Megan Moore, Mezzo-Soprano, Performs World Premiere of Jake Heggie Work at George & Nora London Foundation Recital on April 6

Megan Moore, photo by Dario Acosta

 

On Sunday, April 6, at 4:00 pm, mezzo-soprano Megan Moore, a 2022 George London Award winner, will perform the world premiere of a new three-song cycle by Jake Heggie at a recital presented by the George and Nora London Foundation for Singers at The Morgan Library & Museum. The work, titled Crossing Borders, has text adapted by Gene Scheer based upon the WWII diaries of Nora London, telling the dramatic story of her family’s escape from France to America when she was 16 years old.

 

Crossing Borders was commissioned by the foundation to mark the 30^th anniversary of its recital series featuring recent George London Award winners, which was inaugurated in 1995 by Renée Fleming.

 

Joined by pianist Francesco Barfoed, Megan will also perform Rossini’s three-song cycle La regata veneziana (The Venetian Regatta); Prokofiev’s Five Poems, Op. 27 (text by Anna Akhmatova); selections by Barbara Strozzi and Rachmaninoff; and Mahler’s four-song cycle Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen (Songs of a Wayfarer). Full program details follow below.

 

Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer have worked together frequently in both opera and song; among their collaborations are the opera Moby-Dick (currently at the Metropolitan Opera) and the song cycle Camille Claudel: Into the Fire, which was premiered by Joyce DiDonato and the Alexander String Quartet.

 

Cincinnati native Megan Moore has received critical acclaim from The Observer, which praised her “genuinely beautiful voice” and “rich, buttery mezzo tone.” When she made her Seattle Opera debut in May 2024, in The Barber of Seville, the Seattle Times said, “Megan Moore as Rosina delivers teenage sass with her vocal fireworks.” Of her performance in Handel’s Julius Caesar with Opera Theatre of Saint Louis last summer, Opera Today said, “As Cornelia’s son, Sextus, mezzo-soprano Megan Moore triumphed as a hot headed young man who was capable of spitting out unerring spot-on cascades of mellifluous phrases, and then prove equally successful at scaling back her striking, pulsating delivery to embody meltingly beautiful heartbreak and loss. The wonderfully wedded introspective duet between Cornelia and Sextus has rarely been heard to better effect.”

 

George London and the George and Nora London Foundation for Singers

George London (1920-1985) was one of the greatest opera stars of the 20th century, who blazed a trail for American singers on the international stage and created some of the most indelible interpretations of prominent bass-baritone roles. In his later years, he devoted much of his time and energy to the support and nurturing of young singers, in partnership with his wife, Nora. Since 1971, the foundation’s annual competition has given more than 300 awards, and a total of more than $2 million, to an outstanding roster of young American and Canadian opera singers who have gone on to international stardom – the list of past winners includes Joyce DiDonato, Renée Fleming, Christine Goerke, Ryan Speedo Green, Catherine Malfitano, James Morris, Eric Owens, Dimitri Pittas, Matthew Polenzani, Sondra Radvanovsky, Neil Shicoff, Dawn Upshaw, and Willard White, to name just a few.  As The New York Times noted, “this prestigious competition … can rightfully claim to act as a springboard for major careers in opera.” See the full list of George London Award winners: https://www.georgeandnoralondon.org/competition.html

 

In addition to the annual competition, the George and Nora London Foundation also presents a recital series to give grantees exposure and experience, and, in many cases, a New York recital debut. The foundation also awards scholarships to promising high school students attending the pre-college program of The Juilliard School, a program now in its 12th year.

www.georgeandnoralondon.org

 

Megan Moore

Lyric coloratura mezzo-soprano Megan Moore is quickly garnering attention as an artist of versatility and depth in the repertoire of Rossini, Handel, and Mozart. During the 2024-25 season, she made her Boston Baroque debut in the title role of Handel’s Ariodante with Music Director Martin Pearlman on the podium. She makes her South American debut at Teatro Municipal de Santiago in Rossini’s Stabat Mater led by Evelino Pidò in March. She also returned to the roster of the Metropolitan Opera to cover the main role of Jess in Jeanine Tesori’s new opera Grounded conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin, as well as Rosina in Bartlett Sher’s madcap production of Il Barbiere di Siviglia under the baton of Giacomo Sagripanti. She made her debut with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s in New York City singing works of Freya Waley-Cohen, Matthew Aucoin, and Henry Purcell, and sang the role of Beylke in Alex Weiser and Stephanie Fleischmann’s Tevye’s Daughters with the American Lyric Theater.

 

Recent awards include Young Concert Artists International Auditions, the Jensen Foundation Vocal Competition, Zenith Opera Competition, National Society of Arts & Letters Voice Award, and the Copenhagen Lied Duo Competition (with Francesco Barfoed). She has also taken top honors from the Naumburg Foundation International Vocal Competition in Concert Repertoire, the Gerda Lissner Lieder & Song Competition, and the James Toland Vocal Arts Competition.

 

Ms. Moore is co-founder of Lynx Project, which amplifies diverse voices through new song commissions, inclusive concerts, and educational programming. Since its founding five years ago, Lynx Project has commissioned over four hours of new music through its Amplify Series, which sets texts by youth with non-verbal autism. A native of Cincinnati, Ohio, Ms. Moore received her training at Miami University, Eastman School of Music, Internationale Meistersinger Akademie, Santa Fe Opera and The Juilliard School. www.meganmooremezzo.com

 

 

Sunday, April 6, 2025, at 4:00 pm

The Morgan Library & Museum

George and Nora London Foundation Recital

MEGAN MOORE, Mezzo-Soprano

Francesco Barfoed, Piano

 

BARBARA STROZZI                          “L’Eraclito amoroso”

 

GIOACHINO ROSSINI                      La regata veneziana

                                                                “Anzoleta avanti la regata”

                                                                “Anzoleta co passa la regata”

                                                                “Anzoleta dopo la regata”

 

SERGEI PROKOFIEV                         Five Poems, Op. 27

                                                                “The sun has filled my room”

                                                                “True tenderness”

                                                                “Memory of the sun”

                                                                “Greetings”

                                                                “The grey-eyed king”

 

SERGEI RACHMANINOFF              Selections from Six Romances, Op. 38

                                                                “The dream”

                                                                “A-oo”

 

GUSTAV MAHLER                             Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen (Songs of a Wayfarer)

                                                                “Wenn mein Schatz Hochzeit macht”
                                                                “Ging heut morgen übers Feld”

                                                                “Ich hab’ ein glühend Messer”

                                                                “Die zwei blauen Augen von meinem Schatz »

 

JAKE HEGGIE                                      Crossing Borders: Passages from Nora Schapiro’s Diary

(1940-1943)

“Suitcases” (Paris)

“Crossing borders” (Lisbon)

“To my diary” (New York)

World premiere

 

Tickets: $55

Tickets and information: https://www.georgeandnoralondon.org/events-and-recitals

 

 

March 3, 2025