Making Music Together

Acclaimed Soprano Denyce Graves accompanied by Three Mo'Tenors Music Director Victor Simonson featured at MPTV Maryland Public Television benefit concert.

OWNINGS MILLS, MD (PRWEB) May 2, 2004 --Renowned soprano, Denyce Graves once again enthralled audiences at a concert recently at The Gordon Center for Performing Arts, Owings Mills, MD, sponsored by Maryland Public Television. This intimate" concert featured Graves performing a sensational evening of Jazz, R&B, Gospel and Classical music. She was accompanied by Three Mo Tenors Musical Director Victor Simonson.

Graves has become particularly well-known to operatic audiences for her portrayals of the title roles in Carmen and Samson et Dalila. These signature roles have brought Ms. Graves to the Metropolitan Opera, Vienna Staatsoper, Royal Opera - Covent Garden, San Francisco Opera, Opéra National de Paris, Lyric Opera of Chicago, The Washington Opera, Bayerische Staatsoper, Arena di Verona, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Opernhaus Zürich, Houston Grand Opera, Dallas Opera, Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, Los Angeles Music Center Opera, and the Festival Maggio Musicale in Florence.

Simonson worked briefly with Graves recently under the direction of Director of Music, Nolan Williams, (Editor- African American Negro Hymnal) at the Resurrection Easter Morning service for the Metropolitan Baptist Church, during their Largo, Maryland groundbreaking ceremony. The gifted soprano performed several selections for thousands of congregants, including classical, operatic, and Negro Spirituals.

Simonson serves as Director of Organ Music at Metropolitan with Williams and Grammy award winning Gospel Artist Richard Smallwood. He is currently touring with Three Mo Tenors, has served as Interim Music Director for the Boys Choir of Harlem, works with Opera...From a Sistahs Point of View with sopranos Angela Brown and Kishna Davis, and was commissioned by the Queens Symphony Orchestras Gospel Choir for his gospel compositions.

Exclusively for the Members and Contributors of MPT, the benefit recital included a variety of genres, for which Simonson is most gifted. He is known primarily for his versatility in adapting passion to anything from Bach to the Beatles, Mozart to Motown, and Chopin to Copeland. His talent includes composing, musical directing, piano, arranging, and organ in jazz, gospel, classical, and Broadway, and is hailed as the youngest African American Musical Director for a Broadway bound- show.