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Join us for this performance featuring Allegra De Vita (mezzo soprano) and Robert Mellon (baritone) with world premiere piece by Dan Sonenberg

Allegra De Vita, mezzo soprano

Robert Mellon, baritone

Featuring a world premiere piece by Dan Sonenberg

Portland Conservatory of Music

28 Neal Street

The Board President of Opera Maine and her husband, who live within walking distance of the Conservatory, will host a reception at their home for all attendees of the Valentine Concert. Please join us after the concert for food, drink, good company, and the opportunity to meet the artists! We will send the address to all ticket reservations the week of the concert.

Your name and the number of tickets will be reserved at the door of the event. Please check in upon arrival.

Name and the number of tickets purchased are documented with Opera Maine at the time of purchase. Please note that neither electronic nor paper tickets are issued for this event.

Allegra De Vita, hailed by Opera News as a “complex mezzo, [whose] fine-spun vibrato, was lovely in itself, but it also consistently conveyed human utterance.” She was recently seen as “Isabella” in L’italiana in Algeri with Tulsa Opera and as “Meg Page” in Falstaff with The Maryland Lyric Opera.

She was also seen as Angelina in La Cenerentola at Dayton Opera, The Page in Salome at The Spoleto Festival, Siebel in Faust at Washington National Opera, the title role in Carmen with the Fort Wayne Philharmonic, Tancredi in Erminia with Opera Lafayette, Agrippina in Fall of Lehman Brothers with Ballet-Opera-Pantomime in Montreal, Olga in Eugene Onegin with Syracuse Opera, and sang Isaura while understudying Tancredi in Tancredi with Opera Philadelphia. Ms. De Vita spent three summers at the Glimmerglass Festival performing the roles of Pippo in La Gazza Ladra, Fulvio in Cato in Utica, and Arsamenes in Xerxes.

As a 2018 graduate from the Washington National Opera’s Cafritz Young Artist Program, Ms. De Vita was seen as Rosina in The Barber of Seville (Emerging Artist Performance), Tebaldo in Don Carlo, Ruggiero in Alcina (Emerging Artist Performance), the title role in The Dictator’s Wife, Cherubino in Le Nozze di Figaro (Emerging Artist Performance), and Kate Pinkerton in Madame Butterfly.

Ms. De Vita was a 2015 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions Grand Finalist and can be heard on the Grammy Award winning CD of “Wozzeck” conducted by Hans Graf with the Houston Symphony. She was a resident artist at the Academy of Vocal Arts in Philadelphia, PA, where she performed the role of Charlotte in Werther and Zerlina in Don Giovanni. Ms. De Vita holds a master’s degree in voice from Rice studying with Dr. Stephen King, and a BA Magna cum Laude in biology with a neuroscience concentration from Sacred Heart University.

American baritone Robert Mellon was acclaimed by Opera News for having “excellent comic timing,” and a “domineering baritone, gleaming like polished copper.” In the 2020-21 season he made several role and house debuts: Schaunard in La bohème with San Diego Opera, Malatesta in Don Pasquale with Opera Las Vegas, Figaro in Il barbiere di Siviglia with Union Avenue Opera, and with Opera de Oviedo, Marcello in La bohème and Gubetta in Lucrezia Borgia. In 2022, Robert joins Pensacola Opera as Papageno in The Magic Flute, sings his first Iago in Othello with InSeries Opera, debuts with Opera Philadelphia as Marullo in Rigoletto, and returns to Opera Maine for a gala concert. Robert also sings the title role in Verdi’s Falstaff with Union Avenue Opera and joins Tulsa Opera as Taddeo in L’Italiana in Algeri. In 2023 he returns to Pensacola Opera for Marcello in La bohème, Germont in La traviata with Opera Las Vegas, Tonio in Pagliacci with Opera Tampa and George in Of Mice and Men with Livermore Valley Opera.

The 2019-20 season included company debuts with Opera de Oviedo as Simone in Eine Florentinische Tragödie and Tonio in Pagliacci; the title role in Gianni Schicchi and Simone in Eine Florentinische Tragödie with Livermore Valley Opera, where the San Francisco Chronicle wrote, “Baritone Robert Mellon was both the musical star of the performance and its dramatic vertex…with a steely vocal edge that never interfered with the beauty and flexibility of his singing.” Mr. Mellon reprised the roles of Papageno in Die Zauberflöte with Opera Maine and Don Alfonso in Così fan tutte with Syracuse Opera.

In 2018-19 Robert sang the world premiere of Dear Erich with New York City Opera and Leporello in Don Giovanni with Syracuse Opera, then returned to Shreveport Opera for Bernardo in West Side Story. He has performed leading roles with Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, The National Sawdust Festival, the Peoria Symphony, and been a guest artist with Manhattan School of Music and Rutgers University. Other roles include Figaro in Le nozze di Figaro, Sam in Trouble in Tahiti, and Macbeth in the U.S. premiere of Ernest Bloch’s Macbeth. Concert work includes the Mozart and Duruflé Requiem, Dvorak’s Te Deum, Stravinsky’s Pulcinella, Rossini’s Petite Messe Solennelle, Bach’s Magnificat, and Mussorgsky’s Songs and Dances of Death.

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