Teresa Wakim Makes Handel and Haydn Society Solo Debut in Mozart Coronation Tonight

Soprano Teresa Wakim makes her Handel and Haydn Society (H&H) Symphony Hall debut as a featured soloist with Mozart Coronation, H&H's final program of the 2011–2012 Season. Wakim, a member of the H&H professional chorus since 2003, will be stepping in to replace scheduled guest Rosemary Joshua, who has withdrawn from her appearance due to personal reasons. Performing with Wakim is tenor Thomas Cooley, who returns to H&H in Mozart Coronation after most recently performing in Mozart Mass in C Minor in 2010; he can be heard on H&H's recording of the work, released on CORO. Soloists also include mezzo-soprano Paula Murrihy and Boston-based baritone Sumner Thompson, who both return toH&H after having performed as members of the H&H Chorus as well as guest soloists. Murrihy most recently appeared in Handel's Messiah in 2008, and Thompson was heard last season in The Bach Experience.

Mozart's Coronation Mass will be recorded live for commercial release on the CORO label in September 2012. The recording will join Mozart Mass in C Minor (September 2010) and Mozart Requiem (September 2011) to complete a Mozart trilogy.

Mozart Coronation
Friday, April 27, 2012 at 8pm
Sunday, April 29, 2012 at 3pm
Symphony Hall, 301 Massachusetts Avenue, Boston, MA

HANDEL: "Arrival of the Queen of Sheba" from Solomon
MOZART: Exsultate, jubilate, K. 165
HAYDN: Symphony No. 85, La Reine
HANDEL: Coronation Anthem No. 1, Zadok the Priest
MOZART: Mass in C major, K .317, Coronation

Tickets start at $20 and may be purchased through the Handel and Haydn Box Office by phone at 617 266 3605, online at handelandhaydn.org, or in person at the Handel and Haydn office, Horticultural Hall, 300 Massachusetts Avenue, Boston (M–F, 10am–6pm). Student rush available starting one hour before the performance: $15 cash only with valid ID, best available seats subject to availability. Groups of 10 or more receive a 20% discount.

HARRY CHRISTOPHERS
The 2011–2012 Season is Harry Christophers' third as Artistic Director of the Handel and Haydn Society. Since September 2006, when he led a sold-out performance in the Esterházy Palace at the Haydn Festival in Eisenstadt, Austria, he has conducted Handel and Haydn each season and, following his appointment in 2008, Christophers' tenure as Artistic Director began with the 2009–2010 season. Christophers and Handel and Haydn have since embarked on an artistic journey with a showcase of works premiered in the United States by the Handel and Haydn Society over the last 197 years, and the release of the first of a series of recordings on CORO leading to the 2015 Bicentennial. Christophers is founder and conductor of the UK-based choir and period instrument ensemble The Sixteen. He has directed The Sixteen throughout Europe, America, and the Far East, gaining a distinguished reputation for his work in Renaissance, Baroque, and 20th-century music. In2000, he instituted The Sixteen's "Choral Pilgrimage," a tour of British cathedrals from York to Canterbury. With that ensemble, he has recorded close to 100 titles for which he has won numerous awards, including a Grand Prix du Disque for Handel Messiah, numerous Preise der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik (German Record Critics Awards), the coveted Gramophone Award for Early Music, and the prestigious Classical Brit Award (2005) for his disc entitled Renaissance. In 2009, he received one of classical music's highest accolades, the Classic FM Gramophone Awards Artist of the Year Award, and The Sixteen won the BaroqueVocal Award for Handel Coronation Anthems, a CD that also received a 2010 Grammy Award nomination. Harry Christophers is also Principal Guest Conductor of the Granada Symphony Orchestra and a regular guest conductor with the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields and the Orquestra de la Comunidad de Madrid. In October 2008, Christophers was awarded an Honorary Degree of Doctor of Music from the University of Leicester. Most recently, he was elected an Honorary Fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford and also of the Royal Welsh Academy for Music and Drama.

TERESA WAKIM
A member of the Handel and Haydn Society Chorus since 2003, rising American soprano Teresa Wakim has garnered wide acclaim for her performances of opera, oratorio and chamber music. Wakim has performed as soloist under many of the world's renowned 'early music' specialists, including Ton Koopman, Harry Christophers, Nicolas McGegan, Roger Norrington, Laurence Cummings, Martin Pearlman, AlexWeimann, Paul O'Dette, Stephen Stubbs, and Jeannette Sorrell. A graduate of the Oberlin Conservatory of Music and Boston University's College of Fine Arts, she recently won First Prize in the Internationaler Solistenwettbewerb für Alte Musik in Austria and was named Lorraine Hunt Lieberson Fellow by Emmanuel Music. Noted engagements include Bach's B Minor Mass and St. John Passion with the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra in the U.S. and Europe, Bach's Wedding Cantata and Mendelssohn's Hear My Prayer with The Cleveland Orchestra, Handel's Messiah with the San Antonio Symphony, Pamina in The Magic Flute with Apollo's Fire, and a title role in Handel's Acis and Galatea with the Boston Early Music Festival. Ms. Wakim can be heard as a featured soloist on four Grammy-nominated recordings with the Boston Early Music Festival and Seraphic Fire.