Pierrot's Tanzlied "Mein sehnen, mein wähnen"

Kalmanovitch, Melrose & Hampson

One of the most beautiful arias ever written for lyric baritone is undoubtedly "Mein sehnen, mein wähnen" or Pierrot's Tanzlied for Erich Korngold's "Die Tote Stadt."
After the young, beautiful dancer Marietta has made a toast with the rest of her troupe, she asks Fritz to sing a song. He sings a yearning dance song that looks into his past.

Here are three singers at various phases of their careers singing the Tanzlied. The young Philip Kalmanovitch who is just beginning his career, Leigh Melrose who has begun singing on major stages in the last few years and the legendary Thomas Hampson.

Philip Kalmanovitch:



Leigh Melrose:



Thomas Hampson:

Also, don't forget that for the next two weeks we'll be taking submissions for our first-ever charity Barihunks calendar. Send High Res photos and bio to Barihunks@gmail.com.

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Leigh Melrose in Holocaust Opera

Leigh Melrose

British barihunk Leigh Melrose has never received the attention that he deserves on this site. We featured a video of him singing a selection from Britten's "Billy Budd" at the end of a feature on Alexander Tsymbalyuk. He certainly can't be ignored anymore, as Melrose has landed a key role at English National Opera in Mieczysław Weinberg’s 1968 opera The Passenger. 

The opera was banned in the Soviet Union and was first premiered last year at the Bregenz Festival. Weinberg, a Soviet composer of Jewish-Polish heritage who died in 1996, never saw a performance of this lost masterpiece in his lifetime. 


The opera revolves around an encounter between two women – one a former Auschwitz guard and the other a former prisoner. Melrose plays Tadeusz, a camp inmate and violinist who defies the Commandant byordered by performing some meloncholy music by Bach rather than a frolicking waltz. Needless to say, things don't end well for Tadeusz.



We continue to find the performances at ENO as some of the most innovative and interesting in all of opera right now. We loved Nic Muhly's "Two Boys" and look forward to seeing The Passenger. The opera runs from September 19-October 25. Additional cast and performance information is available HERE. If you're looking for more traditional operatic fare, ENO will be performing the highly acclaimed Jonathan Miller production of Donizetti's "The Elixir of Love" at the same time.

You can read an entire feature on Leigh Melrose and The Passenger in the Islington Tribune by clicking HERE. 

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Erik Anstine Featured on Seattle Opera Blog

Barihunks in disguise: Anstine and Cutlip (Photo by Rozarii Lynch)

We recently introduced Erik Anstine to readers and we suspect that he has a big career ahead of him. He is currently one of the priests in the Seattle Opera's "Magic Flute," which includes the Papageno of barihunk Philip Cutlip and the Sarastro of barihunk and ex-football player Keith Miller. The second cast also includes British barihunk Leigh Melrose as Papageno, a singer who we blogged about last year and who should be better known on this side of The Pond. Cheers to the Seattle Opera for showcasing him to U.S. audiences. The always entertaining Seattle Opera blog has a profile of Anstine and tenor Eric Neuville, which you can read HERE.

Seattle Young Artist member Erik Anstine

Tickets remain for the Wednesday, Friday and Saturday performances. The costumes for this productions are by the internationally renowned fashion designer Zandra Rhodes and are not to be missed! You can click HERE for ticket and performance information.

Philip Cutlip (Top) and Keith Miller (Bottom)

Here is a sampling of Anstine singing Mozart's "Ha! Wie will ich triumphieren" from Die Entführung aus dem Serail.



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