Conductor Gary Thor Wedow has established a reputation for dramatically exciting and historically informed performances with opera companies, festivals, and choral organizations throughout North America. His most recent successes include Gluck’s Orpheus and Eurydice and Mozart’s The Magic Flute for Seattle Opera, Wolf-Ferrari’s Le donne curiose for Wolf Trap Opera, and Handel’s Agrippina for Boston Lyric Opera. Mr. Wedow has been closely associated with New York City Opera for many years, and he most recently conducted Christopher Alden’s production of Mozart’s Don Giovanni and the New York premiere of Telemann’s Orpheus. He led Madison Opera’s “Opera in the Park” in July 2012 and recently conducted the Berkshire Choral Society in Salzburg and Mondsee.

Highlights of Mr. Wedow’s 2012–13 season include Mozart’s La finta giardiniera for San Francisco Opera’s Merola Program, Handel’s Xerxes at Indiana University, Handel’s Rinaldo for Portland Opera with the Portland Baroque Orchestra, Johann Strauss II’s Die Fledermaus for Virginia Opera, Handel’s Messiah with the Alabama Symphony, and a return to Seattle Opera for Poulenc’s La Voix humaine and Puccini’s Suor Angelica.

Born in LaPorte, Indiana, and now a resident of New York City, Gary Thor Wedow has been a member of The Juilliard School faculty since 1994 and has led performances there of Monteverdi’s L'Incoronazione di Poppea, La finta giardiniera, Agrippina, and Don Giovanni. He has prepared several performing editions of Baroque works in collaboration with countertenor Lawrence Lipnik. Mr. Wedow’s long association with director Stephen Wadsworth has included productions of Handel’s Xerses and Ariodante as well as Gluck’s Iphigénie en Tauride.

Mr. Wedow has been a frequent guest of Florida Grand Opera, Canadian Opera Company, Glimmerglass Opera, Berkshire Opera, Chautauqua Opera, Amherst Early Music Festival, and Pittsburgh Opera. His wide-ranging repertoire includes Monteverdi’s Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria, both Sartorio and Handel’s Giulio Cesare, Rossini’s The Barber of Seville, Bizet’s Carmen, Gilbert and Sullivan’s Patience, Puccini’s La bohème, Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress, and several world premieres. Choral masterpieces and symphonic repertoire have taken him to the podiums of the Seattle Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra London, and Boston’s Handel and Haydn Society, where he was associate conductor for many years. As a pianist, Mr. Wedow studied with Jorge Bolet.

Countertenor Tim Mead was a choral scholar at King's College, Cambridge, where he studied with Charles Brett before winning a number of scholarships to the Royal College of Music. Recent engagements of Handel works include Giulio Cesare (as Tolomeo) for the Deutsche Oper am Rhein, Saul (David) with Opera North, and the title roles of Rinaldo with Bach Collegium Japan, Giulio Cesare for Glyndebourne Festival Opera, Orlando for Chicago Opera Theatre, Ezio for the London Handel Festival, and Admeto at the Göttingen International Handel Festival and Edinburgh Festival. Other highlights have included Cavalli's La Calisto (as Endimione) for the Bavarian Staatsoper; Monteverdi's The Coronation of Poppea (Ottone) for English National Opera and Opéra de Lyon; the premiere of Harrison Birtwistle's The Minotaur at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden; and title roles in Gluck's Orfeo et Euridice with English National Opera, Akademie für Alte Musik, and the Handel and Haydn Society. His concert appearances have included J.S. Bach's Magnificat and Dixit Dominus with Le Concert d'Astrée, Das Weihnachtsoratorium with Les Arts Florissants, St. Matthew Passion with the Britten Sinfonia; Handel's Messiah with the Manchester Camerata; Handel's Lotario (Idelberto) and Riccardo Primo (Oronte) with the Basel Chamber Orchestra, Occasional Oratorio with The King's Consort; Biber's Missa Bruxellensis with the Academy of Ancient Music at BBC Proms; and Telemann's Brockes Passion with the Nederlandse Bachvereniging.

Mr. Mead's discography includes Riccardo Primo (Oronte) with Basel Chamber Orchestra (Sony BMG); Purcell's Solomon (title role) with Gottingen Festival Orchestra and Nicholas McGegan (Carus); Handel choral works with the Choir of King's College, Cambridge, for EMI; Handel's Israel in Egypt with the Orchester der Deutschen (Brilliant Classics). He can be seen in Handel's Admeto (Trasimede) with Handel-Festspiele Halle, conducted by Howard Arman on DVD (Arthaus Musik).

Tim Mead's opcoming engagements include the Royal Opera Housem Covent Garden, Glyndebourne Festival, Bavarian Staatsoper, Scottish Opera, English National Opera, and Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.

Tenor Kenneth Tarver is an acclaimed interpreter of Mozart's Don Giovanni, Così fan tutte, The Abduction from the Seraglio, and The Magic Flute; Gluck's Orphée et Eurydice; Rossini's Moïse et Pharaon, The Barber of Seville, and La cenerentola; The Nose by Shostakovich; and Donizett's Don Pasquale. His recordings include Berlioz's Les Troyens with Sir Colin Davis and the London Symphony Orchestra, winner of two Grammy Awards, and Don Giovanni with Renée Jacobs (Harmonia Mundi).

His recent successes have included Haydn's L'Anima del Filosofo (as Orfeo) conducted by Iván Fisher at the Budapest Festival; Mozart's Idomeneo at La Monnaie; Haydn's Orlando Paladino in Amsterdam; Haydn's L'Infedeltà Delusa conducted by Nikolaus Harnoncourt in Vienna; The Abduction from the Seraglio (Belmonte) and Traetta's Antigona in Berlin; Rameau's Les Indes Galantes in Toulouse. Other highlights include Shchedrin's My Age, My Wild Beast at the Rheingau Festspiele; Orff's Carmina burana at the Verbier Festival; Mozart's Requiem at the Tanglewood Festival conducted by James Levine; Berlioz's Te Deum in Oslo; a concert and recording for Opera Rara of Rossini's Aureliano in Palmira (title role) with Maurizo Benini at the Royal Festival Hall in London; Mozart's Coronation Mass in Rome; and La Cenerentola in Buenos Aires.

Kenneth Tarver has built a repertoire of both well-known and seldom-performed masterpieces with conductors such as Alberto Zedda (Rossini's Moise et Pharaon in Liège; L'Inganno Felice and La Gazza Ladra at the Rossini Festival in Wildbad; La Scala di Seta in Berlin; Adelaide di Borgogna in La Coruña), Riccardo Chailly (Stravinsky's Pulcinella with the Concertgebouw Orchestra; Matthäus-Passion in Milan; Bach's St. John Passion with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchester inCarlo Rizzi (Rossini's Armida at the Edinburgh Festival), and Frans Bruggen (Mozart's Requiem with the Orchestra della Toscana).

Alastair Miles is recognized as one of the world's leading basses. Born in Harrow, England, he studied flute at the Guildhall School of Music before embarking on a vocal career, during which he has performed at The Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco Opera, Vienna Staatsoper, Bavarian Staatsoper, Netherlands Opera, and Milan's Teatro all Scala. He has a stylistically wide repertoire and has made more than 70 recordings.

Mr. Miles appears regularly at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, and English National Opera (ENO), as well as Welsh National Opera, Opera North, and Glyndebourne. His recent roles have included Narbal in Berlioz's Les Troyens for Netherlands Opera, Creonte in Mayr's Medea in Corinto for Bavarian Staatsoper, Zaccariain Verdi's Nabucco for Vienna Staatsoper, Commendatore in Mozart's Don Giovanni and Pogner in Wagner's Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg for Glyndebourne Festival, Poliferno in Steffani's Niobe, Regina di Tebe at Covent Garden, and Duke Alfonso in Donizetti's Lucrezia Borgia for ENO.

On the concert stage, Mr. Miles has performed with the world's leading orchestras and conductors. Recent appearances include Elgar's The Dream of Gerontius and Handel's Messiah with Sir Colin Davis and London Symphony Orchestra, Schumann's Faustszenen with Nikolaus Harnoncourt and the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. Beethoven's Ninth Symphonywith Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, and Sarastro in Mozart's The Magic Flute with Daniel Harding at the Lucerne Festival.

Engagements during the 2011–12 season include Claudio in Handel's Agrippina for Opéra de Dijon and Opéra de Lille with Emmanuelle Haim, Daland in Wagner's The Flying Dutchman for Opéra Royal de Wallonie, Liège, St. Matthew Passion with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Philip II in Verdi's Don Carlo for the Deutsche Oper Berlin, and Bertran in Meyerbeer's Robert Le Diable in Salerno. Future roles include Pogner in Die Meistersinger for Netherlands Opera.

The New York Choral Artists, a professional chorus founded by Joseph Flummerfelt in 1979, appears regularly with the New York Philharmonic, including on the September 10, 2011 performance titled A Concert for New York, given on the eve of the tenth anniversary of 9/11. Recent performances with the Orchestra have included Janáček's The Cunning Little Vixen in June 2011; Ligeti's Le Grand Macabre in May 2010; Ravel's L'Enfant et les sortilèges in 2006 and at Carnegie Hall in February 2009; Puccini's Tosca in June 2008; Verdi's Requiem in 2006; the world premiere of John Adams's On the Transmigration of Souls in 2002; and Brahms's A German Requiem in September 2001, in commemoration of the events of September 11. Other performance highlights include celebrating the rededication of the Statue of Liberty in 1986 and the 100th anniversary of Carnegie Hall, and the U.S. premiere of Paul McCartney's Standing Stone with the Orchestra of St. Luke's. The New York Choral Artists have sung under the batons of Bernstein, Chailly, Sir Colin Davis, Leinsdorf, Masur, Muti, Nelson, Shaw, Slatkin, Tilson Thomas, and others.

The chorus's discography features many recordings with the New York Philharmonic, including On the Transmigration of Souls with Lorin Maazel and Mahler's Symphony No. 3 with Leonard Bernstein, both of which won Grammy Awards; Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 and Schoenberg's Gurrelieder with Zubin Mehta; Shostakovich's Symphony No. 13, Babi Yar, with Kurt Masur; and Stephen Sondheim's Sweeney Todd. Recordings with other orchestras include Stravinsky's Symphony of Psalms, Oedipus Rex, and Requiem Canticles; Beethoven's The Ruins of Athens; Gershwin's Porgy and Bess; an album of Christmas songs featuring soprano Kathleen Battle; and a Christmas album conducted by Joseph Flummerfelt.

The New York Choral Artists are managed by Jacqueline Pierce.

Named Conductor of the Year in 2004 by Musical America, Joseph Flummerfelt is the founder and musical director of the New York Choral Artists and an artistic director of Spoleto Festival U.S.A. He was conductor of the Westminster Choir for 33 years.

Mr. Flummerfelt has led more than 50 performances with the Spoleto Festival Orchestra in both Italy and the U.S. and has appeared as guest conductor with numerous American orchestras. He made his New York Philharmonic conducting debut in a performance of Haydn's The Creation, and in 2001 he led the Orchestra and the Westminster Choir in the world premiere of Stephen Paulus's Voices of Light. He has collaborated with such conductors as Claudio Abbado, Barenboim, Bernstein, Boulez, Chailly, Sir Colin Davis, Gilbert, Giulini, Maazel, Masur, Mehta, Muti, Ozawa, Sawallisch, Shaw, and Steinberg, among many others.

Joseph Flummerfelt's choirs have been featured on 45 recordings, including Grammy Award–winning versions of Mahler's Symphony No. 3 with Leonard Bernstein, Barber's opera Antony and Cleopatra, and John Adams's On the Transmigration of Souls. He has also received two other Grammy nominations, and his Delos recording of Brahms's choral works, Singing for Pleasure, with the Westminster Choir, was chosen by The New York Times as a favorite among Brahms recordings.

Mr. Flummerfelt's many honors include Le Prix du Président de la République from L'Académie du Disque Français and four honorary doctoral degrees. He is sought out as a guest conductor and master teacher of choral conducting, and also oversees most of the choral presentations of the New York Philharmonic.