re, and Faust in Lili Boulanger’s Faust et Helene.
He made his debut with Opera Maine as Rinuccio
in Gianni Schicchi and has appeared with Palm
Beach Opera and Vero Beach Opera. Concert credits
include performances with the New Jersey Festival
Orchestra, Ocean City Pops, and Longfellow Chorus
Festival.
He was selected to compete in the 2019 Operalia
Competition in Prague and awarded the Grand
Prize of the Gerda Lissner International Vocal Competition,
first place in the Deborah Voigt International
Vocal Competition, second place in the Metropolitan
Opera Mid-Atlantic region, Grand Prize in
the Mario Lanza Vocal Competition, and the Encouragement
Award from the George London Foundation.
He is also the recipient of the Alfonso Cavaliere
Award. He has participated in the training programs
of Bel Canto at Caramoor, PORTopera, and Seagle
Music Colony.
A trained violinist, White is an avid surfer and runs
his own surfboard business, which currently has clients
around the world.
John Brancy’s
intense musicality
and communicative
power place him
among the finest
of baritones of his
generation. Hailed
by The New York
Times as “a vibrant,
resonant presence,”
Brancy won first
prize in the Art
Song Division of
the 2018 Concours
Musical International de Montreal, a win that
recognized him as a premiere interpreter of art
song repertoire in our time. The New Jersey
native also won first prize in the 2018 Lotte Lenya
Competition in New York, second prize at the
2017 Wigmore Hall Competition in London, and
prior to that, the media prize in the 2017 Belvedere
International Singing Competition in Moscow
and first prize in the Jensen Foundation Vocal
Competition in 2015. He is also a past winner of the
Marilyn Horne Song Competition and the Sullivan
Foundation grand prize.
Brancy recently debuted with the Los Angeles
Philharmonic (Meredith Monk’s Atlas) and San
Francisco Opera (Billy Budd) and looks forward to
premiering a new work by Michael Gandolfi with
the Boston Symphony. Also on his schedule are
performances of Messiah for the US Naval Academy
and The Florida Orchestra, Jonathan Dove’s Flight
for Pacific Opera Victoria, Brahms’ Deutsches
Requiem in Bordeaux and Puccini’s Messa di Gloria
with the Rundfunkchor of Berlin. He has also been
engaged by Semperoper Dresden, Paris’s Théâtre
du Chatelet, Florida Grand Opera, Carmel Bach
Festival, San Francisco Symphony, Oper Frankfurt,
Opera de Lorraine, Carnegie Hall, the Carmel Bach
Festival and the Oratorio Society and Musica Sacra
in New York. An alumnus of The Juilliard School in
New York, Brancy has toured extensively with his
collaborator, pianist Peter Dugan; they will receive
their Wigmore Hall recital debut in fall of 2020.
Tenor
JOHN BRANCY
Baritone