John Mark Ainsley

John Mark Ainsley (born July 9 1963) is an English lyric tenor. Known for his supple voice, Ainsley is particularly admired for his interpretations of baroque music and the works of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. More recently he has gravitated successfully towards 20th century music, singing in operas by Henze, Janáček, and Britten.

Early life and education

Ainsley was born in Crewe, Cheshire, the son of an Anglican vicar and a teacher. He spent most of his childhood in Worcester and was educated at the Royal Grammar School Worcester and Magdalen College, Oxford. Although he passed his exams, Ainsley was unhappy with the rigours of academia and decided to drop out. He studied privately with Anthony Rolfe Johnson for five years and went to sing as a lay clerk at Christ Church. He later spent some time in Chicago where he studied with Diane Forlano, who remains his teacher to this day. [Jolly, "Grove Music Online"]

Career

Ainsley made his official solo debut in 1987 when he sang in Stravinsky's "Mass" under Simon Rattle. After further engagements with Gothic Voices and other groups he made his professional opera debut in 1988 as Armindo in Scarlatti's "Gli equivoci nel sembiante" at Innsbruck's Early Music Festival. This was followed by his debut with English National Opera the following year as Eumete in "Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria", and his United States debut in 1990 in a series of concerts in Boston and New York. He has subsequently performed all around the world in operas and concerts. In 1992 he made his debut with the Berlin Philharmonic under Haitink and created the tenor part in the world premiere of John Tavener's "We shall see Him as He is". The following year he made his debut in the Vienna Musikverein, singing the evangelist in Bach's "St Matthew Passion" and tenor solos in the "St John Passion" under Peter Schreier. Other notable concert appearances include performances with the London Philharmonic under Roger Norrington, the London Symphony under Sir Colin Davis, Mstislav Rostropovich and Andre Previn, Les Musiciens du Louvre under Marc Minkowski, the Cleveland Orchestra under Franz Welser-Möst, the New York Philharmonic under Kurt Masur, the Boston Symphony under Seiji Ozawa, the San Francisco Symphony under Jeffrey Tate, the Vienna Philharmonic under Trevor Pinnock, the Academy of St Martin in the Fields under Neville Marriner , and both the Orchestra of the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino and the Orchestre de Paris under Carlo Maria Giulini among many others. [ [http://www.naxos.com/artistinfo/John_Mark_Ainsley/7116.htm naxos.com] ]

His opera appearances include the role of Idamantes in "Idomeneo" with Welsh National Opera, the title role in "La clemenza di Tito" with Opera Australia, Fenton in "Falstaff" with Scottish Opera, the title role in Monteverdi's "Orfeo" with Netherlands Opera, and Don Ottavio in "Don Giovanni" at numerous houses and festivals including Covent Garden and the San Francisco Opera and both the Aix-en-Provence and Glyndebourne festivals. Other roles have included Lensky in "Eugene Onegin", Lysander in Britten's "A Midsummer Night's Dream", David in Carl Nielsen's "Saul og David", and Jupiter in "Semele", the latter of which he performed to acclaim at the English National Opera in 1999. At the 2003 Salzburg Festival, he created the role of ‘Der Daemon’ in the world premiere of Hans Werner Henze's "L'Upupa", which he later reprised at the Teatro Real in Madrid. [Jolly, "Grove Music Online"]

More recently, Ainsley has sung the roles of Soliman in "Zaide" and Belfiore in "La finta giardiniera" at the Salzburg Festival (2006), The Madwoman in Britten’s "Curlew River" with Oper Frankfurt (2006), Pelléas in "Pelléas et Mélisand" with the Deutsche Oper Berlin (2006), Skuratov in Janácek's "From the House of the Dead" with both the Amsterdam and Vienna Festivals (2007), Hippolyt in the world premiere of Henze's "Phaedra" with the Berlin State Opera (2007) and La Monnaie (2007), Edward Fairfax in "Billy Budd" with Oper Frankfurt (2007), Chevalier de la Force in "Dialogues des Carmelites" with the Hamburg State Opera (2008), and both Bajazete in "Tamerlano" and the title role in "Idomeneo" with the Bavarian State Opera (2008). Ainsley is scheduled to sing the role of Emilio in "Partenope" with the English National Opera in the Fall of 2008 and will return for performances at the Bavarian State Opera and Berlin State Opera in 2009. [ [http://www.operabase.com/listart.cgi?name=John+Mark+Ainsley&loose=E&acts=+Schedule+ Opera base] ] Other upcoming appearances include performances at La Scala and the Glyndebourne Festival. [ [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2008/10/02/bmtenor102.xml telegraph.co.uk February 2008] ]

Recordings

Ainsley has made numerous recordings that range from Monteverdi to Britten, one of which won a Grammy in 1995 for best operatic performance (for a recording of Don Giovanni). He regularly appears on radio and in the BBC Proms. Amongst other recorings are Rameau's "Dardanus", Monteverdi's "L'Orfeo" (he is generally regarded as the world authority on this character's role), Britten's Serenade for tenor, horn and strings, and lieder by Mozart, Beethoven and Schumann. Ainsley has also become particularly associated with Handel's music and has recorded over ten of his oratorios including "Jephtha", "La Resurrezione", "Messiah", "Joshua" and "Saul". he has also recorded numerous English Folk and French songs including works by Vaughan Williams, Peter Warlock, Herbert Howells, and Fauré among others.

Watch and listen

*To hear Ainsley sing music from Handel's "Messiah" [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhN9LzQpeGg Watch here]
*To hear Ainsley sing the role of Jupiter in "Semele" [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYOZnwQQV18 Watch here]

Personal life

In 2007 he entered into a civil partnership with organist William Whitehead.

References

ources

*wikicite|id=idGroveMusicOnline|reference=James Jolly: "John Mark Ainsley", "Grove Music Online" ed. L. Macy (Accessed October 3, 2008), [http://www.grovemusic.com (subscription access)]
* [http://www.worldwhoswho.com/views/entry.html?id=ain-gd-090103-1046 AINSLEY, John Mark] International Who's Who. accessed September 1, 2006.