Dominic Cossa
Encyclopedia
Dominic Cossa is an American operatic lyric baritone particularly associated with the Italian and French repertoire.
, Cossa studied with Anthony Marlowe in Detroit, Michigan
, Robert Weede
in Concord, California
, and Armen Boyajian in New York City. He made his debut at the New York City Opera
as Morales in 1961, and a week later sang Sharpless with the company. He won the American Opera Auditions in 1964 and was sent to Italy for debuts at the Teatro Nuovo in Milan and Teatro della Pergola
in Florence.
He made his debut at the San Francisco Opera
in 1967 as Zurga in Les pêcheurs de perles
. His Metropolitan Opera
debut took place on January 30, 1970 as Silvio in Pagliacci
. Other roles there were Figaro
in Il barbiere di Siviglia, Lescaut in Manon Lescaut
, Marcello in La bohème
, Mercutio in Romeo and Juliette, Masetto in Don Giovanni
, Valentin in Faust
, Yeletsky in Pique Dame
, Germont in La traviata
, and Albert in Werther
. In 1976 he created the role of David Murphy in the world premiere of Gian Carlo Menotti
's The Hero
with the Opera Company of Philadelphia
.
Cossa's left a few notable recordings of his best roles such as Belcore in L'elisir d'amore
opposite Dame Joan Sutherland
and Luciano Pavarotti
, Achillas in Handel's Giulio Cesare opposite Norman Treigle
and Beverly Sills
, Nevers in Meyerbeer's Les Huguenots
, again opposite Sutherland, Martina Arroyo
and Huguette Tourangeau
, and the baritone solo part in Roger Sessions
' When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd
. He can also be heard on the Classical Record Library's A Celebration of Schumann and Schubert with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.
He has sung as soloist with the New York Philharmonic
, the Boston Symphony, the Chicago Symphony, the Israel Philharmonic, and the National Symphony.
He was chosen by Licia Albanese
to be the recipient of the Puccini Foundation's Bacccarat Award in 2004, and in 1993 was inducted into the Hall of Fame for Great American Singers at the Academy of Vocal Arts in Philadelphia.
Cossa taught at the Manhattan School of Music
and in 1988 he accepted a position as Professor of Music at the University of Maryland, College Park
, where he became chair of Voice/Opera.
He was a National Patron of Delta Omicron
, an international professional music fraternity.
Biography
Born in Jessup, PennsylvaniaJessup, Pennsylvania
Jessup is a borough in Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 4,676 at the 2010 census.-Geography:Jessup is located at ....
, Cossa studied with Anthony Marlowe in Detroit, Michigan
Detroit, Michigan
Detroit is the major city among the primary cultural, financial, and transportation centers in the Metro Detroit area, a region of 5.2 million people. As the seat of Wayne County, the city of Detroit is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan and serves as a major port on the Detroit River...
, Robert Weede
Robert Weede
-Biography:Born Robert Wiedefeld in Baltimore, Maryland, Weede studied voice at the Eastman School of Music and in Milan. He made his Metropolitan Opera debut in 1937, as Tonio in Pagliacci...
in Concord, California
Concord, California
Concord is the largest city in Contra Costa County, California, USA. At the 2010 census, the city had a population of 122,067. Originally founded in 1869 as the community of Todos Santos by Salvio Pacheco, the name was changed to Concord within months...
, and Armen Boyajian in New York City. He made his debut at the New York City Opera
New York City Opera
The New York City Opera is an American opera company located in New York City.The company, called "the people's opera" by New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia, was founded in 1943 with the aim of making opera financially accessible to a wide audience, producing an innovative choice of repertory, and...
as Morales in 1961, and a week later sang Sharpless with the company. He won the American Opera Auditions in 1964 and was sent to Italy for debuts at the Teatro Nuovo in Milan and Teatro della Pergola
Teatro della Pergola
The Teatro della Pergola is a historic opera house in Florence, Italy. It is located in the centre of the city on the Via della Pergola, from which the theatre takes its name...
in Florence.
He made his debut at the San Francisco Opera
San Francisco Opera
San Francisco Opera is an American opera company, based in San Francisco, California.It was founded in 1923 by Gaetano Merola and is the second largest opera company in North America...
in 1967 as Zurga in Les pêcheurs de perles
Les pêcheurs de perles
Les pêcheurs de perles is an opera in three acts by the French composer Georges Bizet, to a libretto by Eugène Cormon and Michel Carré. It was first performed on 30 September 1863 at the Théâtre Lyrique in Paris, and was given 18 performances in its initial run...
. His Metropolitan Opera
Metropolitan Opera
The Metropolitan Opera is an opera company, located in New York City. Originally founded in 1880, the company gave its first performance on October 22, 1883. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager...
debut took place on January 30, 1970 as Silvio in Pagliacci
Pagliacci
Pagliacci , sometimes incorrectly rendered with a definite article as I Pagliacci, is an opera consisting of a prologue and two acts written and composed by Ruggero Leoncavallo. It recounts the tragedy of a jealous husband in a commedia dell'arte troupe...
. Other roles there were Figaro
Figaro
-Literature:* Figaro, the central character in:** The Barber of Seville by Beaumarchais***Il barbiere di Siviglia , the opera by Paisiello based on Beaumarchais' play...
in Il barbiere di Siviglia, Lescaut in Manon Lescaut
Manon Lescaut (Puccini)
Manon Lescaut is an opera in four acts by Giacomo Puccini. The story is based on the 1731 novel L’histoire du chevalier des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut by the Abbé Prévost....
, Marcello in La bohème
La bohème
La bohème is an opera in four acts,Puccini called the divisions quadro, a tableau or "image", rather than atto . by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa, based on Scènes de la vie de bohème by Henri Murger...
, Mercutio in Romeo and Juliette, Masetto in Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and with an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It was premiered by the Prague Italian opera at the Teatro di Praga on October 29, 1787...
, Valentin in Faust
Faust (opera)
Faust is a drame lyrique in five acts by Charles Gounod to a French libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré from Carré's play Faust et Marguerite, in turn loosely based on Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust, Part 1...
, Yeletsky in Pique Dame
The Queen of Spades (opera)
The Queen of Spades, Op. 68 is an opera in 3 acts by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky to a Russian libretto by the composer's brother Modest Tchaikovsky, based on a short story of the same name by Alexander Pushkin. The premiere took place in 1890 in St...
, Germont in La traviata
La traviata
La traviata is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi set to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave. It is based on La dame aux Camélias , a play adapted from the novel by Alexandre Dumas, fils. The title La traviata means literally The Fallen Woman, or perhaps more figuratively, The Woman...
, and Albert in Werther
Werther
Werther is an opera in four acts by Jules Massenet to a French libretto by Édouard Blau, Paul Milliet and Georges Hartmann based on the German epistolary novel The Sorrows of Young Werther by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe....
. In 1976 he created the role of David Murphy in the world premiere of Gian Carlo Menotti
Gian Carlo Menotti
Gian Carlo Menotti was an Italian-American composer and librettist. Although he often referred to himself as an American composer, he kept his Italian citizenship. He wrote the classic Christmas opera, Amahl and the Night Visitors, among about two dozen other operas intended to appeal to popular...
's The Hero
The Hero (opera)
The Hero is a two act opera by Italian-American composer Gian Carlo Menotti. Comissioned by the Opera Company of Philadelphia, the work premiered at the Philadelphia Academy of Music on June 1, 1976. At this point of his career, Menotti's style of composition, which rejected the avant-garde, was...
with the Opera Company of Philadelphia
Opera Company of Philadelphia
The Opera Company of Philadelphia is an American opera company in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and is the city's only company producing grand opera. The organization produces four fully staged opera productions annually, encompassing works from the seventeenth through the 21st century...
.
Cossa's left a few notable recordings of his best roles such as Belcore in L'elisir d'amore
L'elisir d'amore
L'elisir d'amore is an opera by the Italian composer Gaetano Donizetti. It is a melodramma giocoso in two acts...
opposite Dame Joan Sutherland
Joan Sutherland
Dame Joan Alston Sutherland, OM, AC, DBE was an Australian dramatic coloratura soprano noted for her contribution to the renaissance of the bel canto repertoire from the late 1950s through to the 1980s....
and Luciano Pavarotti
Luciano Pavarotti
right|thumb|Luciano Pavarotti performing at the opening of the Constantine Palace in [[Strelna]], 31 May 2003. The concert was part of the celebrations for the 300th anniversary of [[St...
, Achillas in Handel's Giulio Cesare opposite Norman Treigle
Norman Treigle
Norman Treigle was an American operatic bass-baritone, who was acclaimed for his great abilities as a singing-actor, and specialized in roles that evoked villainy and terror....
and Beverly Sills
Beverly Sills
Beverly Sills was an American operatic soprano whose peak career was between the 1950s and 1970s. In her prime she was the only real rival to Joan Sutherland as the leading bel canto stylist...
, Nevers in Meyerbeer's Les Huguenots
Les Huguenots
Les Huguenots is a French opera by Giacomo Meyerbeer, one of the most popular and spectacular examples of the style of grand opera. The opera is in five acts and premiered in Paris in 1836. The libretto was written by Eugène Scribe and Émile Deschamps....
, again opposite Sutherland, Martina Arroyo
Martina Arroyo
Martina Arroyo is an operatic soprano of Puerto Rican and African-American descent who had a major international opera career during the 1960s through the 1980s...
and Huguette Tourangeau
Huguette Tourangeau
Huguette Tourangeau, is a French-Canadian operatic mezzo-soprano, particularly associated with the French and Italian repertories.- Life and career :...
, and the baritone solo part in Roger Sessions
Roger Sessions
Roger Huntington Sessions was an American composer, critic, and teacher of music.-Life:Sessions was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a family that could trace its roots back to the American revolution. His mother, Ruth Huntington Sessions, was a direct descendent of Samuel Huntington, a signer of...
' When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd
When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd
When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd is an elegy written by Walt Whitman shortly after the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln in 1865...
. He can also be heard on the Classical Record Library's A Celebration of Schumann and Schubert with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.
He has sung as soloist with the New York Philharmonic
New York Philharmonic
The New York Philharmonic is a symphony orchestra based in New York City in the United States. It is one of the American orchestras commonly referred to as the "Big Five"...
, the Boston Symphony, the Chicago Symphony, the Israel Philharmonic, and the National Symphony.
He was chosen by Licia Albanese
Licia Albanese
Licia Albanese is an Italian-born American operatic soprano. Noted especially for her portrayals of the lyric heroines of Verdi and Puccini, Albanese was a leading artist with the Metropolitan Opera of New York from 1940 to 1966...
to be the recipient of the Puccini Foundation's Bacccarat Award in 2004, and in 1993 was inducted into the Hall of Fame for Great American Singers at the Academy of Vocal Arts in Philadelphia.
Cossa taught at the Manhattan School of Music
Manhattan School of Music
The Manhattan School of Music is a major music conservatory located on the Upper West Side of New York City. The school offers degrees on the bachelors, masters, and doctoral levels in the areas of classical and jazz performance and composition...
and in 1988 he accepted a position as Professor of Music at the University of Maryland, College Park
University of Maryland, College Park
The University of Maryland, College Park is a top-ranked public research university located in the city of College Park in Prince George's County, Maryland, just outside Washington, D.C...
, where he became chair of Voice/Opera.
He was a National Patron of Delta Omicron
Delta Omicron
Delta Omicron is a co-ed international professional music honors fraternity whose mission is to promote and support excellence in music and musicianship.-History:...
, an international professional music fraternity.
Sources
- Bender, WilliamWilliam BenderWilliam Bender is an American music critic who currently reviews for the American Record Guide. A former music critic with the New York Herald Tribune and the World Journal Tribune, he was chief music critic for Time magazine from 1968-1978...
. "Music: Souvenir Opera", TimeTime (magazine)Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
(June 14, 1976) - Central Opera Service Bulletin. "Winners of Vocal Competitions" (May-June 1966)
- Hamilton, David (ed.) "Cossa, Dominic", The Metropolitan Opera Encyclopedia. Simon and Schuster (1987) ISBN 067161732X
- New York Times, "4 American Opera Singers Have Debut in Milan" (September 21, 1962)
- University of Maryland School of Music. Faculty biography: Dominic Cossa
External links
- Opera Music Theater International. Dominic Cossa: Opera Music Theater International Lifetime Achievement Award
- Cummings, David (ed.). "Cossa, Dominic", International Who's Who in Classical Music 2003. Routledge (2003). ISBN 185743174X