OPERA AUSTRALIA ANNOUNCES 2009 SEASON

Stuart is thrilled to announce a return to Opera Australia in Peter Grimes.

Stuart will be taking the title role in the new production by Neil Armfield, conducted by Richard Hickox.

LATEST CD RECORDING

The San Francisco Symphony recording of Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde conducted by Michael Tilson-Thomas and with Soloists Thomas Hampson and Stuart is scheduled for release on Sept 9.

Classics Today.com has already reviewed the CD:

"This performance has two big assets........ The assets are Stuart Skelton's really heroic performance of the tenor part, and Michael Tilson Thomas' excellent conducting of a supremely responsive San Francisco Symphony. First, Skelton: here is a tenor who truly has the heft for the part. In the opening song he cuts through the orchestra with just the right defiant tone.......whether here, in the delicate imagery of "Of Youth", or in the tipsy abandon of "The Drunkard in Spring", Skelton must be acknowledged as one of the better tenors to take the part, at least recently."

David Hurwiz

Seattle RING (click)

Stuart is very excited to announce his company debut as Siegmund in the upcoming RING with the Seattle Opera in 2009. Performances of Die Walkuere will be on August 10,18 & 26.

More Ring News.

Stuart is pleased to announce his involvement, again as Siegmund, in the Robert Wilson Ring in Zurich, under the baton of Phillipe Jordan. Performances will be in Nov of 2008 and again in 2009.

Lauritz Melchior Award

Stuart is very proud to announce that he has been awarded the inaugural Orphee d'Or Prix Lauritz Melchior by the Academie du Disque Lyrique in Paris. The Lauritz Melchior Prize is for the best Wagnerian Tenor on Recording, and was awarded for Stuart's peformance on the Melba Recordings Die Walkuere from the State Opera of South Australia's production of 2004.

Reviews for the newly released SACD of Die Walkuere are in. Click HERE for the latest reviews

"The Australian tenor Stuart Skelton is, quite simply, one of the best Siegmunds on disc."

"Siegmund's Revenge.

"Stuart Skelton’s Siegmund: He posseses the special heroic tone, a molten bronze-gold alloy; the clarity of a tenor with the colours of a baritone; the inexhaustible breath – these Wälse which never seem to finish – valour and youth.

However, his interpretation is not satisfied merely with vocal hedonism; it also expresses the weight of the fate which hounds him. More still than the poetry of spring, he gives himself up to the despair of the duet of the second act, the todesverkündigung was received with such a resigned pain such that his nobility of expression was transcendent.

It is interesting to note how the center of gravity of the work is off-set; the first act suddenly gains importance, to the detriment of the last act. Emotion is transferred from Wotan’s farewell to the ultimate fight of his son. This hero initiates, in advance, the Twilight of the Gods. And while in Adelaide, back in 2004, the audience saw Brünnhilde through Wotans’ eyes, we would rather, by listening to this recording, hear Siegmund with Sieglinde’s ears."

Contact Melba Recordings @ www.melbarecordings.com.au