Leah Crocetto in Recital (WNOpera)

Washington National Opera (WNO) continues its 60th anniversary season with Leah Crocetto in Recital, featuring the celebrated star of last season’s Dialogues of the Carmelites, on Friday, February 26, 2016 at 7 p.m. in the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater. Accompanied by acclaimed pianist Mark Markham, Ms. Crocetto will perform art songs by Strauss, Duparc, and Barber, as well as popular opera arias and a few of her favorite jazz standards.

Recognized as a rising star in the next generation of singers, American soprano Leah Crocetto made her WNO last season as Madame Lidoine in Poulenc’s powerful Dialogues of the Carmelites. She represented the United States at the 2011 BBC Cardiff Singer of the World Competition, where she was a finalist in the Song Competition. She is a 2010 Grand Finals winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and was the First Place Winner, People’s Choice, and the Spanish Prize Winner of the 2009 Jose Iturbi International Music Competition, and winner of the Bel Canto Foundation competition. A former Adler Fellow at San Francisco Opera, Ms. Crocetto has appeared frequently with the company, most recently in the title role of Verdi’s Luisa Miller in Francesca Zambello’s celebrated production.

In her stellar 2015-2016 season, Leah Crocetto makes two major debuts: her long-awaited Metropolitan Opera debut as Liù in Turandot, and her role debut as Semiramide in Rossini’s seldom-heard opera of the same name, with Opéra National de Bordeaux. Additional highlights of the season include Anna in Maometto II with the Canadian Opera Company and Donna Anna in Don Giovanni with Santa Fe Opera.

Last season, in addition to her debut at WNO, Ms. Crocetto performed Desdemona in Otello with English National Opera, Mimì in La bohème with San Francisco Opera, and Elisabetta di Valois in a new production of Don Carlo (a co-production with WNO) at Opera Philadelphia.

Equally at home as a soloist, a collaborator with some of the finest singers in the world, a jazz pianist, or a vocal coach, pianist Mark Markham and his interpretations have been praised by the public and press alike. Since 1995, Mr. Markham has been the recital partner of Jessye Norman, giving nearly 300 performances in over 25 countries, including recitals in Carnegie Hall, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Palau de la Música Catalana in Barcelona, London’s Royal Festival Hall, the Musikverein in Vienna, the Salzburg Festival, Bunka Kaikan in Tokyo, Mann Auditorium in Tel Aviv, the Ancient Theatre of Epidaurus in Greece, and at the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize presentation to President Jimmy Carter in Oslo. In 1990, Mr. Markham was invited to join the faculty of the Peabody Conservatory, where he served for ten years as vocal coach and professor of vocal repertoire and accompanying. He relocated to Europe for a decade, living in the South of France while maintaining a busy international schedule as a solo artist and collaborative partner with Ms. Norman, before returning to the United States in 2011. In addition to performances around the world, he maintains a vocal coaching studio in New York City and Baltimore.

Washington National Opera’s 2015-2016 season continues with the company premiere of Kurt Weill and Maxwell Anderson’s Lost in the Stars, February 12-20 in the Eisenhower Theater, and concludes with its first complete presentation of Wagner’s extraordinary four-part Ring Cycle, with a world-class cast under the direction of Francesca Zambello and featuring the WNO Orchestra conducted by WNO Music Director Philippe Auguin, April 30 to May 22, 2016. WNO’s 2016-2017 season will be announced in the coming weeks.

TICKET INFORMATION:

All tickets to Leah Crocetto in Recital are $45 and are available online, in person at the Kennedy Center Box Office, and by calling (202) 467-4600 or (800) 444-1324.