|
|
 |
Donald E. Osborne, Director California Artists Management 564 Market Street, Suite 420, San Francisco, CA 94104-5412 415 362-2787 / fax: 415 362-2838 / Skype: calartistsdon / Email |
Susan Endrizzi Morris, Director California Artists Management P.O. Box 2479, Mendocino, CA 95460-2479 707-937-4787 / cell: 415-302-1083 / Skype: sueendrizzi / Email |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 Download Bio Download Photo Sample Video 1 Sample Video 2 Listen |
Ellen Hargis and Paul O'Dette |
Friends and colleagues for over
25 years,
Ellen Hargis and
Paul O’Dette bring an incomparable spirit of drama, vivid musical
imagination and fun to their voice and lute collaborations.
Each performer is a virtuoso in his
respective field. The artists' mutual commitment to performance practice, their
avid interest in the undiscovered, and a natural ability to communicate the
essence of this intimate repertoire make their concerts uniquely memorable. The
Duo has toured around the globe, performing to rave reviews in Japan, Russia,
Spain, France, Austria, England, Canada, and across the United States. The
Hargis / O’Dette Duo has two recordings on the Noyse Productions label, in
addition to dozens of recorded collaborations with leading American and European
early music ensembles. The Duo is featured twice in the new Norton Anthology:
the Caccini example and Dowland’s Flow my
tears.
“Soprano
Ellen Hargis is one of the outstanding Artists of our day." -
Pittsburgh Tribune
Soprano Ellen Hargis is one of North
America’s premier interpreters of 17th and 18th century music, specializing in
ballads, opera and oratorio. Called "the baroque music diva" by New Yorker
magazine, she works with the foremost period music conductors, including Harry
Bicket, Jane Glover, Paul Goodwin, Daniel Harding, Monica Huggett, Nicholas
Kraemer, Gustav Leonhardt and Andrew Parrott. She has guested with The Saint
Paul Chamber Orchestra, The Virginia Symphony, Washington Choral Arts Society,
Long Beach Opera, CBC Radio Orchestra, the Seattle and Freiburg Baroque
Orchestras, and performs with The King's Noyse, The Newberry Consort,
Tragicomedia, Piffaro, Theatre of Voices, the Mozartean Players, Fretwork and
Andrew Lawrence-King and the Harp Consort, and the Mark Morris Dance Group. Ms.
Hargis has appeared at the Berkeley Festival, the Utrecht Festival, The St.
Petersburg Early Music Festival and the Resonanzen Festival in Vienna, and she
has sung leading roles at the Boston Early Music Festival in every opera
production since 1987. Her
discography embraces medieval to contemporary music. Recent releases include
Beach’s St. Matthew Passion for
Smithsonian Records, and the lead role of
Aeglé in Lully’s Thésée as well as
Conradi’s opera Ariadne for CPO - both
nominated for Grammy Awards. Ms. Hargis was 2011-12 visiting Artist at the
Eastman School of Music, teaches voice at Case Western Reserve University, and
is Artist-in-Residence with the Newberry Consort at the University of Chicago
and Northwestern University.
"O'Dette
is the greatest living lutenist."-
Stereophile
Paul O'Dette has
been called "the clearest case of genius ever to touch his instrument." (Toronto
Globe and Mail) His performances at major international festivals are often
singled out as the highlight concert, including festivals in New York City,
Boston, Berkeley, Los Angeles, Vancouver, throughout Europe, Russia, South
America, Austraia and Japan. Best
known for his recitals and virtuoso solo lute music recordings, O'Dette
maintains an active international career as an ensemble musician, performing
with William Christie, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Jordi Savall, Christopher Hogwood,
Nicholas McGegan, Philippe Jaroussky, Andrew Parrott, Tafelmusik and Parley of
Instruments. He is a member of the acclaimed ensemble Tragicomedia.
Paul O'Dette directs Baroque orchestras on both sides of the Atlantic,
including Portland Baroque, Tafelmusik, Apollo's Fire, Chatham Baroque, Ensemble
Arion and Corona Artis. He has conducted Baroque operas at Tanglewood, the
Boston and Utrecht Early Music Festivals, the Drottningholm Court Theatre and
Festival Vancouver. Paul O’Dette has
recorded over 130 CDs, his solo recordings winning prizes and rave reviews.
Artistic Director for the Boston Early Music Festival, the first three opera
recordings he directed were each nominated for a Grammy Award.
Paul O’Dette has been Director of Early Music at the Eastman School of
Music since 1976.
Lovesick
Heartache, Jealousy, Madness, Insomnia, Death and the Cure are explored through the
Ellen Hargis, soprano / Paul O’Dette, chitarrone
Wait!
I’m singing now…..
Cantatas & chitarrone solos from the pens of 17th
century Venetian & Roman composers.
Singers and Singing: Barbara Strozzi’s hilarious cantata L’astratto, Antonio Cesti’s sarcastic Aspette! adesso canto and Alessandro Scarlatti’s extraordinary L’Orfeo expressing the voice of the legendary singer of Thrace. Kapsberger and Piccinini chitarrone solos explore the virtuoso repertoire of the 17th-century’s most prized vocal accompanying instrument.
THE POWER OF LOVE is elegant, playful and even naughty 17th century English music, taking its title from the John Wilson song. Poetry by Waller, Griffin and Carew provides lyrics for songs by composers Wilson, Henry Lawes, Charles Colman and Nicholas Lanier. (Noyse Productions CD release in 2005)
“Hargis has a pure, clarion tone. Her high notes are brilliant.”
OperaTattler.com – September
20, 2010
"Ellen Hargis, a soprano who specializes in early music, and Paul O'Dette, a
superb performer on the lute and theorbo, joined forces for "Amour,
Cruel Amour," a program that explored both the high drama and delicate
subtleties of 17th century love songs. The highlights were the
Italian songs by Luigi Rossi. Ms. Hargis' voice is attractive and nicely
supported, and she did a fine job of shaping and conveying the spirit of each of
the pieces. Mr. O'Dette was in good form as well, both in the energy and
elegance of his accompaniments and in his solo turns."
The New York Times
"Soprano Ellen Hargis' lustrous voice has the clarity and ring of fine crystal.
Lutenist Paul O'Dette's refined technique lets his delicate instrument sing with
the naturalness and ease of breathing.
When the two artists make music together, they create magic."
(Cleveland) The Plain Dealer
"Hargis' attractive spinto voice handled everything comfortably, with superb
diction and especially potent dramatic power. Yet this is a true team at work,
for O'Dette has a whimsical musical personality of his own. They have fun
performing together."
Los Angeles Times
"The success was resounding because of the artists' inspired handiwork. "The
Power of Love" offered a neat and relatively concise survey, considering
the massive options. Songs in Italian, French and English hovered around the
general theme of romantic spring fever and, in some of the most affecting
pieces, the sweet woe of love gone astray. O'Dette is one of the world's finest
practitioners on the lute. Hargis cuts through the ancient character of the
music with an assured tone and an ever-lucid approach to the material, in all
languages."
Santa Barbara News Press
"Hargis & O'Dette were a joy to hear."
The Georgia Strait
MEMORABLE BLEND OF POWER and DELICACY.
The Edmonton Journal
“Did
anyone know that Hargis had such coloratura in her?
The encore was Rodgers and Hart’s ‘My Funny Valentine’ – taken very
seriously, sung very straight, with a delicate weight of feeling the song seems
to have been waiting for all these years and now, miraculously, was receiving.”
The Boston Globe
CONCERT ASTOUNDS
“Fortunately, both Hargis and O’Dette perform as to
the manner born, so that no seam shows between the original tune and elaborated
performance of it.”
(Albany, NY) TIMES UNION
“Ellen
Hargis performs Italian and English songs with such an inimitable charm you
might believe she grew up among English peasants or Italian fishermen, learning
the melodies from her grandmother. She has a remarkable ability to get inside a
song. Her voice is clear as crystal and sonorous as the ring of a bell. Hargis
often performs with the wonderful lutenist Paul O'Dette who provides exceptional
accompaniment for her impressive and hauntingly pure soprano.”
Moscow
News
Concert brings the
Elizabethan to Life: performance reconstructs historic with impressive results.
“O'Dette was faultlessly fluent on his lute. Hargis's soprano rang clearly and
eloquently. Two songs were shattering:
Flow My Tears and In Darkness Let Me
Dwell. Hargis’ singing was moving beyond words.
The house was deservedly full.”
Vancouver Sun
“No music is more self-consciously exquisite than the 17th-century love
songs that soprano Ellen Hargis and lutenist Paul O'Dette played. Yet these
songs reached to the depths of amorous despair and the giddiest joys of
infatuation. The high artifice did not conceal the emotions; it distilled them
and displayed their concentrated essences. Hargis' pure, open sound quivered at
the ends of Dowland's expiring phrases, and her dynamics rose hopefully and
faded resignedly. Through it all, she maintained an achingly beautiful sound,
exactly capturing Dowland's ethos. French sounded delicious coming from Hargis'
mouth, and deliciousness is the point of the French music. Her diva flare and
fire and explosive ornamental outbursts gave these songs hair-raising
immediacy.”
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
“Soprano Ellen Hargis
and lutenist Paul O'Dette have unimpeachable credentials. Ms. Hargis, who sings
with a clear tone and minimal vibrato, brought a hint of introspective drama to
Monteverdi's Ohimè ch'io cado and
Quel sguardo sdegnosetto, and a
palpably forlorn account of Si dolce è'l
tormento. Much of Ms. Hargis's expressive charm is in her flexibility, a
quality heard to best effect in three songs by Barbara Strozzi. Her thoughtful
pacing and the ease with which she moved through the gentle chromaticism of
Respira, mio core and the increasingly
florid writing in L'amante segreto
gave these songs a monumental quality, as if operatic fragments. A vigorous
reading by both gave Questa è la nuova
a folkish, almost rustic quality. Mr. O'Dette accompanied on the chitarrone, a
deferential instrument by nature, made to provide support. But he also played
solo works by Giovanni Girolamo Kapsberger and Bellerofonte Castaldi that ask
for more, and Mr. O'Dette responded with the kind of virtuosic detail and
interpretive fluidity he has always brought to his lute performances.”
New York Times
Five stars – THE POWER OF LOVE
“Against a background of civil and religious war pitting the Cavaliers,
partisans of King Charles I, against the Puritans, enemies of music and
entertainments, this album is dedicated to the power of love, which remains ever
indifferent to the vagaries of the world at large. Above and beyond these
elements are Ellen Hargis’ and Paul O’Dette’s magical performances – or rather
incarnation – of melancholy, regret, and love’s urgency, which confirms that the
twenty-five-year partnership between the soprano (who is by turns charming,
afflicted and hedonistic) and the lutenist/theorbist has resulted in such a
close rapport that each has become the ‘double’ of the other.
The entire recording deserves the highest praise, including the
unexpected and humorous ‘dessert’, Richard Rodgers’
My Funny Valentine.”
Goldberg Magazine
“This splendid CD samples the ring song repertoire from mid-17th
century England. The songs, coming
from a time of social and political upheaval and great musical experimentation,
vary greatly in style and effect.
Rustic-sounding songs in lively jig rhythms are side by side with mannerist
chromatic protestations of passion. The performances are vibrant, sensitive and
finely nuanced, underscoring the music’s drama, pathos and humor.”
