Connecticut Master Chorale

For Louise Fauteux's recent appearance in Un Ballo in Maschera with Connecticut Concert Opera, the Hartford Courant characterized her as a "pert, boyish Oscar" with "clarion tone in her two showpiece arias and a soaring top in the great Act I ensemble." Ms. Fauteux has also been heard in leading roles in the The Impresario, The Magic Flute, Hansel and Gretel, Dido and Aeneas, Amahl and the Night Visitors, The Telephone and The Marriage of Figaro for such venues as Opera North, El Paso Opera, Raylynmor Opera, Opera Theatre of Weston, Boheme Opera, Hat City Music Theatre, Brattleboro Opera Theatre, and American Classical Orchestra. This year she also appeared live on Italy RAI television, performing bel canto repertoire with Met coach Gregory Buchalter at the Teatro Mancinelli in Orvieto, Italy.

While attending Westminster Choir College in Princeton, New Jersey, Louise Fauteux was a featured soloist in Peer Gynt with Kurt Masur and the New York Philharmonic. She toured Korea and Taiwan with the Westminster Choir under the baton of Joseph Flummerfelt. Awards and honors include a fellowship with the Carmel Bach Festival, national semifinalist for the MacAllister Awards, semifinalist in the Bethlehem Bach Competition, and the Highwood Scholarship from the Connecticut Opera Guild. She also received a 2003 Hartt School of Music grant for study in Italy and scholarships for graduate study at Westminster and in Weimar, Germany, where she performed with the Jenaer Philharmonic Orchestra. She appears regularly in recital with pianist Michael Budewitz, who is on the faculty of the Hartt School of Music and accompanies for Intermezzo Festival and Connecticut Opera.

Last year Ms. Fauteux was a guest soloist with the Connecticut Master Chorale for Mozart's Coronation Mass. Since then she has also appeared for arias from Faust (CT Concert Opera), Bach's St. John Passion and Rossini's Messe Solennelle (New Haven Oratorio Chorale) Handel's Messiah (Arcadia Players) and Haydn's Creation (Hartt School of Music and the New Haven Chorale). Other concert repertoire includes the Saint Saens' Christmas Oratorio, Haydn's Nelson Mass, Mozart's Exsultate, jubilate, Orff's Carmina Burana, Brahm's Requiem, and Beethoven's Mass in C. She was also profiled in a February issue of "West Hartford Life," and there described as a "fine young singer ..very sincere, and unmannered in her interpretations." Ms. Fauteux studies with Arthur Levy in Manhattan.

Richard Slade (tenor) is a versatile artist, equally at home on the concert and operatic stages. As a member of The Western Wind, America's pre-eminent vocal ensemble, he tours extensively, and was recently featured on their new Public Radio special and CD, "Holiday Light."

He has sung Tamino in The Magic Flute across New York state, from the Smith Opera House in Geneva to a tour with the Long Island Philharmonic, and as a guest artist with the Mannes Summer Opera. He has been a regularly featured singer at the Caramoor Festival, with appearances in La Gazza Ladra, Lucrezia Borgia, and Il Pirata, plus a solo recital. In June of 2000 he saved the show at Caramoor by learning and performing Schumann's Spanisches Liebeslieder on three hours notice, substituting for an indisposed colleague. He participated in the Samuel Barber festival at the Kaye Playhouse and was recently featured on the McGraw-Hill Young Artists Showcase on WQXR. He has performed in rare revivals of important works such as Donizetti's Gianni di Parigi and Martin y Soler's Una Cosa Rara at the Vineyard Opera, and in Opera Manhattan's productions of Fauré's Pénélope, Hahn's Le Marchand de Venise, and Poulenc's Dialogues of the Carmelites. In the 150th anniversary performance of The Bohemian Girl at the Kaye Playhouse, he sang the role of Thaddeus. He made his Town Hall debut in Paisiello's La Molinara, and his Bronx Opera debut as Eisenstein in Fledermaus.

His concert appearances include the title role in Händel's Judas Maccabeus, as well as Messiah and many of Bach's Cantatas. He recently sang in Beethoven's Missa Solemnis and Dvorak's Stabat Mater with the Choristers of Upper Dublin (Ambler, PA), Schubert's Mass in E Flat and Beethoven's Choral Fantasy with the Canterbury Choral Society in New York City, and Haydn's Lord Nelson Mass with the Ars Musica Chorale, in Paramus, New Jersey.

In the world of operetta he has performed Iolanthe, Princess Ida, and Utopia, Limited with New York Gilbert & Sullivan Players, and a duet cabaret show, Oh Love, True Love! or The Lass That Lov'd a Tenor, with his wife, the soprano Cynthia Reynolds. Mr. Slade is very much at home on the recital platform - not only does he sing a wide range of classical art songs, but he specializes in the parlor repertory of the Victorian era. His solo recitals, A Wand'ring Minstrel I and I'll Sing Thee Songs of Araby have delighted community audiences. He maintains a private voice studio, teaches at Concordia College in Bronxville and Manhattanville College in Purchase, and specializes in imparting the almost forgotten arts of florid singing. In addition to his singing, Mr. Slade is a choral conductor, directing church and synagogue choirs and the chamber ensemble Jubal's Lyre, which he founded.

Mr. Slade received his BA from Yale University and his MM from New England Conservatory. He was an apprentice with the Des Moines, Sarasota and Maine Opera Companies. He has toured the U.S. and Europe with the Yale Whiffenpoofs, the New York Ensemble for Early Music, the New York City Opera, and the New York Gilbert & Sullivan Players.

A Connecticut native, Brendan Cooke returns as soloist to the Connecticut Master Chorale, having performed in Judas Maccabeus and Beethoven’s Mass in C. Mr. Cooke has sung with opera companies all over the United States including the Portland Opera Repertory Theater, Opera North, Baltimore Opera, Maryland Lyric Opera, Chautauqua Opera, Opera Vivente, New Orleans Opera and the Ohio Light Opera. His repertoire ranges from Mozart bass and baritone roles (Figaro, Guglielmo, Don Alfonso, and Il Commendatore) to twentieth century repertoire (Bottom in Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Postman in Lee Hoiby’s The Scarf, Mr. Gobineau in Menotti’s The Medium, and Gino Carella in the world premiere of Mark Lanz Weiser’s Where Angels Fear to Tread).

An active recitalist, Brendan has given concerts in New Orleans, Baltimore, Stamford, at the Chautauqua Institution, and recently at the Academy of the Arts in Easton, MD, in conjunction with their exhibit of N.C. Wyeth and Howard Pyle portraits. On the concert stage, Brendan has appeared with the Baltimore Symphony singing excerpts from Copland’s Old American Songs , the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra and Symphony Chorus of New Orleans as a soloist in Handel’s Israel in Egypt, Bach’s St. John Passion and Kodaly’s Te Deum, with Baltimore’s Ridgely Consort in Fauré’s Requiem. He has been the baritone soloist in Vaughan Williams’ A Pilgrims Journey, Duruflé’s Messe cum Jubilo and Requiem, Handel’s Messiah, and Robert Sirota’s Iscariot.

Brendan holds a Bachelor of Music Education from Loyola University of New Orleans and a Master of Music from the Peabody Conservatory, where he was a student of John Shirley-Quirk. Currently living in Baltimore, Brendan sings regularly with the Baltimore Opera, having performed roles in La Traviata, Elektra, Tosca, Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Rigoletto, Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, and Carmen. This past winter, Brendan was a member of Sarasota Opera’s prestigious Studio Artist Program, where he sang roles in Tosca and Die Zauberflöte. Upcoming engagements include Puccini’s La Fanciulla del West in Baltimore.