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Jamie Barton
Ian Stones
Clare Erskine
“The voice is rich, generous and vibrant, big but beautifully controlled, impeccably smooth throughout its range. It’s the sort of instrument you could listen to all day, in any sort of repertoire”
(Hugo Shirley, Gramophone)
Jamie Barton’s iconic career was launched with her double victory (First and Song Prize) at the 2013 BBC Cardiff Singer of the World Competition. The Richard Tucker Award in 2015 and Metropolitan Opera’s Beverly Sills Artist Award in 2017 followed, and she has since established her position as one of the finest mezzo-sopranos in the world. A trailblazer for inclusion and diversity in the arts, she made history — and raised the rainbow flag — at the Last Night of the Proms 2019 which was broadcast worldwide on television and on BBC Radio 3, conducted by Sakari Oramo.
A favourite at the Metropolitan Opera, Barton’s notable appearances have included Eboli in their new production of Don Carlos, Mère Marie (Les Dialogues de Carmelites), the title role in Gluck’s Orfeo, Elisabetta (Maria Stuarda), Adalgisa (Norma), and this season as Azucena (Il trovatore) in David McVicar’s production under Daniele Callegari. Barton’s remarkable artistry has been recognised on the most prestigious European stages in recent seasons, including her return to Royal Opera House, Covent Garden as Azucena in Adele Thomas’ new production of Il trovatore under Sir Antonio Pappano and reprising her formidable Brangäne (Tristan und Isolde) at Bayerische Staatsoper under Juraj Valčuha. Previously, she sang Azucena (Il trovatore) for her debut at Bayerische Staastoper under Asher Fisch, Eboli (Don Carlo) at Deutsche Oper, Berlin under Roberto Rizzi-Brignoli, Amneris (Aida) under Isabel Rubio at Teatro Real, Madrid, and Brangäne (Tristan und Isolde) at the Festival d’Aix en Provence in a new production by Simon Stone under Sir Simon Rattle which was broadcast and streamed worldwide on Arte. This season Jamie makes her anticipated house and role debut as Baba the Turk (The Rake’s Progress) for Opéra National de Paris under Susanna Mälkki.
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In concert, Barton has collaborated with major conductors including Marin Alsop for both Brahms’ Alto Rhapsody with Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment in her BBC Proms debut and Bernstein’s Symphony No.1 for her London Symphony Orchestra debut, both Sir Andrew Davis and Sir Antonio Pappano for Verdi’s Messa da Requiem with Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, and James Gaffigan for Mahler’s Symphony No.2 at Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía. Recent concert highlights include Jamie’s return to Valencia for her first performance of Wesendonck Lieder under James Gaffigan, Mahler’s Symphony No.8 with Orchestre de Paris under Daniel Harding, her first Waldtaube (Gurrelieder) with Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks under Sir Simon Rattle, and her return to the BBC Proms for Rückert Lieder with BBC Symphony Orchestra under Dalia Stasevska. Selected highlights in the upcoming season include Das Lied von der Erde with Danish National Symphony Orchestra under Fabio Luisi, Gurrelieder with the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester and Alan Gilbert, La Damnation de Faust with Gulbenkian Orchestra under Hannu Lintu, and The Dream of Gerontius with WDR Sinfonieorchester and Cristian Măcelaru.
Continuing to challenge the idea of identity and gender, Barton has drawn crowds with programmes led by female composers at London’s Wigmore Hall, New York’s Carnegie Hall, Tanglewood Festival, Zankel Hall, the Celebrity Series in Boston, Matinée Musicale Cincinnati, and at the Kennedy Center in Washington as part of Renée Fleming’s VOICES series. Her latest CD release, Unexpected Shadows, with Jake Heggie is a celebration of powerful, exceptional women and was released by Pentatone to unanimous critical acclaim. This season Jamie returns to the Wigmore Hall to present a new programme in collaboration with James Baillieu.
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“…the mezzo-soprano stole the show. Jamie Barton has the privilege of delivering one of the work’s highlights. She especially has a superb projection that supported her wonderful phrasing.”
“Jamie Barton delivers in a few sentences a lesson in singing both through the depth of her bass and the roundness of her upper midrange”
“Jamie Barton in the role of Azucena, is an unequivocal tour de force. Her voice is considerably skilled and beautifully toned. Her lower register is utterly sumptuous, almost baritonal. She unquestionably cements her position as one of the finest mezzo-sopranos in the world. Moreover, her dramatic skills are exemplary and her portrayal of a tortured, anguished, and haunted old woman was utterly spellbinding. Her pain was palpable. This is a role she first sang in 2015 and she clearly knows her way around the living hell of this character. Her “Stride la vampa!” sets out her credentials as a woman on the edge of derangement, but her fourth act duet and interactions with Manrico, especially in the duet “Madre, non dormi?” is most evocative. She presents a battled, weary, and vulnerable tormented soul.”
“But the night belongs to mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton, a Cardiff Singer of the World winner and Last Night of the Proms artist with a big personal following. She is hugely impressive as the singular Azucena, unhinged by grief and guilt, yet making this role more musical than mad, which is not always the case.”
“Jamie Barton finds depth of expression in Azucena’s every line.”
“It’s a great role for American mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton and she sang the living crap out of it. Her character has been to hell and back and is properly haunted. Barton’s mezzo has a juicy bite and a fierce chest register – her cry of “Parola orrenda” at the word “stake” was terrifying and is probably still reverberating around the auditorium right now.”
“A source of strength here is Mother Marie, sung with restraint by Jamie Barton, who wisely kept her sizable voice under wraps, except at climactic moments, as when urging Blanche to be courageous.”
“[As Léonor] Barton sang with rich, round tone and tapered her powerful, wide-ranging mezzo-soprano for some lovely diminuendos and pianissimos. Like her colleagues she threw in an extra high note here and a modest embellishment there and acted with dignity and poise, no mean feat in this production.”
“Restraint also marked Jamie Barton’s voluptuously sung Orfeo, which was convincing in conveying the hero’s anguish yet also had an admirable dignity. Wisely, she shied away from overt displays of volume, especially in chest voice. Her ‘Che farò’ was moving and she varied the aria’s close to make it sound less ordinary”
‘Both musicians think big and presented Haydn’s Arianna a Naxos with an almost Straussian weight and pace. This was a moment as significant in its way as Mirga Grazinyte-Tyla’s debut with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra: uninhibited
and fully focused.’
‘She has the gift of communicating music simply and directly, without phoniness or hauteur.’
‘There’s her voice, the kind of sumptuous velvet-and-steel mezzo-soprano that fills an auditorium seemingly as easily as opening the mouth, used with sharp intelligence.’
‘Hers is a voice in a million, full, flexible and even throughout the range, rich in colours and needle-sharp in projection.’
“Jamie Barton was a cackling, sarcastic Ježibaba”
“It was Barton’s night. Her characterful Bizet, Saint-Saëns and Verdi arias were followed by a tender Over the Rainbow and rambunctious I Got Rhythm.”
“A big success was scored by this year’s star guest, American mezzo Jamie Barton. As well as singing Bizet and Saint-Saëns with a gloriously rich voice, and bringing tears to the eyes with Over the Rainbow, she waved her own flag for bisexuality – literally so at the end, when she picked up a huge Pride flag and went off holding it aloft.”
“Jamie Barton led the cast as Sister Helen Prejean. For Barton it was a role debut, a genuine tour de force”
“[in Haydn’s Arianna a Naxos] She essayed the tragic emotions of the final aria in her glorious, richly coloured lower register, while delivering the concluding presto with blazing intensity…Acerba voluttà from Adriana Lecouvreur was sung with fiery authority and supreme technical command…it was a powerful reminder that Barton is a natural creature of the operatic stage and one of its brightest stars.”
“Jamie Barton’s portrayal of Fricka was brilliantly purposeful and vocally commanding. Her flamboyant mezzo-soprano, with its inky depths and flickering hues, rendered the character as guardian of legal integrity.”
“Barton’s dramatic performance, vivid and arresting with a profusion of expressive facial gestures, infused her character with sympathy, warmth, awkwardness, sorrow, and strength”
“She delivers powerful, show-stopping singing as Azucena, capturing the variously crazed, forlorn facets of this conflicted character”
“Jamie Barton deployed her opulent mezzo-soprano to eloquent effect as Fricka, the Second Norn and the Götterdämmerung Waltraute.”
“Splendid mezzo Jamie Barton as Sara, the Duchess of Nottingham, meltingly and sweetly expresses her guilt-ridden love for dashing Roberto Devereux”
“A performance rich in pathos and cloaked in the thickly upholstered vocal colours that make her singing so irresistible.”
“Splendid mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton, as Sara, Duchess of Nottingham, meltingly and sweetly expresses her guilt-ridden love for dashing Roberto Devereux, Earl of Essex.”
“As Sara, Jamie Barton deployed her velvety, richly-coloured mezzo with beauty and urgency to limn the character’s desire and anguish.”
“Near flawless singing and acting…a warm, round, mellow mezzo voice with great resonance.”
“The role of Sara is almost pure bel canto, and Barton’s floating melodic lines was nonpareil.”
“Jamie Barton’s Eboli was a vocal and dramatic powerhouse.”
“Jamie Barton was a molten-voiced goddess…[she] brought verve and tonal warmth to the role of Fricka”
“Jamie Barton brought power, nuance and beauty to Fricka, Waltraute, and the Second Norn, particularly her hurt, yet commanding, Walküre Fricka. That performance single-handedly raised the heat level on stage.”
“Jamie Barton proves she has vocal balls of steel, delivering a Fricka of power and considerable subtlety…The voice is creamy, but when the top notes fly, the audience is pinned to their seats.”
“The fiery Princess Eboli is portrayed with appropriate tempestuousness and sly humour by mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton. Ms Barton’s resonant deeper tones transitioned easily and swiftly into a thrilling and shimmering upper register. Ms Barton’s aria “O don fatale” was an act of vocal mastery that left the audience enthralled and mesmerised by her sheer artistic brilliance. During this aria, Ms Barton made fluid transitions from one mood to another with a panoply of interpretation that was nothing short of breathtaking.”
“Jamie Barton was the best [of the cast], and the star of the evening, elevating the mezzo role of Princess Eboli from vengeful femme fatale to a wounded but sympathetic courtier, both perpetrator and victim of the palace’s sexual intrigue. Her Veil Song was coy and sultry, and the showstopping “O don fatale” was a magnificent study in how an unhinged mind can still gather itself to a moral purpose.”
“With her sumptuous sound and innate feeling for expressive colour, the marvellous Ms Barton excelled as Adalgisa. She captured the novice’s panicked confusion to find herself caught in a romantic triangle. Yet during impassioned passages Ms Barton’s smouldering singing made clear that this outwardly meek character is a bundle of yearning.”
“Fortunately, Norma’s emotional journey is supported by mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton, in fine voice as the novice priestess Adalgisa. The women’s duets, in particular “Mira o Norma”, provide the most thrilling and memorable moments.”
“[the orchestra] made way for a terrifically impassioned Jamie Barton to sing verses from the book of Jeremiah.”
“Jamie Barton, in magnificently imposing voice”
“Jamie Barton, making her LSO debut, wrapped her dark, glowing mezzo around the Hebrew texts warmly, drawing a fine balance between grief and nobility.”
“Jamie Barton delivered the climactic Lamentation, her rich mezzo alternately oracular and caressing”
“Leonor’s aria “O mon Fernand” roused the audience, [and] Barton achieved the high point of the night, in an interpretation full of personality, quality, variety of expression, authority in the extremes of the registers, and daring assurance.”
“her voice shines most in the higher range, and in her much applauded debut at the Real – and in this particular opera – she has left an unbeatable impression.”
“Jamie Barton stole the show with top-notch singing and vibrant acting. Her sumptuous mezzo is based on a solid centre, with fresh colours and a beautiful, quick vibrato, crowned with powerful high notes. She does not just live off these natural gifts but she strives for technical excellence, displaying nuanced and contrasted phrasing, always coloured with a rich palette and by exciting chest notes. In the ecstatic “O mon Fernand” she showed how well she can control her voice with extraordinary piano singing and smooth legato.”
“Debuting with an already fully developed interpretation, the justly deserved standout among the cast was the American mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton, who offered a magnificent Leonor. She has a big, velvety voice with an extensive range, but that’s also delicate, with an attractive timbre and impeccable placement…All this was on stupendous display in her interpretation of Leonor’s grand scena in the second act, “O mon Fernand””
“Jamie Barton was the rich-voiced Fricka”
“Anyone who watched Jamie Barton sail serenely to victory at 2013’s Cardiff Singer of the World competition will know what a fine signer she is. This debut recital from Delos only underlines the fact. The voice is rich, generous and vibrant, big but beautifully controlled, impeccably smooth throughout its range. It’s the sort of instrument you could listen to all day, in any sort of repertoire. She’s an intelligent, sensitive musician too, and evidently a good programme-builder, here offering Dvorak and Sibelius to complement her Mahler. It’s all extremely impressive…The disc’s highlight is the Sibelius, in which the mezzo pours her heart into grand, soaring accounts of some of the composer’s most seductive songs…This really is an exciting talent, and a terrific disc.”
“Wotan’s wife Fricka is a weighty figure in the first leg of the Ring cycle, and Jamie Barton was a perfect match for the role, commanding respect with her presence alone. Barton possesses a powerful mezzo-soprano that she can fashion to fit various demands, summoning up a hard amber sound when she needed to project authority, and finding a much softer, more lyrical note in her lamentations.”
“In fact, Wagner’s characters all feel human here. Fricka, Wotan’s wife, sung with molten tone by Jamie Barton, isn’t the traditional harridan, but sober and wounded.”
“Jamie Barton complemented [Eric Owens] as a solid, sensual Fricka”
“A gorgeous [recital disc] debut from the 2013 Cardiff Singer of the World. Her rich soulful mezzo draws out Mahler’s dark colours and soars in Sibelius’s snowy miniatures.”
“Jamie Barton sang opulently as the witch Jezibaba.”
“The real marvel of the cast was Jamie Barton, who was absolutely sensational as the sorceress Jezibaba. Her voice was a wonder in itself, a full, shady mezzo with harrowing power, and fierce fire in her chest. Of everyone in the cast, she had the most success in navigating the cartoonish aesthetic of the production, hamming it up just enough to embrace the comic elements of the role, but never forgetting its essential darkness. Barton brings tremendous presence to the stage, coupled here with a specific and deliciously wicked vocal characterization.”
“Barton is wickedly devious as Jezibaba.”
“Jamie Barton gobbled the lusty-nasty-witchy flailings of Jezibaba.”
“As the crusty witch Jezibaba, mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton dug into her lower range with some dramatically appropriate guttural effects…[but] maintained grace and musicality no matter how nasty her sentiments.”
“Jamie Barton’s devilish Jezibaba was the highlight. Surrounded by half-human, half-animal henchmen, Barton brought such electric charisma that it was hard not to find affection for the wily sorceress.”
“Russell Thomas, a tenor of gorgeously burnished power, and Jamie Barton, whose mezzo pours out like lava, are luxury casting as the star-crossed lovers, Ismaele and Fenena.”
“A mezzo-soprano from the Deep South, she has already made her mark at the Met and Covent Garden, and her Wigmore Hall debut was ecstatically acclaimed…Barton has excellent technique, evenly spanning a cavernous lower register and a gleaming top; her breath control is apparently effortless, she sings perfectly in tune. There’s something about Marilyn Horne about the silver sheen and focus of the tone, but the voice is bigger and broader than Horne’s, and more than capable of firing the big guns demanded by Verdi and Wagner. She is also a born communicator, smiley and chatty and radiating infectious pleasure in the glorious noise she makes.”
“The mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton, whose voice is majestically plush yet somehow always articulate, even conversational, made much of Elizabeth’s hurt and dignity.”
“What a voice…a true force of nature. Her mezzo is rich, smooth, creamy, voluminous, even up and down the scale, and used with style, taste and musicality.”
“Glimmerglass cast it powerfully, with Jamie Barton in redoubtable vocal form”
“Making her Royal Opera debut as Nabucco’s true daughter, the American mezzo Jamie Barton uncovered a good deal more in Fenena, impressing with her warmth and richness of tone matched by a purposeful line and convincing dramatic engagement.”
“But this Fenena was Cardiff Singer of the World in 2013 and the winner of last year’s Richard Tucker Award, the redoubtable Jamie Barton in her Royal Opera debut. This was luxury casting indeed, affording the extraordinary pleasure of watching and listening as, in the finale of first act, each ‘sister’ anchored opposite sides of the stage and soared over the ensemble.”
“Jamie Barton is a first-rate Fenena”
“The mezzo Jamie Barton (in her house debut) was strong as Adalgisa, possessing an even bigger sound than [her Norma]; that said, they worked well together and their voices blended in a particularly sonorous way.”
“Jamie Barton [was] mellifluous [as] Fenena. Barton’s Act 4 preghiera was arguably the most touching piece of singing all evening.”
“Jamie Barton was Giovanna Seymour, singing with a well-placed, resonant mezzo of notable beauty.”
“As Norma’s acolyte, Adalgisa, Jamie Barton made her L.A. Opera debut…providing an indelible demonstration of why the young mezzo-soprano has become the latest darling of the American opera scene. Her sound is the darkly creamy lager tha poured forth from altos of yore. Yet she displays the craft of a superior modern singer, which includes accuracy of intonation, alertness to rhythm and fine articulation.”
“Mezzo-soprano Barton brought a luscious tone and caressing phrasing to the part of Adalgisa.”
“Her voice exuded a buttery warmth and sumptuous tone.”
“Her Adalgisa was Jamie Barton, a mezzo with a burnished sound that was an impressive fit…it is an exciting and singular sound.”
“[Anna Bolena] had a splendid foil and partner in the voluptuous-voiced mezzo Jamie Barton as Giovanna Seymour…their revelation scene in Act II was a thrilling high point of the evening.”
“[Anna Bolena] had a splendid foil and partner in the voluptuous-voiced mezzo Jamie Barton as Giovanna Seymour…their revelation scene in Act II was a thrilling high point of the evening.”
“The superb mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton sings Giovanna (Jane)…[her] sumptuous voice has utterly unforced carrying power. In head-to-head exchanges with Anna, Ms. Barton’s Giovanna held her own, trading fiery phrases and bursts of skittish passagework. Yet she was even more affecting during tender moments…[where she] demonstrated how to send a long-lined Donizetti phrase wafting through the house. At 33, she seems poised for greatness.”
“by the time the crucial Act II duet with Boleyn came around, [Barton raised] the emotional stakes for her and her counterpart to dizzying heights. There was urgent passion in her singing, and blooming sighs in her pleas for forgiveness, making this duet the electric highlight that it should be in every performance of this piece.”
“Vocal finesse shone from the Alto Rhapsody too, thanks to the wonderful American mezzo Jamie Barton. That joyfully dark, voluptuous and steady voice sucked us in from the first worried note to the last breath of emollient calm.”
“Her Brahms singing [at the Cardiff Singer of the World competition in 2013] marked her out as an important interpreter of his music, an impression confirmed by her Proms performance of the Alto Rhapsody…Where some interpreters ramp up the angst, Barton was notably restrained: the only moment of overt passion came, tellingly, in the heft with which she uttered the statement that “human hatred” has forced Brahms’s traveller from his path. Elsewhere, the noble beauty of the sound was breathtaking.”
“Jamie Barton, an international prizewinner of considerable renown, is dazzling as Fenena, with a showstopper Act IV aria that displayed the lyricism and agility of this remarkable voice.”
“Jamie Barton’s passionate portrayal of Fenena [was impressive]…Her prayer in Part Four was a highlight.”
“Internationally acclaimed recipient of the 2015 Richard Tucker Award, mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton gave an excellent performance…and stole the show.”
“Jamie Barton was again a ripe-toned Fricka”
“peerless mezzo Jamie Barton [portrays] everything about the character of Fricka in that bathed-in-fire voice”
“With her warmth, sly sense of playfulness and a voice that just won’t quit, Barton held the audience captive…Her programme showed off many of the qualities that won her the Main and Song Prizes at the 2013 BBC Cardiff Singer of the World competition: velvet tone, a clear focus and huge range and, perhaps most importantly, the joy of singing…particularly compelling Dvorak’s suite of “Gypsy Songs,” which displayed Barton’s ability to switch styles and feeling without sacrificing the group’s cohesiveness; she soared ecstatically in “When my old mother taught me to sing,” bringing out the poignancy and yearning in her voice.”
“During her recital debut at Zankel Hall, she exuded immense likability and down-to-earth charm…The program, featuring songs in Spanish, French, German and Czech, as well as the world premiere of Jake Heggie’s three-song cycle “The Work at Hand,” showcased Ms. Barton’s versatility…Ms. Barton’s voluptuous voice, dusky and scintillating, with each note animated by an interplay of richly shaded overtones, was well served by the Chausson selections. Here, the languidly unfolding melodies created sufficient space for her to play with a mesmerizing array of tone colors. In “Hébé,” she was able to thin out her voice on the final word, “divin,” in a way that maintained its lustrous sheen. The broody melancholy of “Le temps des lilas” (“The Time of Lilacs”) made the most of her dark low register.”