In the 26 February 2021 programme of Masquerade, alto Atala Schöck and bass-baritone Antal Cseh presented excerpts from popular operas by Mozart, Bizet and Russian composers as well as arias from rarely played Italian masterpieces. The performance was streamed form 8:00 p.m. on Facebook and Origo.
Atala Schöck won the József Simándy Singing Competition in 1998, two years later she came third at the Hungarian Radio Singing Competition. It was still in 2000 that she graduated the Teacher Training Institute of the Music Academy. She made her debut at the Hungarian State Opera in 2004 and has since become an invaluable member of the company. After the stages of Szeged and Budapest, audiences in Dresden, Frankfurt, Prague, Vienna, Palermo, Turin, Brussels, Paris and Bayreuth also got to know her talent. Her achievements were awarded by the Ferenc Liszt Award in 2017. Beside her operatic roles, she is a regular interpreter of baroque and classical oratorios.
Antal Cseh studied in the solo voice programme at the University of Szeged's Faculty of Music, and in parallel with his studies in Szeged, he also started the opera voice course at the Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest, passing his final examination in 2006. He was a prize-winner in several national and international singing competitions, and he participated in master classes with such outstanding artists as László Polgár, Renato Bruson, Yevgeny Nesterenko, Tamás Vásáry and Éva Marton. He made his debut with the Hungarian State Opera in 2007 in Andrea Chénier. Since then, he performed a variety of roles at the Opera and during international tours of the institute.
Artistic director of the performance: Katalin Kovács
Pianist: Katalin Doman
Hosted by Dániel Mona
Programme:
Mozart: Così fan tutte – Guglielmo and Dorabella's duet from act 1 ("Il core vi dono") – Atala Schöck and Antal Cseh
Mozart: Don Giovanni – Leporello's aria from Act 1 ("Madamina, il catalogo è questo") – Antal Cseh
Bizet: Carmen – Seguidilla from Act 1 ("Près des remparts de Séville") – Atala Schöck
Mussorgsky: Boris Godunov – Varlaam's drinking song from Act 1 ("Kak vo gorode bylo vo kazani") – Antal Cseh
Tchaikovsky: The Queen of Spades – Paulina's aria from Act 1 ("Da, vszpomnyila... padrugi milije") – Atala Schöck
Verdi: Attila – Attila's aria from Act 2 ("Mentre gonfiarsi l'anima") – Antal Cseh
Donizetti: La favorita – Leonora's aria from Act 3 ("Fia dunque vero... Oh mio Fernando") – Atala Schöck
The performance can be viewed HERE.
Photo by Attila Nagy