Billy Budd, Sailor Gala

Join BCHS and collaborators Berkshire Opera Festival and Tanglewood Learning Institute at the Linde Center for Music and Learning for an evening of selections from the opera Billy Budd, Sailor paired with readings by Ryan Winkles from the classic novella.  This 1951 opera is scored by Benjamin Britten with a libretto by authors E. M. Forster and Eric Crozier.

The evening begins at 7 pm with a celebratory toast and “taste of history” provided by Berkshire Cider Project. Our friends at Berkshire Cider Project have created a special cider  made exclusively from a single heirloom apple tree on the site of Herman Melville’s Arrowhead. This extremely limited cider is dry and sparkling, with crisp acid balanced by the natural tannins of these historic apples.

Nautical-themed desserts and cocktails by Gourmet Caterers follow the performance. 

Open seating, $100; use the BOOK NOW button to reserve tickets.

THE PERFORMANCE

Captain Vere:  “I am an old man” — prologue; first music in the opera (3:45)
Billy Budd:  “Jemmy Legs likes me” — Act 1, scene 3; finale of Act 1 (3:00)
Billy Budd:  “Look! Through the port” (“Billy in the Darbies”) — Act 2, scene 3 (5:30)
Captain Vere:  “We committed his body to the deep” — epilogue; final music in the opera (4:40)

THE PERFORMERS

Markel Reed, baritone, sings Billy Budd
Baritone Markel Reed “brings great articulate power and style” (Broadway World) to his performances.  At the Metropolitan Opera, he performed in productions of Blanchard’s Fire Shut Up in My Bones and in their Grammy-winning Porgy and Bess in 2019, when he also created the role of Chester in Fire Shut Up in My Bones at its premiere in St. Louis.  This season has featured Figaro in Il barbiere di Siviglia with Virginia Opera, and returns to the Omaha Symphony and the Steamboat Symphony.  His previous credits include performances with Theater St. Gallen in Switzerland, Boston Lyric Opera, Utah Opera, Detroit Symphony, and Boston Symphony Orchestra.

Colin Aikins, tenor, sings Captain Vere
A heralded tenor from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Colin is currently pursuing his Master’s in vocal performance at the Juilliard School under the tutelage of William Burden. Colin received his Bachelor’s Degree at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, PA and studied under the tutelage of Julia Faulkner of the Chicago Lyric Opera. Most recently, he made his role debut as Alfredo from Verdi’s La Traviata with City Lyric Opera and Gherardo in Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi with the Juilliard Opera. He has sung in numerous productions at the Curtis Opera Theatre.

Noah Palmer, Pianist 
Noah is a conductor, accomplished vocal coach and pianist. He has worked with several regional opera companies, including Sarasota Opera and Opera North. In 2021, Noah was the principal coach and rehearsal pianist for Tom Cipullo’s “Glory Denied” at the Berkshire Opera Festival and was subsequently invited back in 2022 for their production of Jake Heggie’s “Three Decembers”. Noah has performed with some of the Capital Region’s finest singers, including Andrew Boisvert, Vedrana Kalas, Sylvia Stoner, Irina Petrik, and the late Kevin Kees. In 2022, he accompanied violinist Elizabeth Pitcairn in a vibrant program of Russian and Polish music at Troy Savings Bank Music Hall. 

Luca Antonucci, Host
A native of Watertown, Massachusetts, Luca Antonucci holds an M.M. in Orchestral Conducting from the Hartt School, where he studied with Edward Cumming and Glen Adsit, and is currently completing a D.M.A. from the world-renowned University of Michigan, where he studies with Kenneth Kiesler. Luca graduated summa cum Laude from Amherst College and was a Fulbright Fellow in Vienna, where he conducted research and published “Schönberg Conducts Mahler: Exploring A Performance from Schönberg’s East Coast Year” in the Journal of the Arnold Schönberg Center. 

Ryan Winkles, Actor
Ryan is an actor based in the Berkshires of Massachusetts. He was most recently seen playing Autolycus in The Winter’s Tale on Boston Common with Commonwealth Shakespeare Company. Regional Credits include: Joy and Pandemic  (Huntington Theatre Company); Mr Fullerton Between the Sheets (Gloucester Stage);  Pericles (the rig); ROE (WAM Theater); The Stones (Great Barrington Public Theatre); Visitors (Martha’s Vineyard Playhouse). Ryan is also a company member of Shakespeare & Company where credits include As You Like It, The Tempest, Henry V, King Lear, Macbeth, Two Gentlemen of Verona, Othello, and Richard III. Television: “Time Traveling Bong”(Comedy Central). Film: The Boston Strangler(Hulu), Paper Birds(French Press Films), UFOTOG(Trumbull Studios). Ryan is a proud member of Actors Equity and SAG.

Berkshire Opera Festival
BOF is a fully-producing summer festival founded by Jonathon Loy and Brian Garman which presented its first season in 2016. The mission of Berkshire Opera Festival is to entertain and enrich the lives of people of all ages and backgrounds throughout the Berkshire region by providing accessible and affordable performances of a broad range of operas with the highest artistic standards. Each summer, BOF presents musically and dramatically compelling operatic productions, in addition to recitals and other related musical events. Recent productions include Mozart’s Don Giovanni and Puccini’s La Bohème.

Tanglewood Learning Institute
Performances by unconventional artists. Open rehearsals and master classes led by world-renowned musicians. Weekends dedicated to film, masterpieces old and new, and more. Eye-opening discussions with noted biographers, civic leaders, and playwrights. Only at TLI will you find such a diverse and daring mosaic of voices and visions, because at TLI, everything—every idea, every story, every perspective—is in play.

This program is made possible with financial support from 

Thank you to our event collaborators