Program Notes | Mozart’s Requiem

Gabriel Fauré
Born: May 12, 1845 in Pamiers, Ariège, France
Died: November 4, 1924 in Paris, France
Composed: 1887
World Premiere: November 25, 1888 in Paris
Duration: 7 minutes
Instrumentation: woodwinds and horns in pairs, and strings

This little jewel encapsulates all the features that make Fauré so popular on concert programs. Melodious, melancholy without being depressing, and thoroughly French, the Pavane charms from beginning to end.

The title derives from the Italian pavana, a 16th-century court dance in quadruple meter, usually slow and processional, and favoring continuous repetition of simple step patterns. Fauré composed his Pavane in late summer 1887. He had been for an extended visit to Countess Elisabeth Greffulhe’s residence in Dieppe, on the Normandy coast, and took up music paper again in nearby Le Vésinet. On 12 September 1887, he wrote to Marguerite Bauguies:

“The only new thing I have been able to compose during this shuttlecock existence is a Pavane—elegant, assuredly, but not particularly important—for the Danbé Concerts Orchestra.”

Jules Danbé was conductor of the Opéra-comique. He had recently formed a concert orchestra.

Marketing an ancient dance in modern garb
Fauré was eager to market this modest composition. A few weeks later, Fauré wrote to his Dieppe hostess, Countess Greffulhe, that he had composed the Pavane specifically for her Paris salon. The Countess’ cousin, Count Robert de Montesquiou-Fézensac, had become an important literary adviser to Fauré. Montesquiou was a poet, essayist, art critic, and aesthete. He was also very rich.

Apparently seeking to curry favor with the Count and his cousin, Fauré set a Montesquiou poem for optional chorus in the Pavane. He intended to make the piece both danceable and singable, thereby fit for performance in the Countess’ elegant Parisian home. The original instrumental version is ultimately more successful, benefiting from the inherent restraint and tastefulness of the composer’s first inspiration.

Gustav Mahler
Born: July 7, 1860 in Kalischt, Bohemia
Died: May 18, 1911 in Vienna, Austria
Composed: 1883–85; revised 1891–96
World Premiere: March 16, 1896 in Berlin
Duration: 16 minutes
Instrumentation: three flutes (3rd doubling piccolo), two oboes (2nd doubling English horn), three clarinets (3rd doubling bass clarinet), two bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, timpani, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tam tam, glockenspiel, harp, and strings

During the two decades before he met and married Alma Schindler, Gustav Mahler led one of the most tempestuous love lives of any composer in the late 19th century. Because he was so successful as an opera conductor early in his career, biographical details are more readily available for Mahler than they are for many of his contemporaries. He was such a celebrity by the 1890s that people who interacted with him were already retaining memorabilia.

That is the reason we have so much information about Johanna Richter, a singer with whom Mahler became romantically involved in 1884, while he was working in Kassel, Germany. Ultimately, she jilted him, but he remained enthralled for a while and poured his passion into music. In a letter to his friend Fritz Löhr, he wrote:

“I have written a cycle of songs, six of them so far, all dedicated to her. She does not know them. What can they tell her but what she knows? … The idea of the songs as a whole is that a wayfaring man, who has been stricken by fate, now sets forth into the world, traveling wherever his road may lead him.”

Eventually the set of six was pared to four, becoming the cycle we know as Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, or Songs of a Wayfarer. Generally considered to be Mahler’s first masterpiece, the cycle is certainly his earliest work to gain a permanent place in the repertoire. The songs deal with the plight of a jilted lover who remains haunted by the maiden who rejected him. Because of that premise, Songs of a Wayfarer has been likened to Schubert’s Die Schöne Müllerin and Winterreise, as well as to Ralph Vaughan Williams’s Songs of Travel (which they preceded by more than a decade).

Mahler’s original score was for voice and piano, but it is clear that he thought of these songs as orchestral from the beginning. He wrote them in the 1880s, long before he had developed into a symphonist. Significantly, the orchestration dates from sometime in the 1890s—there is some discrepancy among various editions and manuscripts—but almost certainly after Mahler had penned both of his first two symphonies. By then, he had achieved a considerable command of instrumentation technique. Those who know the First Symphony will immediately recognize the second and fourth songs in this cycle, because their music corresponds to the first and third movements of that symphony, respectively. In fact, the entire plan of the First Symphony is closely related to these songs.

The texts are Mahler’s own, although they bear the clear imprint of the German folk poetry known as Des Knaben Wunderhorn (The Boy’s Magic Horn). The progression of the four movements is decidedly grim. In the first, the woman is marrying another man; the singer perceives his own grief in nature. In the second song, the beauty of nature fails to touch his injured heart. Memory of her blue eyes begets thoughts of death in the next movement: a burning knife is the metaphor illustrated in this jarring and violent music. Finally, Mahler’s stricken lover is driven to a funeral march in the closing song.

While the tunes Mahler uses are relatively simple, his music is highly sophisticated and complex. The scoring is chamber-like, emphasizing the intimacy of the singer’s thoughts, despite the large orchestra. Further, each song ends in a different key from the one in which it began. Such a plan, which Deryck Cooke calls "progressive tonality," was quite daring in the 1880s. It is but one way in which Mahler demonstrates in this early cycle so many of the distinctive characteristics that so brilliantly mark his mature compositions.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Born: January 27, 1756 in Salzburg, Austria
Died: December 5, 1791 in Vienna, Austria
Composed: 1791
World Premiere: January 2, 1793 in Vienna
Duration: 51 minutes
Instrumentation: two bassoons, two basset horns (played by clarinets in most modern performances), two trumpets, three trombones, timpani, organ, soprano, mezzo-soprano, tenor and bass-baritone soloists, mixed chorus, and strings

A poignant farewell
In December 1790, Joseph Haydn left Austria for London with the violinist and entrepreneur Johann Peter Salomon. He spent his last day in Vienna with Mozart. When they parted, Mozart embraced his friend and said, "Papa, I fear that this will be our last farewell." Haydn, no longer young at 59, took Mozart’s remark to be concern for his welfare on such a long journey to a distant country. As it happened, Mozart’s words were prophetic of his own death. Haydn outlived his younger contemporary by 18 years and produced superb music in his old age. When he died in 1809, the work performed at his funeral was the Mozart Requiem.

Mysterious commission
Mozart rarely composed without a specific commission, and the Requiem was no exception. During summer 1791, he was hard at work with Emanuel Schikaneder on The Magic Flute. The new opera went into rehearsal in July. At about the same time, a mysterious stranger presented himself to Mozart at his residence, with an unusual assignment: a Requiem mass, to be composed and delivered as soon as possible. The stranger declined to identify himself or the originator of the commission, and cautioned Mozart not to attempt to learn anything further about his employer.

We know these facts from written reports by Mozart’s contemporaries, including his widow Constanze and her second husband, Georg Nikolaus Nissen, who was one of Mozart’s first biographers. Only after Mozart’s death did the full story emerge. Count Walsegg-Stuppach, an Austrian nobleman and music lover, fancied himself a composer. Lacking real talent, he often commissioned works by well-known composers for private performance, copying the works to pass them off as his own.

In February 1791, the Count’s wife died. Stricken, Walsegg resolved to secure a Requiem to be performed annually on the anniversary of her death. He sent the messenger to Mozart with the request, instructing his representative to maintain secrecy.

Distraction: a royal commission for an opera
Needing money, Mozart accepted the project and set to work, then put the Requiem aside when Emperor Leopold II was to be crowned King of Bohemia. For that occasion, Mozart was asked to compose an opera seria. Composing with lightning speed, he completed most of La clemenza di Tito in an astonishing 18 days, before travelling to Prague to supervise rehearsals and the premiere. His frenetic pace included ongoing work preparing for The Magic Flute’s opening. One starts to understand the extreme degree of nervous exhaustion that compromised his health.

Mental and physical health problems
Following his return from Prague in September 1791, Mozart resumed work on the Requiem. The unidentified emissary called on him repeatedly to check on its progress. Unable to determine the origin of the eerie commission and drained from overwork, Mozart became convinced that a messenger from the netherworld had been sent and that he was composing his own Requiem.

At this point, Mozart’s health deteriorated. Battling dizziness, headaches, swelling, and nausea, he continued to work on the Requiem. With the assistance of a composition student, Franz Xaver Süssmayr (1766–1803), he sketched several movements, orchestrating the first few measures of some, concentrating on the vocal lines, providing only limited instrumental detail in others. At Mozart’s death on December 5, the Requiem lay incomplete.

Widow’s work
Constanze Mozart was unable to collect the fee owed to her late husband until the missing parts were completed. She approached several Viennese composers, eventually settling for Süssmayr, who had worked closely with Mozart during his last months.

One of Süssmayr’s cleverest ploys to conceal the participation of a second composer was to conclude the work with the repetition of the music heard at the beginning. Mozart had used this same type of self-quotation in earlier masses, so the tactic was stylistically consistent—and very convincing. So successful was Süssmayr’s reconstruction and completion that the Requiem has become one of the most frequently performed choral works in the classical repertoire. Also because of Süssmayr, the Requiem is a thorny topic in Mozart scholarship, with musicologists and performers debating how much of the music is Mozart’s and how much his gifted student’s. The Requiem’s inherent beauty and remarkable contrapuntal skill assure its following, regardless of questions about authenticity.

About the music
Such an embarrassment of riches graces the Requiem that singling out individual movements is gratuitous. The overall impact of the work is heightened by the relationship of each movement to the next. Mozart’s subtle migration between tonal centers and his negotiation between major and minor modes exercise psychological power. But the sound that rings in our ears for hours afterward is the dark, vigorous fugue of the Kyrie, repeated at the end of the work for the Cum sanctis tuis. Its resolution on stark open fifths, unsweetened by a major third and unmitigated by even a D-minor chord, is a chilling reminder that this is music of death.

Mozart, the movies, and misconceptions
Thanks to Peter Shaffer’s award-winning play Amadeus (1979) and Milos Forman’s remarkable film (1984) based on the play, Mozart’s character and music have been absorbed into mainstream culture. Reinforcement came in 1991, with the bicentennial observation of Mozart’s death, and in 2006, when festivals worldwide celebrated his 250th birthday.

A singular benefit of these Mozart phenomena has been more widespread familiarity with Mozart’s music, which continues in unabated popularity on piano recitals, in concert halls, opera houses, and elsewhere. This ubiquity has spawned a generation of new Mozart lovers, who are discovering the beauty and variety of his works for the first time. But any popularization is something of a double-edged sword. Unfortunately, in hand with this exposure have been a number of misconceptions and factual errors about the circumstances of Mozart’s life and death.

Nowhere is this problem more evident or more acute than in the case of the Requiem, K. 626. Shaffer’s play and Forman’s film adjusted characters and situations for maximum dramatic and cinematic effect. Inevitably this resulted in some distortion of what actually took place. (For example, Antonio Salieri took no part in completing the Requiem, as the movie implies.) Truth is indeed stranger than fiction, and the circumstances surrounding the composition of the Requiem are so remarkable that no embellishment is necessary.

A word on Mozart’s name
Mozart was born in Salzburg on January 27, 1756 and died in Vienna on December 5, 1791, not quite thirty-six years old. He was baptized with the names Joannes Chrysost[omus] Wolfgangus Theophilus. His parents gave him the names Johann and Chrysostom because he was born on that saint’s day. Wolfgang was the first name of Mozart’s maternal grandfather. The name ‘Theophilus’ (Greek for ‘beloved of God’) came from the godfather, Joannes Theophilus Pergmayr, a Salzburg businessman and local official. Days after the boy’s birth, Leopold referred to his infant son as Gottlieb (the German for Theophilus). ‘Amadeus’ is the Latinate form.

In letters, the composer signed his name variously as ‘Mozart,’ ‘W.A. Mozart,’ ‘Wolfg. Amad. Mozart,’ ‘MZT,’ ‘Wolf. Amdè Mozart’ and, most frequently, ‘Wolfgang Amadè Mozart.’ As a boy in Italy, he occasionally signed in the Italianate spelling: ‘Wolfgango Amadeo.’ Despite Peter Shaffer’s stage play Amadeus and Miloš Forman’s even more popular film, Mozart did not use the name Amadeus.

In recent years, the spelling ‘Wolfgang Amadè Mozart’ has supplanted the old-fashioned ‘Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’ in common usage and printed programs. The glory of his music remains unchanged.

2025–26 marks the GRAMMY and Emmy Award-winning conductor Xian Zhang’s 10th season as Music Director of the New Jersey Symphony, and her inaugural season as the Music Director of the Seattle Symphony with whom she has been a long-term collaborator since her debut in 2008. Zhang has also been appointed Principal Guest Conductor of the NCPA Orchestra in Beijing, beginning this season. Following her tenure as Music Director of Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano between 2009–16, she continues as their Conductor Emeritus.

With the New Jersey Symphony, Zhang has commissioned composers such as Wynton Marsalis, Jessie Montgomery, Qigang Chen, Chen Yi, Steven Mackey, Thomas Adès, Daniel Bernard Roumain, Christopher Rouse, Vivian Li, Gary Morgan, Christian McBride, Paquito D’Rivera, and Allison Loggins-Hull. She is also responsible for introducing their annual Lunar New Year celebration. Under her artistic leadership, the New Jersey Symphony won two awards at the mid-Atlantic Emmy Awards in 2022 for their concert films, including EMERGE which was conducted by Xian Zhang, directed by Yuri Alves and co-produced with DreamPlay Films.

As a guest conductor, Zhang appears regularly with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and The Philadelphia Orchestra. Her Deutsche Grammophon recording with the latter (Letters for the Future with Time For Three, released 2022) won GRAMMY awards for Best Contemporary Classical Composition (Kevin Puts’ Contact) and Best Classical Instrumental Solo.

2025–26 highlights include returns to The Philadelphia Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, St. Louis Symphony, and National Arts Centre Ottawa. In Europe, she returns to Netherlands Radio Philharmonic with a performance at the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, and makes her debut at the Finnish National Opera conducting Tosca. This follows her huge success at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, where she recently conducted Madama Butterfly and Tosca to great acclaim:

“The success of Kurzak’s performance was due in no small part to Xian Zhang’s sensitivity as a conductor. Zhang has an exceptional ear for balance, as well as the ability to draw the softest, most transparent tones imaginable from the orchestra. […] With such skills and obvious audience appeal, Zhang should prove a valuable addition to the Met’s conducting staff.” – New York Classical Review

Other recent highlights include subscription programs with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, Orquestra Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo, Houston Symphony, San Francisco Symphony, Washington’s National Symphony Orchestra, Montreal Symphony, Baltimore Symphony, Orchestra of St. Luke’s (including Brahms Requiem at Carnegie Hall), and Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse.

Zhang previously served as Principal Guest Conductor of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and BBC National Orchestra & Chorus of Wales, the first female conductor to hold a titled role with a BBC orchestra. In 2002, she won first prize in the Maazel-Vilar Conductor's Competition. She was appointed New York Philharmonic’s Assistant Conductor in 2002, subsequently becoming their Associate Conductor and the first holder of the Arturo Toscanini Chair.

Chinese soprano Mei Gui Zhang, whose “voice literally floated past the space she stood in and “lived in” and created remarkable, layered beauty” (OperaWire), is enjoying a burgeoning international career.

In the 2025–26 season, Ms. Zhang returns to San Francisco Opera for the world premiere of Huang Ruo and David Henry Hwang’s The Monkey King in the role of Guanyin. In concert, she will sing French arias with Xu Zhong and the Paris Philharmonic, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 and “Ah! Perfido” with Eun Sun Kim and the Minnesota Orchestra, and two projects with Xian Zhang, the first with the Seattle Symphony with Qigang Chen in Iris Unveiled, and Mozart’s Requiem with the New Jersey Symphony. Finally, Mei Gui Zhang will sing Mozart’s Mass in C Minor with the North Carolina Symphony.

In the 2024–25 season, Ms. Zhang debuted the role of Oscar in Un ballo in maschera with the San Francisco Opera, sang Barbarina in Le nozze di Figaro at The Metropolitan Opera, Pamina in Die Zauberflöte with the Atlanta Opera and Opera Carolina, and Susanna in Le nozze di Figaro with the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing; and in concert, she performed in C.P.E. Bach’s Die Auferstehung und Himmelfahrt Jesu with the American Symphony Orchestra at Carnegie Hall and Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 with the Allentown Symphony.

Highly regarded for her interpretations of Mozart’s works, Mei Gui Zhang has appeared as Zerlina in Don Giovanni with the Atlanta Opera, LA Opera, Opéra National de Bordeaux, and Guangzhou Opera House; Despina in Così fan tutte with the Boston Symphony at Tanglewood, and Ilia in Idomeneo (cover) with The Metropolitan Opera. At the Verbier Festival, where she was a Laureate of the 2019 Prix Yves Paternot, Ms. Zhang was seen as Pamina and Barbarina. She has also been a featured soloist in Mozart’s Requiem with the North Carolina Symphony and Mozart’s Exsultate, jubilate with the New Jersey Symphony.

Mei Gui Zhang made her triumphant Carnegie Hall debut in 2023, joining The Philadelphia Orchestra in J.L. Adams’ Vespers of the Blessed Earth and later reprised the performance at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center. In the following season, Ms. Zhang debuted with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in Fauré’s La Bonne Chanson, the Real Orquesta Sinfónica de Sevilla for Canteloube’s Chants d’Auvergne, Fort Worth Opera as Musetta in La bohème, and the title role in Roméo et Juliette at the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing.

Previous seasons sparkled with notable performances at esteemed venues, including her debut as Euridice in San Francisco Opera’s Orfeo ed Euridice opposite countertenor Jakub Józef Orliński; and her “energetic, bright-voiced Thibault” in Sir David McVicar’s Don Carlos under the baton of Yannick Nézet-Séguin at The Metropolitan Opera. Ms. Zhang has also performed with The Philadelphia Orchestra in L’enfant et les sortilèges, Tianjin Grand Opera in The Rape of Lucretia (Lucia), and Harbin Symphony Orchestra in Fidelio (Marzelline).

Ms. Zhang’s connection to her cultural roots is a hallmark of her career: she brings to life rarely performed works by Chinese composers, offering audiences a fresh perspective that intertwines her rich heritage with her operatic prowess. These works have brought her to prominent stages worldwide, including the world premiere performance of Aaron Zigman & Mark Campbell’s Émigré with the New York Philharmonic and Shanghai Symphony, recorded with Deutsche Grammophon; and her debut as the lead role Dai Yu in Bright Sheng’s The Dream of the Red Chamber with San Francisco Opera.

As a concert soloist, Mei Gui Zhang has performed throughout China in Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 with the Sichuan Symphony Orchestra, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 at the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing, and concerts with both the Xi’an and Shenzhen Symphony Orchestras. She performed Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis with Bard College, Bruckner’s Te Deum with the New Jersey Symphony, Bach’s “Coffee Cantata” with the Music@Menlo Chamber Music Festival, and solo recitals with pianist Ken Noda at Lincoln Center’s Bruno Walter Auditorium, Miami’s Wertheim Performing Arts Center, and on tour in China in a program entitled From West to East.

As a member of the Lindemann Young Artists Development Program at The Metropolitan Opera, Mei Gui Zhang made her debut as the Bloody Child in Macbeth, and at San Francisco Opera’s Merola Opera Program, she performed Anne Trulove in The Rake’s Progress. Ms. Zhang represented China in the 2023 BBC Cardiff Singer of the World Competition. She was a finalist in the 2019 Queen Sonja International Music Competition; took second place at the 2020 Opera Index Competition; and won the Audience Prize at the 2020 Glyndebourne Opera Cup.

Taylor Raven is a “vocal sensation” (Washington Classical Review) and quickly establishing herself in opera, concert, and recital. In the 2025–26 season, Taylor will make her house debut with the English National Opera for Così fan tutte (Dorabella) and returns to the LA Phil for a staged production of Die Walküre (Grimgerde). Highlights on the concert stage include returns to the Cleveland Orchestra and Minnesota Orchestra for Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9, the New Jersey Symphony for Mozart’s Requiem, and her debuts with the North Carolina Symphony for Handel’s Messiah and Opera Omaha for their annual Opera Outdoors concert.

Last season, Taylor debuted with The Metropolitan Opera in the company premiere of John Adams’ Antony and Cleopatra (Charmian) and with Pacific Opera Victoria for La clemenza di Tito (Sesto). On the concert stage, she debuted with the Minnesota Orchestra for Mozart’s Requiem, Duisburger Philharmoniker for Julia Perry’s Stabat Mater, The US Naval Academy for Handel’s Messiah, the Buffalo Philharmonic for Moravec’s Sanctuary Road, and the Quad City Symphony Orchestra for Giddens’ Omar’s Journey (Fatima). In recital, Taylor debuted with the Northwest Sinfonietta performing Jessie Montgomery’s Five Freedom Songs and made her New York City solo recital debut with the Kaufmann Music Center. Additional appearances included a return to the North Carolina Opera for their Opera in the Park series and a debut with the Bard Music Festival in various recitals, and Martinů’s Julietta with the American Symphony Orchestra conducted by Leon Botstein.

Taylor began her 2023–24 season with a return to the San Francisco Opera for a role debut as Fatima in Rhiannon Giddens and Michael Abels’ Omar. Other season highlights included returns to the Seattle Opera for Il barbiere di Siviglia (Rosina) and the LA Phil for a fully staged production of Das Rheingold (Flosshilde) with scenic design by Frank Gehry, conducted by Gustavo Dudamel. On the concert stage, she debuted with the Colorado Symphony for Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 conducted by Marin Alsop and the Memphis Symphony for Handel’s Messiah.

Ms. Raven made her debut at the San Francisco Opera for a trio of operas including the world premiere of John Adams’ new opera Antony and Cleopatra (Charmian), Dialogues des Carmélites (Sister Mathilde), and La traviata (Flora). Other highlights included debuts with the Kentucky Opera for La Cenerentola (Angelina), and the Chicago Opera Theater for The Life and Death(s) of Alan Turing (Joan Clarke) and a return to the Des Moines Metro Opera for the title role in Carmen. On the concert stage, she made her debut with The Cleveland Orchestra for La fanciulla del West (Wowkle), conducted by Franz Welser-Möst.

Recent engagements include debuts with the Houston Grand Opera for Die Zauberflöte (Dritte Dame), the Washington Concert Opera for Lakmé (Mallika), and the North Carolina Opera for Moravec’s Sanctuary Road. On the concert stage, she made debuts with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra Iowa, and returned to the LA Phil.

She is a graduate of the Young Artist Program at the LA Opera where she was seen in La clemenza di Tito (Annio), Don Carlo (Tebaldo), the Kosky production of Die Zauberflöte (Zweite Dame) conducted by James Conlon, and Hansel and Gretel (Sandman). Taylor made her LA Phil debut as a soloist in the Hollywood Bowl performance of Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy with Bramwell Tovey and made her debut with the Seattle Opera in As One (Hannah After). She appeared with the New West Symphony in Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky under Mikhail Agrest and made her Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra debut as a soloist in Mahler’s Das Klagende Lied with James Conlon as a part of their May Festival.

Taylor holds degrees from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and the University of Colorado-Boulder.

Emmy-winning, Billboard-charting American tenor Eric Ferring is known internationally as “a prodigiously gifted lyric tenor” (Opera News) for his “fine, gleaming tenor” (New York Classical Review), as well as for having “a beautifully round and warm timbre, expressive, and with great finesse” (Olyrix). His expertise ranges from early bel canto repertoire and the music of Handel and Mozart to the origination of contemporary operatic roles.

Ferring’s 2025–26 season includes return performances with Art Song Chicago, Tampa Oratorio Singers (Elijah), as well as debuts with the Knoxville Symphony (Messiah), Charlotte Symphony (Messiah), New Jersey Symphony (Mozart’s Requiem), Opera Carolina (Rinuccio, Gianni Schicchi), and the Umeri Choir (Mozart’s Missa brevis in F Major). Ferring will also record his third solo album in 2026 and will release it with Lexicon Classics.

Ferring’s 2024–25 season includes performances with conductor Emmanuelle Haïm and her ensemble Le Concert d'Astrée, for a program of Rameau and Handel in Paris’ Opéra de Lille and at the LA Phil (debut). He also sang Beethoven’s 9th Symphony with the Portland Orchestra, Handel’s Messiah with the Evansville Philharmonic, and Mozart’s Requiem with the North Carolina Symphony. In New York City, he joined the Festival Orchestra of Lincoln Center (formerly Mostly Mozart), to perform Gomatz in Act 1 of Mozart's Zaide, conducted by Dame Jane Glover. With Haymarket Opera, he performed the role of Artabano in Hasse’s Artaserse, which is also being released on Cedille Records in 2026, and sang Oronte in Handel’s Alcina with the company at The Ravinia Festival.

The 2023–24 season featured Eric’s house debut with Opéra de Lille as Don Ottavio in a new production of Don Giovanni, a role he also sang in concert for his return to Opéra de Rouen. He made his debuts with the Seattle Symphony for Handel's Messiah, the Insula Orchestra in Paris, France for Mozart’s Requiem, and with The English Concert, Mr. Ferring made his role and orchestra debut as Grimoaldo in Rodelinda on a multi-continent tour conducted by Harry Bicket. Previous notable engagements include his principal role debut at Lyric Opera of Chicago as Lurcanio in Ariodante, a role he also performed for his Opéra de Paris debut in a new Robert Carsen production. With The Metropolitan Opera, he has bowed as Arturo in a new production of Lucia di Lammermoor, Tamino in The Magic Flute, and Pong in Turandot. He has sung Fenton in Falstaff with the Santa Fe Opera, Tamino in Die Zauberflöte with Opéra national du Rhin and the Verbier Festival, and Lysander in A Midsummer Night’s Dream with Opéra de Rouen.

With the Pittsburgh Opera, he appeared as The Protagonist in the world premiere of the one-man opera Ashes & Snow in collaboration with American Opera Projects, bowed as Nemorino in a student matinee performance of in L’elisir d’amore, and sang Ricky in The Long Walk and Señor Alcalde in the world premiere of The Summer King. In concert, he performed in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with Spoleto Festival USA and Handel’s Messiah with the Jacksonville Symphony.

In 2022, he released his solo debut album No Choice but Love with Lexicon Classics, which showcased works by LGBTQIA+ composers. This was followed by 2023’s We Have Tomorrow, featuring pianist Madeline Slettedahl and French string quartet, Quatuor Agate, and recorded under the Delos label.

Eric Ferring was an Apprentice Singer at the Santa Fe Opera, where he was awarded the 2017 Richard Tucker Memorial Scholarship. He also participated in the Académie du Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis’ Gerdine Young Artist Program, receiving a career award from the Richard Gaddes Fund for Young Artists, and was a Studio Artist at Wolf Trap Opera. Ferring’s numerous awards include top prizes at many competitions including the George London Foundation for Singers, Glyndebourne Opera Cup, Gerda Lissner Foundation International Voice Competition, American Opera Society of Chicago, the National Society of Arts and Letters, the Metropolitan Opera Laffont Competition, as well as grants and awards from the Richard Tucker Foundation, Sullivan Foundation, Santa Fe Opera, and Opera Theatre of Saint Louis. 

He is a native of Dubuque, Iowa and graduated from Drake University with his Bachelor of Music in Vocal Performance and The Boston Conservatory with his Master of Music in Opera Performance. Ferring is a graduate of the Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Ryan Opera Center and the Pittsburgh Opera Resident Artist Program. Ferring is also an Assistant Regional Director at the American Guild of Musical Artists (AGMA), the Executive Director of Art Song Chicago, and Project Curator for Lexicon Classics.

Hailed as an artist “alight with the spirit of the music” (Boston Globe), three-time GRAMMY Award-winning bass-baritone Dashon Burton has built a vibrant career with regular appearances across the US and Europe.

His 2025–26 season highlights include Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 and Don Fernando in Fidelio with the Cleveland Orchestra led by Franz Welser-Möst; Mahler’s Songs of a Wayfarer and Mozart’s Requiem with the New Jersey Symphony under Xian Zhang; Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with the Grand Rapids Symphony and Marcelo Lehninger; Britten’s War Requiem with the Erie Philharmonic and Daniel Meyer; and Rossini’s Petite messe solennelle with the Cincinnati May Festival.

Recent highlights include Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with the LA Phil and Gustavo Dudamel at the Hollywood Bowl; Brahms’ Serious Songs (arr. Glanert) and Mozart’s Requiem with the St. Louis Symphony under Stéphane Denève, Mozart’s Requiem with the Minnesota Orchestra and Thomas Søndergård; and a role as Artist-in-Residence with the Milwaukee Symphony, which included Mahler’s Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen and Bach’s Ich habe genug, both conducted by Ken-David Masur. He has collaborated regularly with Michael Tilson Thomas, singing performances of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with the San Francisco Symphony, Copland’s Old American Songs, and MTT’s own Walt Whitman Songs with the Boston and San Francisco Symphony orchestras. Highly regarded as a Baroque specialist, his performances of Handel’s Messiah have included the National Symphony, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, and the Philadelphia Orchestra.

A multiple award-winning singer, Burton won a GRAMMY in 2021 for Best Classical Solo Vocal Album with Dame Ethyl Smyth’s The Prison with The Experiential Orchestra (Chandos). As a founding member of the groundbreaking vocal ensemble Roomful of Teeth, he received his first GRAMMY in 2013 for their debut recording of new commissions, and his third in 2024 for Rough Magic, featuring works by Caroline Shaw, William Brittelle, Peter Shin, and Eve Beglarian.

His discography also includes Songs of Struggle & Redemption: We Shall Overcome (Acis), Paul Moravec’s Sanctuary Road (Naxos), Lori Laitman’s Holocaust 1944 (Acis), and Caroline Shaw’s The Listeners with the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra. His album of spirituals was praised by The New York Times as “profoundly moving … a beautiful and lovable disc.”

Burton holds a Bachelor of Music degree from Oberlin College and Conservatory and a Master of Music degree from Yale University’s Institute of Sacred Music. He is currently an Assistant Professor of Voice at Vanderbilt University’s Blair School of Music.

Under the direction of Australian-born conductor Heather J. Buchanan since September 2003, the Montclair State University choral program has been recognized for successful collaborations with world-renowned artists and celebrated professional musicians in national and international venues, including Meredith Monk, Richard Alston Dance Company (UK), VOCES8 (UK), and Eric Whitacre. Montclair choirs appear regularly with the New Jersey Symphony and have won critical acclaim for their “heartfelt conviction,” “and vibrant sound,” being a “marvel of diction, tuning, and rhythm,” “eloquence,” and for singing with the “crispness and dexterity of a professional choir.” Pianist Gregory Stout is the Montclair choral accompanist.

The University Singers, Montclair’s flagship choir, is an elective mixed-voice ensemble comprising undergraduate and graduate students with a passion for choral singing. Previous New Jersey Symphony performances include Felix Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 3, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Requiem, the US premiere of Kate Whitley's Speak Out, and George Frideric Handel’s Messiah annually since 2014. They recorded Songs of Ascension with Meredith Monk & Vocal Ensemble on the prestigious European label ECM Records under legendary producer Manfred Eicher, which received a GRAMMY Award nomination in the Producer of the Year category. Their solo recording I Sing Because is available on Spotify and iTunes.

Established in 1908, Montclair State is a Research Doctoral Institution ranked in the top tier of national universities, with 13 degree-granting colleges/schools serving more than 24,000 undergraduate and graduate students. At Montclair’s John J. Cali School of Music, students study with a world-class faculty drawn from the finest musicians and scholars in the New York metropolitan area and beyond. Professor of Music and Director of Choral Activities Dr. Heather J. Buchanan holds degrees from the University of New England (Australia), Westminster Choir College of Rider University (US), and the Queensland Conservatorium at Griffith University (Australia), and is a Licensed Body Mapping Educator. A vibrant teacher, dynamic performer, and passionate health advocate for musicians, she is in demand as a guest conductor, somatic educator, and choral clinician in the US and abroad.