Possessing a
voice praised by the San Francisco Chronicle for its “effortless precision and
tonal luster,” Jessica Rivera is established as one of the most creatively
inspired vocal artists before the public today. The intelligence, dimension,
and spirituality with which she infuses her performances on the great
international concert and opera stages has garnered Ms. Rivera unique artistic
collaborations with many of today’s most celebrated composers including John
Adams, Osvaldo Golijov, and Nico Muhly, and has brought her together in
collaboration with such esteemed conductors as Bernard Haitink, Sir Simon
Rattle, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Robert Spano, and Michael Tilson Thomas.
Ms. Rivera
was heralded in the world premiere of John Adams’s newest opera, A Flowering Tree, singing the role of
Kumudha, in a production directed by Peter Sellars as part of the New Crowned
Hope Festival in Vienna. Since then, she has performed A Flowering Tree for her debut with the Berliner Philharmoniker
with Sir Simon Rattle and, under the composer’s baton, with the Cincinnati
Opera, San Francisco Symphony, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Orchestra of
St. Luke’s at Lincoln Center, and the London Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican
Centre. The London performances were recorded and are commercially available on the Nonesuch Records
label.
The artist
made her European operatic debut as Kitty Oppenheimer in Peter Sellars’s
acclaimed production of John Adams’s Doctor
Atomic with the Netherlands Opera, a role that also served for her debut at
the Lyric Opera of Chicago, and she joined the roster of the Metropolitan Opera
for its new production of Doctor Atomic
under the direction of Alan Gilbert. She gave concert performances of Doctor Atomic with Robert Spano and the
Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, and her portrayal of Kitty Oppenheimer was captured
in Amsterdam and is commercially available on DVD on the BBC/Opus Arte label.
Ms. Rivera’s 2012-13
season features the role of Pat Nixon in John Adams’s Nixon in China as part of a multi-city European tour with the BBC
Symphony Orchestra conducted by the composer. A frequent guest soloist with the Atlanta
Symphony Orchestra, the soprano performs a program of Grieg, Sibelius, and
Rachmaninoff under the baton of Music Director Robert Spano and reprises her
acclaimed interpretation of John Adams’s El
Niño with the Vancouver Bach Choir. Ms.
Rivera makes two appearances at Carnegie Hall in the season as a part of the
Hall’s “Voices from Latin America” focus; celebrating her close association
with Osvaldo Golijov, Ms. Rivera performs La Pasiónsegún San
Marcos conducted by Robert Spano in Stern Auditorium and Ayre with the St. Lawrence String
Quartet in Zankel Hall. Other concert
work includes Centinela Songs by
Gabriela Lena Frank with the Annapolis Symphony and the world premiere of Holy Daughters, a newly-commissioned oratorio by Ms. Frank and Pulitzer Prize-winning
author and playwright Nilo Cruz, featuring the Berkeley Symphony Orchestra and
the San Francisco Girls Chorus under the baton of Joana Carneiro.
During the
2011-12 season Ms. Rivera made her debut with the Finnish National Opera as
Kitty Oppenheimer, and with Madrid’s Teatro Real in Golijov’s Ainadamar, singing the role of Margarita
Xirgu. She returned to the Atlanta
Symphony, led by Robert Spano, for concert performances of Adams’s A Flowering Tree, and to the Cartagena
Festival in Colombia for Golijov’s La Pasión según San
Marcos. Under
the direction of Bernard Haitink, Jessica Rivera made her Boston Symphony
Orchestra debut in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, which she also sang with the
Chamber Orchestra of Europe at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam and in Salle
Pleyel in Paris. Other season highlights
included the world premiere of a new work by Gabriela Lena Frank with Joana
Carneiro and the Berkeley Symphony, Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 with Michael Stern
and the Kansas City Symphony, and a solo recital presented by San Francisco
Performances.
Jessica
Rivera is now in her third year of the Artist Residency Program with San
Francisco Performances where she conducts workshops in classroom and community
settings throughout the Bay Area encouraging young people to open their minds
to the beauty and power of music as well as to the poetry and spirit behind the
art of song.
Highlights of
recent seasons include performances of El
Niño with David Robertson and the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra, the San
Francisco Symphony and at the Edinburgh International Festival with James
Conlon and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Nixon Tapes with the Pittsburgh Symphony under the direction of
John Adams, Górecki’s
Symphony No. 3 (“Symphony of Sorrowful Songs”) with Gustavo Dudamel and the Los
Angeles Philharmonic, Mahler’s Fourth Symphony with Franz Welser-Möst for a debut with the
Cleveland Orchestra, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with Sir Roger Norrington and
the Orchestra of St. Luke’s at Carnegie Hall, with Bernard Haitink and the
Chicago Symphony Orchestra and with Michael Tilson Thomas and the Los Angeles
Philharmonic, Britten’s Spring Symphony with Robert Spano and the Atlanta
Symphony Orchestra, Carmen, as
Micaëla, with Bramwell Tovey and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Poulenc’s Gloria with Mr. Haitink and the Chicago
Symphony Orchestra, which she also sang with Grant Gershon at the Hollywood
Bowl, and Ravel’s Shéhérazade with
Mr. Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony. Carnegie Hall and Cal
Performances Berkeley co-commissioned a work for Jessica Rivera written by Mark
Grey to a libretto by Niloufar Talebi; Atash
Sorushan (Fire Angels) received its premiere during recital presentations
at Zankel Hall and Hertz Hall in a collaboration with pianist Molly Morkoski
and the MEME Chamber Ensemble.
Jessica
Rivera made her critically acclaimed Santa Fe Opera debut in the summer of 2005
as Nuria in the world premiere of the revised edition of Osvaldo Golijov's Ainadamar. She reprised the role for the
2007 Grammy Award-winning Deutsche Grammophon recording of the work with the
Atlanta Symphony Orchestra under Robert Spano, and bowed in the Peter Sellars
staging at Lincoln Center, Opera Boston, as well as in performances at the
Barbican Centre, the Adelaide Festival of Arts, Cincinnati Opera, and the Ojai
and Ravinia Festivals. The artist’s first performances of Margarita Xirgu in Ainadamar, a role created by Dawn
Upshaw, occurred in the summer of 2007 at the Colorado Music Festival under the
baton of Michael Christie.
Committed to
the art of recital, Ms. Rivera has performed in concert halls in New York, Los
Angeles, San Francisco and Santa Fe. In
past seasons, to support a recital disc on the Urtext Records label that
examines works for soprano, clarinet, and piano, Ms. Rivera toured North
America with concerts in Los Angeles, New York (Carnegie Hall), Las Vegas,
Oklahoma City, and Chicago (Ravinia Festival). She also has given a recital
program at the Amelia Island Festival accompanied at the piano by Robert Spano.
She was deeply honored to have received a commission from Carnegie Hall for the
world premiere of a song cycle by Nico Muhly called The Adulteress given on the occasion of her Weill Hall recital
performance.
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