NEWS – December 4, 2008
Acclaimed Soprano Maija Lisa Currie to Appear at
Tenth Annual Pipes of Christmas Concert
Soprano Maija Lisa Currie, described by Opera News as having a “luxurious voice” will make her debut appearance at this year’s Pipes of Christmas concerts in New York and New Jersey.
Maija Lisa Currie
According to producer Robert Currie, “We are absolutely thrilled to be welcoming Maija Lisa into our “Pipes” family. Maija brings to our concert a wealth of critically-acclaimed performances from across the country and we are absolutely delighted to be able to include another of our own extremely talented clanspeople for these special anniversary performances.”
The concert, which is sponsored in part through the generosity of the Grand Summit Hotel, will feature the music of Christmas accompanied by a selection of readings taken from the Celtic literature of Scotland, Ireland, and Wales. In addition to Ms. Currie, featured performers include Andrew Weir from the film “Braveheart,” the Scottish Country Dance trio Local Hero, the Solid Brass ensemble, Scotch Whisky Ambassador Evan Cattanach, and the Kevin Ray Blandford Memorial Pipe Band of Redlands, CA.
About Maija Lisa Currie
Described by Opera News as having a “luxurious voice, nimble and subtle” for her portrayal of Manon, soprano Maija Lisa Currie began the 2008 season as Beauty in Dicapo Opera Theatre’s production of Vittorio Giannini’s Beauty And The Beast, for which the New York Times called her “an attractive young soprano with a promising voice and copious stage presence.” Also this season she covers the role of Cécile de Volanges in Dicapo’s production of Conrad Susa’s The Dangerous Liaisons, sings the role of Esterka Winogron in a semi-staged vocal workshop of Adam B. Silverman’s newly completed opera Korczak’s Orphans, and sings Tytania in a concert reading of A Midsummer Night’s Dream with Dell’Arte Opera Ensemble.
She has performed opera, oratorio, and concert repertoire with such companies as Opernhaus Zürich, Indianapolis Opera, Kentucky Opera, Mobile Opera, Zürcher Festspiele, Spoleto Festival USA, Jacksonville Lyric Opera, Basel Sinfonietta, Dicapo Opera Theatre, Kokomo Symphony Orchestra, Philharmonic Orchestra of Indianapolis, and Brevard Philharmonic Orchestra. During the 2003-2004 season she was a member of the Internationales Opernstudio at Opernhaus Zürich, performing extensively with the company in a number of different productions, including the 2004 production of Der Rosenkavalier.
In addition to her time in the Opernstudio at Zurich, Currie trained as a member of the Indianapolis Opera Ensemble, as a young artist at Music Academy of the West for two summers, and at Brevard Music Center. She was a student at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music where she received a Performance Diploma as well as a Bachelor of Music degree in Voice, and at the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University where she received her Master of Music degree in Voice.
About “The Pipes of Christmas”
Since making its debut in 1999, The Pipes of Christmas has played to standing room only audiences. Given the popularity of the program, a second concert was added in 2001 to accommodate the high-demand for tickets.
That same year, the concert began an award-winning partnership with TV-36, Communities On Cable, by broadcasting concert highlights on Christmas Eve to an estimated 40,000 cable subscribers. Four of the Society’s productions were recipients of the prestigious Telly Award for television production excellence. In 2003, the concert was broadcast live on TV-36 as a fundraiser for the community access station.
Now a cherished holiday institution, the concert has provided audiences with a stirring and reverent celebration of the Christmas season and the Celtic spirit. Audience-goers return year after year to experience the program, many reporting that the Pipes of Christmas has become part of their family’s annual Christmas tradition.
Over the last nine years, the concert has received great critical acclaim. In his review for Classical New Jersey Magazine, Paul Somers wrote, “The whole evening was constructed to introduce gem after gem and still have a finale which raised the roof. In short, it was like a well constructed fireworks show on the Glorious Fourth. The Westfield (NJ) Leader described the concert as “a unique sound of power and glory nowhere else to be found.”