(audience clapping)
BRIAN ZEGER: Good evening.
Good evening, thank you very much.
I'm Brian Zeger,
artistic director of the Marcus Institute for Vocal Arts
here at Juilliard.
I'm thrilled to welcome our audience here at Juilliard
and also our audience from around the world
through Medici TV.
We feel so lucky not only to be able to present
these marvelous classes here in New York,
but to be able to share them with the rest of the world.
'Cause indeed, this is really world-class music making
and world-class teaching, which we will experience tonight.
We're extraordinarily lucky
to be able to have two hours with Yannick Nézet-Séguin,
music director of the Metropolitan Opera.
How he managed to fit us into his monstrously busy
and successful schedule is a mystery to me,
but it is our huge luck, and huge luck
for these four singers he will work with today.
We've had several classes with Yannick
over the past couple of years, and I have to say
he is one of, in addition to being one of the most important
musicians working in the world today,
he is one of the truly great teachers.
He combines such deep knowledge of music,
deep knowledge of vocalism, of text, of drama, of style.
And not only is he an expert in all these fields,
but he really understands how to put them together.
And I have to say for our young singers
who are gathering so many kinds of aptitudes,
so many kinds of skills at the same time,
to have someone who can show them
how to really unify these skills is an incredible gift.
So we feel so lucky, huge thanks to Maestro Nézet-Séguin.
And without further ado, let's begin the class.
Thank you.
(audience clapping)
YANNICK NÉZET-SÉGUIN: Thank you.
Thank you, everyone.
Thank you, Brian,
for this way too nice introduction.
It's always a pleasure to come across the street to this.
Yeah, I can say that now in my newly,
really truly my new city.
So that's absolutely wonderful.
And to work in Juilliard is a dream
for any person who wants to share as I do.
I want to share what I can.
Yes, the things I learned over the years but also,
especially my passion for opera,
my passion for music in general.
I did a class a few weeks, months ago also
with the Lindeman young artist
from the Metropolitan Opera,
but also collaborating with the Juilliard Orchestra.
So it was an operatic thing, repertoire, but
focused mostly towards the orchestra.
But now it's a pleasure to hear
the great vocal talents of this institution.
Of course, I don't pretend,
and I know you know this, but I should say
to the audience here, that I don't pretend that I can
help people having the right position of the larynx
and where the voice should start from the hips, or you know,
the tip of the hair.
Whatever, everybody has his own area of expertise.
But the sense of this class is precisely, as Brian said,
for me it will be about dramatic context, text.
And also, interestingly, because we have
a lot of Mozart in this, there will be,
I will try to focus especially on how we can make
it easier between conductor and principals and singers
on stage how to relate, how to collaborate,
and making it rhythmically stable,
and understandable, intelligible also
for the orchestra playing.
Pretending there is an orchestra.
But of course we're gonna have an orchestral piano for this.
So, the two first ones, I believe is Aaron and Richard.
Right?
Coming first, please.