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Daniel Sumegi is returning to Australia for the OA production of Carmen on Cockatoo Island, running from 25thNovember – 18th December 2022. The internationally acclaimed bass singer performs the role of Escamillo in this hugely ambitious outdoor production.
In the thirty-second year of his career, Daniel Sumegi has sung over one hundred operatic roles on many of the world’s major stages – including the Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco Opera, Los Angeles Opera, Washington National Opera, Seattle Opera, as well as at Opera Australia. He has also appeared in the opera houses of Bonn, Cologne, Frankfurt and Hamburg, as well as Paris, Barcelona, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Los Angeles and Houston among many others.
Regarded also for his dynamic acting, his broad repertoire encompasses all periods of music – from Monteverdi and Mozart to Britten, Tippett and Puts. Equally comfortable as Strauss’ Baron Ochs, Mozart’s Sarastro and Commendatore, Verdi’s Grand Inquisitor and Sparafucile, Offenbach’s Four Villains or Puccini’s Scarpia, he has participated in Ring Cycles in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Strasbourg, Cologne, Tokyo, Buenos Aires, Seattle, Melbourne and Adelaide, most notably as Hagen. He has additionally performed Hunding in concert for the Hong Kong, Atlanta, Stuttgart and Melbourne Symphony Orchestras.
2021/2022 engagements include Die Walküre (Singapore), Salome (Victorian Opera), Fidelio (Dublin) and Bluebeard’s Castle, Aida and Lohengrin (Opera Australia); in 2023, he makes his début as Wotan/The Wanderer in OA’s new production of Der Ring des Nibelungen.
Most recently, he has sung Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (Pogner) for Opera Australia, Salome (Jochanaan) for New Israeli Opera, Der fliegende Holländer (title role) for Malmö Opera in Sweden and Carmen (Zuniga) for Seattle Opera. He also undertook his music theatre debut, as Judge Turpin in Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd, seen in Sydney and Melbourne. Past highlights include Don Carlo and Madama Butterfly (Metropolitan Opera), Der Rosenkavalier (Scottish and Welsh National Opera), Luisa Miller (San Francisco), Billy Budd and Rigoletto (Los Angeles), Parsifal(Hamburg, Barcelona, Adelaide), Salome (Washington, Hamburg, Leeds, Hong Kong), Der fliegende Holländer, Aida, Beatrice and Benedict and Barbiere (Seattle), Manchurian Candidate (Minnesota, Austin), and more than 25 principal roles for Opera Australia.
He has collaborated with noted conductors such as James Conlon, Sir Andrew Davis, Charles Dutoit, Dan Ettinger, Asher Fisch, Valery Gergiev, Nicola Luisotti, Sir Charles Mackerras, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Renato Palumbo, Sir Simon Rattle, Carlo Rizzi, Donald Runnicles, Nello Santi, Sir Jeffrey Tate, Edo de Waart, Sebastian Weigle, and Simone Young.
Daniel Sumegi appears on CD in Beatrice di Tenda and Seattle Opera’s acclaimed Ring Cycle, and on DVD in the San Francisco Opera Production of Capriccio, Opera Australia’s Don Giovanni, and the historic condensed Ring Cycle from Teatro Colón, Buenos Aires. As Carmen on Cockatoo Island approaches, we talked to Daniel about his fascinating career and what’s happening behind-the-scenes at Opera Australia.
It’s beautiful to be back in Sydney where I have given very few performances since 2016 thanks to multiple Covid cancellations. The weather has become great, and fingers crossed it will stay that way. We have just transferred to the Island as I write this, for final blocking and corrections, as well as sound checks, and getting used to singing outside. Everything seems on track for this extravaganza.
I am a Bondi boy. I left Australia 30 years ago to pursue my dreams in the USA, but I feel so fortunate that opera companies and symphony orchestras across Australia have brought me home to work most of those intervening years, sometimes several times each year. I feel very blessed to have the ‘best of both worlds’.
Escamillo is an odd role, in that he is like a special guest star within the opera, almost a peripheral side story. Having said that, his first appearance is the Toreador Song, arguably one of the Top-5 opera tunes in history.
Everyone knows it, even if they don’t know it comes from Carmen.
Liesel has treated the role exactly for what it is – he is a Rock Star, and we are presenting him as such. It’s a lot of fun. Also, Liesel is delightful, cheeky, polite and runs a great rehearsal room.
I haven’t done large-scale outdoor performances since 1991. The technology is so different now, and I am getting used to it. Having something blocking your ear, while sound, including your own, is fed to you is a big adjustment, and I am finding my way with it, and it is going very well.
The sound team at OA is top-notch, and we are in expert hands.
It is apples and oranges, compared with acoustic performance in a theatre, which is my natural preference.
Some big highlights are understandably from the beginnings, when I won an array of singing competitions in Australia and overseas, including the Metropolitan Opera contest. My debut there, 25 years ago, was also the realisation of my goals. Prior to that, I got to perform as understudy for the role of Ramfis in the Sydney Stadium production of Aida in 1989. It had genuine opera stars, and I call it my international debut in my own backyard, since I lived down the street in Bondi.
Working for Opera Australia, first as understudy in 1992, then as a regular guest artist from 1995, was also a dream-come-true. In fact, it is the company I have worked for most, having performed well over 25 major roles for them, and still counting.
This is the Mount Everest for any low-voiced opera singer, and the culmination of a long and varied career. The responsibility that comes with leading the entire team is daunting. I started looking at this music when I was 19. My teacher felt I was born to sing it, though he said it would be many years before I would.
Finally getting to perform it has come late, even later because of Covid, but I am totally ready for it.
I understudied all three roles 12 years ago for Los Angeles Opera, and even did the dress rehearsal for Siegfried. I have sung most of the other bass roles in 10 Ring Cycles since my first in 1998, in Adelaide.
Prior to last year’s postponement, I used immersive study of the roles, and also a technical reworking of my voice, as my lockdown project. I wanted to keep my tools sharp, and I am very glad I did. Many colleagues did not, and now, sadly, their careers are suffering.
The ultimate femme fatale is back, in a brand-new island performance in the middle of Sydney Harbour.
Carmen tosses her hair, stamps her feet and the whole world falls under her spell.
Revel in the irresistible Spanish tunes, sultry story, and dark undercurrent of Carmen. You’ll hear the flirty Habanera and famous Toreador song amid a spectacle that features motorbike stunts, crashed cars and fireworks.
Your night begins with a ferry ride across the glittering water to the world-heritage listed sanctuary of Cockatoo Island. Step off the boat and you’re surrounded by layers of history. Once a meeting place for the Eora Nation, the site is now dotted with the industrial relics of a century of ship-building and architectural marvels dating back to Sydney’s convict past.
Today, the island is a world-class contemporary arts venue, hosting everything from the Biennale of Sydney to live concert performances. It’s the perfect backdrop for Bizet’s gritty tale of fate and freedom.
Raise a glass with friends and grab a snack from an array of pop-up bars and eateries on the foreshore before settling in under the stars for an unforgettable night out.
Carmen on Cockatoo Island runs from 25th November – 18th December 2022
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Michelle is a musician and composer from the UK. She has performed across the UK and Europe and is passionate about arts education and opportunities for women and girls.
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