Don Carlos
Grand opera in Five Acts
12th October 2007
Canadian Opera Company, Toronto
This was a co-production between the Welsh National Opera and Canadian Opera Company of the original 5 Act version of Don Carlos, sung in French.
The first performance of this production was by the WNO at the Wales Millennium Centre, Cardiff on 17th September 2005.
It opened at the Canadian Opera Company in Toronto on 12th October 2007.
The Houston Grand Opera production opened on 13th April 2012 and played in repertoire until the 28th April.
Richard Bradshaw
The music director and chief conductor of COC, the much-loved and admired Richard Bradshaw, was instrumental in setting up the co-production deal with WNO. He was to have conducted the opera but he died suddenly and unexpectedly a few weeks before rehearsals began.
The excellent Paolo Olmi stepped in at short notice to replace him on the podium, but Richard was dreadfully missed – as he still is by all his friends and colleagues.
Don Carlos
| Composed by | Giuseppe Verdi |
| Text by | Joseph Méry and Camille Du Locle |
| Based on Don Carlos, Infant von Spanien by | Friedrich Schiller |
Creative Team
| Conductor | Paolo Olmi |
| Director | John Caird |
| Set Designer | Johan Engels |
| Costume Designer | Carl Friedrich Oberle |
| Lighting Designer | Nigel Levings |
| Movement & Assistant Director | Denni Sayers |
| Chorus Master | Sandra Horst |
| Stage Manager | Jenifer Kowal |
| Surtitles Producer | Gunta Dreifelds |
| Surtitles Author | Simon Rees |
| Assistant Conductor | Derek Bate |
| Music Staff | Albert Krywolt |
| Assistant Director | David Adams |
| Language Coach | Rosemarie Landrie |
| Production Artwork | Johan Engels |
| Production Photographs | Bill Cooper |
Cast
| Multiple actors denote alternating cast | |
| Cast in order of vocal appearance: | |
| Don Carlos, heir to the Spanish throne | Mikhail Agafonov |
| Thibault, Elisabeth's page | Nathalie Paulin |
| Elisabeth de Valois, later Queen of Spain | Adrianne Pieczonka |
| Comte de Lerme | Jason Collins |
| The Spirit of Charles V | Zdeněk Plech |
| Rodrigue, Marquis of Posa | Scott Hendricks |
| Princesse of Eboli, Elisabeth's lady-in-waiting | Mary Phillips / Guang Yang |
| Philippe II, King of Spain | Terje Stensvold |
| A Royal Herald | Adam Luther |
| Flemish Deputies | Jon-Paul Decosse / Alexander Hajek / Niculae Raiciu / Andrew Stewart / Justin Welsh |
| A Celestial Voice | Virginia Hatfield |
| The Grand Inquisitor | Ayk Martirossian |
| Countess d'Aremberg | Cynthia Won |
Chorus
| Sopranos | Megan Atchison / Mary Bella / Heidi Breier / Stacie Carmona / Rhonwen Derbez / Margaret Evans / Rachel Harwood-Jones / Ilona Karan / Mei Lee / Alexandra Lennox / Ingrid Martin / Ileana Montalbetti / Victoria Pinnington / Jennifer Robinson / Catherine Tait / Teresa van der Hoeven / Michelyn Wright |
| Mezzo-sopranos | Marianne Bindig / Susan Black / Sandra Boyes / Sonya Gosse / Heather Jewson / Gaynor Jones / Lilian Kilianski / Kathryn Knapp / Anne McWatt / Marion Newman / Karen Olinyk / Deborah Overes / Marianne Sasso / Lisa Spain / Vilma Indra Vitols / Marcia Whitehead / Paula Wickberg / Cindy Won |
| Tenors | Craig Ashton / Michael Barrett / Sasha Bataligin / Stephen Bell / Gregory Carpenter / Peter Collins / Stephen Erickson / Nicolas Groenewegen / Riccardo Iannello / Jason Kehler / John Kriter / Jason Lamont / James Leatch / Joseph Lévesque / Stephen McClare / Derrick Paul Miller / Wade Nott / Steven Sherwood |
| Basses/Bartones | Grant Allert / Neil Aronoff / Kenneth Baker / James Baldwin / Peter Barnes / Sung Chung / Bruno Cormier / Mark Daboll / Michael Downie / James Lévesque / Douglas Millar / Craig Morash / Jason Nedecky / Niculae Raiciu / Bruce Schaef / Micahel Sproule / Peter Wiens / Marcus Wilson / Nathaniel Wiseman |
Orchestra
| Violin I | Marie Bérard (Concertmaster) / Benjamin Bowman (Associate Concertmaster) / Diane Tait (Assistant Concertmaster) / Anne Armstrong / Sandra Baron / Bethany Bergman / Ruth Fazal / Hiroko Kagawa / Nana Kershaw / Dominique Laplante / Yakov Lerner / Jayne Maddison / Neria Mayer / Aya Miyagawa |
| Violin II | Paul Zevenhuizen (Principal) / Csaba Koczo (Assistant Principal) / James Aylesworth / Andrew Chung / Floortje Gerritson-Huston / Pamela Hinman / Elizabeth Johnston / Mia King / Laurel Mascarenhas / Louise Tardif / Marianne Urke-Rapson / Joanna Zabrowarna |
| Viola | Nicolò Eugelmi (Principal) / Joshua Greenlaw (Assistant Principal) / Carolyn Blackwell / Karen Moffat / Nicholaos Papadakis / Rhyll Peel / Tracy Pioner / Capella Sherwood / Beverley Spotton / Yosef Tamir |
| Cello | Bryan Epperson (Principal) / Paul Widner (Assistant Principal) / Maurizio Baccante / Peter Cosbey / Garret Knecht / Olga Laktionova / Elspeth Poole / Elaine Thompson |
| Bass | Alan Molitz (Principal) / Robert Speer (Assistant Principal) / Tom Hazlitt / Paul Langley / Eric Lee / Robert Wolanski |
| Flute | Douglas Stewart (Principal) / Christine Little / Shelley Brown |
| Piccolo | Shelley Brown |
| Oboe | Mark Rogers (Principal) / Lesley Young |
| Cor Anglais (English Horn) | Lesley Young |
| Clarinet | Stanley McCartney (Principal) / Colleen Cook |
| Bassoon | Eric Hall (Principal) / Elizabeth Gower / William Cannaway / John Fekete |
| Contra Bassoon | Elizabeth Gowen |
| Horn | Joan Watson (Principal) / Michele Gagnon / Bardhyl Gjevori / Janet Anderson |
| Cornet | Robert Grim (Principal) / Valerie Cowie |
| Trumpet | Robert Venables / Luise Heyerhoff |
| Trombone | Robert Ferguston (Principal) / Ian Cowie |
| Bass Trombone | Herbert Poole |
| Cimbasso | Scott Irvine |
| Timpani | Michael Perry (Principal) |
| Percussion | Trevor Tureski (Principal) |
| Harp | Sarah Davidson (Principal) |
| Offstage Musicians | |
| Harp | Sarah Davidson |
| Harmonium | Albert Krywolt |
| Percussion | Trevor Tureski |
| Trumpet | Michael Fedyshyn / Stuart Laughton / Anita McAlister / Richard Sandals |
| Horns | Julian Alexandrov / James MacDonald / Christine Passmore / Gilles Thibodeau |
| Trombones | Janice Owens / Michael Tutton |
| Tuba | Mark Bonang |
| Librarian | Wayne Vogan |
| Librarian Assistant | Muriel Smith |
| Stage Librarian | Paul Langley |
| Personnel Manager | Ian Cowie |