Brian Jeffers, Tenor: Songs of a Lark

Tenor Brian Jeffers, currently from New York City, is one of our own, being born and educated in and around Omaha. He returns home with a variety of his favorite music in this solo recital. Brian Jeffers is a NYC-based vocalist and actor praised for his flexible and heroic tenor (Opera News). His 2022/2023 season engagements include his mainstage role debut as Beadle Bamford in Sweeney Todd as well as Lillas Pastia in La Tragedie de Carmen with Chautauqua Opera and his symphony debut with the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra. In March he made his Lincoln Center chorus debut as part of the NY Philharmonic Chorus in Adolpus Hailstork’s oratorio Done Made My Vow as well as Mozart’s Mass in C Minor with the Mostly Mozart Festival at Lincoln Center’s David Geffen Hall. In 2016 he made his professional debut in the world premiere of Jonathan Dawe’s Nero and the Fall of Lehman Brothers at Columbia University’s Casa Italiana and was a Guest Artist at The Juilliard School’s revival of Dawe’s Cracked Orlando with their Center for Innovation in the Arts. An active performer of new works, he has worked with composers Lisa Despain, Buck McDaniel, Tyler Goodrich White and in 2019 the art song Leavings was written for him by Gilda Lyons with poetry by fellow Iowa/Nebraskan Martha Collins. He has since been seen with Bronx Opera, Opera Saratoga, New Amsterdam Opera, Axelrod Performing Arts Center and City Lyric Opera. Active in choral and popular repertoire, he is a member of the New York Philharmonic Chorus, the tenor of the chamber ensemble at the Church of Our Saviour, Park Avenue, and has performed the solos in Mozart’s Requiem, To Be Certain of a Dawn (Paulus), King David (Honegger), The Creation (Haydn) at ASU Gammage, Vesperae solennes de confessore (Mozart) and Messiah (Handel). As a chorister he has performed Britten’s War Requiem, Verdi’s Requiem, Bach’s B Minor Mass, Orff’s Carmina Burana, Poulenc’s Gloria and Brahms’ Ein Deutches Requiem. He has performed as a backing vocalist for Kristin Chenoweth with the Phoenix Symphony, and in early 2023, appeared with the Gloria choir and Sharon Stone on Saturday Night Live with musical guest, Sam Smith. Born in Sioux City, Iowa and a native of Omaha, he is thrilled to make his debut as a recitalist here in his hometown. Thanks to a silent but vigorous nod from Bellevue East’s Dr. Marjorie Simons-Bester after wondering aloud if he should be an opera singer, Brian earned his Bachelor of Music in Vocal Performance from UNL’s Glenn Korff School of Music and doubled down with a minor in Musical Theatre. He studied with Dr. Jamie Reimer (voice) Dr. Bill Shomos (opera), Alisa Belflower (Musical Theatre) and Stan Brown (Acting). He then earned his MM in Music Theatre-Opera Performance from Arizona State University’s Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts where he studied voice with acclaimed baritone Gordon Hawkins and opera with conductor Brian DeMaris. During his training he performed roles that have proved invaluable to his work as a character actor, such as Don Curzio (Le Nozze di Figaro), King Kaspar (Amahl), Raoul Marcel (O Pioneers!), Mayor Upfold (Albert Herring), Governor (Candide) with UNL Opera, and Lechmere (Owen Wingrave), Lord Eveyln Oakleigh (Anything Goes), and Nemorino (L’Elisir D’Amore) with ASU MT+Opera. He has also trained with operatic tenors Vinson Cole and Bill Burden. He has performed as a Studio (2019) and Apprentice Artist (2023) with Chautauqua Opera, a Young Artist with Opera Saratoga (2022), and is an alum of the Aspen Opera Theatre (2016/2018), Broadway Dreams Foundation (2012-2014), and Harrower Opera Workshop (2012).

Event Links

Website: https://go.evvnt.com/2070005-0

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