Beth Clayton
OFFICER/MEDICAL ANALYST/CHEEVERS
(Mezzo-soprano)

Mezzo-soprano Beth Clayton will make her LA Opera debut during the 2008/09 season in the U.S. premiere of Howard Shore's The Fly, returning later in the season in Die Zauberflöte and Das Rheingold.

Renowned as a unique musician and stage performer, Beth Clayton has been praised for her outstanding performances with America's leading opera companies and orchestras. The New York Times summed up these virtues in its review of her in the title role of Gotham Chamber Opera's presentation of Heinrich Sutermeister's Die Schwarze Spinne, "Beth Clayton, a strong, beautiful, dangerous presence with a warm, dark, round mezzo-soprano to match, made everything that was to be made out of a little role, delivering her intense arias with fine passion and soaring top notes."

During the 2007/08 season, Beth Clayton reprises her signature role of Carmen at New York City Opera, as well as at Austin Lyric Opera; and essays the title role in Handel's Giulio Cesare with the Opéra Municipale de Marseille. She then participates in the world premiere of Howard Shore's The Fly, in a production by film director David Cronenberg, conducted by Plácido Domingo at the Théâtre du Chatelet in Paris. On the concert stage, Ms. Clayton performs Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 with the San Diego Symphony, and Verdi's Requiem with the Winston-Salem Symphony.

The 2006/07 season saw Beth Clayton's debut with the Boston Symphony Orchestra in John Adams's El Niño conducted by David Robertson. She added the role of the Composer in Ariadne auf Naxos to her repertoire in a return to Vancouver Opera conducted by Jonathan Darlington. She also repeated her acclaimed Medoro in Orlando at the Bayerische Staatsoper under Harry Bicket, made her Calgary Opera debut as Carmen, and took part in New York City Opera's season-opening gala singing in the Final Trio from Der Rosenkavalier. In addition, she appeared with the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival in a duet program with soprano Patricia Racette, and in recital in her native Arkansas.

Highlights of recent seasons include Carmen at Opera Colorado (conducted by Stephen Lord and directed by James Robinson) and Santa Fe Opera (in a new production conducted by Alan Gilbert); Pasqualita in the world premiere of John Adams's Doctor Atomic in a return to San Francisco Opera, conducted by Donald Runnicles and directed by Peter Sellars; her debut at the Bayerische Staatsoper, Munich in a new production of Handel's Orlando conducted by Ivor Bolton and directed by David Alden; and a return to Lyric Opera of Chicago as Maddalena in a new production of Rigoletto conducted by Jesus Lopez-Cobos.

Beth Clayton's extensive repertoire ranges from frequent collaborations with today's leading composers to major roles of the baroque. Among the composers with whom she has worked are Kaija Saariaho (in her London debut at the Barbican as Le Pelerin in a concert performance of L'Amour de Loin with the BBC Symphony conducted by Robert Spano), John Adams (El Nino with the Los Angeles Philharmonic), Thomas Ades ("America" with the New York Philharmonic under Masur), Aaron Jay Kernis ("Garden of Light" with the Minnesota Orchestra under Kreizberg), William Bolcom ("A Wedding" at Lyric Opera of Chicago directed by the later Robert Altman), Carlisle Floyd (Loma in Cold Sassy Tree at Houston Grand Opera and San Diego Opera), Peter Lieberson (Ashoka's Dream at Santa Fe Opera) and Deborah Dratell (the title role of Lilith at New York City Opera). She has also sung the title role of Handel's Ariodante with the Handel and Haydn Society of Boston under Christopher Hogwood, the role of Nerone in Agrippina at Glimmerglass Opera under Harry Bicket and Amastre in Xerxes at New York City Opera. In the summer of 2003, Beth Clayton sang the role of Rosalind in the first present-day performances of Sir Richard Rodney Bennett's The Mines of Sulphur which was issued on the Chandos label and has been nominated for a 2007 Grammy Award.

Equally at home in the repertoire of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Beth Clayton has performed as Octavian in Der Rosenkavalier with Vancouver Opera; Indiana Elliott in Virgil Thompson's The Mother of Us All in the celebrated Christopher Alden production conducted by Runnicles for her San Francisco Opera debut; Andromaca in Ermione and the Fox in Janacek's The Cunning Little Vixen at the Dallas Opera; Olga in Yevgeny Onegin and Maddalena at Santa Fe Opera; Carmen with Welsh National Opera for her European operatic debut; Maddalena at Boston Lyric Opera and Opera Colorado; Frederica in Luisa Miller at the Spoleto Festival USA; Mere Marie in a new Francesca Zambello production of Les Dialogues des Carmelites conducted by Seiji Ozawa at the Saito Kinen Festival; Nicklausse in Les Contes d'Hoffmann and Cherubino in Le Nozze di Figaro at Houston Grand Opera; and the Foxfor her debut with the Canadian Opera Company in Toronto and Don Ramiro in La Finta Giardiniera with Washington Opera.

Beth Clayton also appears regularly with leading orchestras in an equally varied repertoire. Her most recent appearances include Pergolesi's Stabat Mater with Orpheus at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and her Cleveland Orchestra debut in the role of Death in Stravinsky's Le Rossignol conducted by Pierre Boulez. She also returned to the New York Philharmonic for arias and duets under Bramwell Tovey. Beth Clayton has sung with the Ravinia Festival in a concert of arias and ensembles. She made her debut with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Kurt Masur in Mendelssohn's Die Erste Walpurgisnacht. Other concert appearances include her debut with the Montreal Symphony in Mahler's Symphony No. 8 conducted by Charles Dutoit. She made her debut with the National Symphony singing Handel's Messiah with Hogwood. She has also performed this work with the San Diego Symphony, the Dallas Symphony, the Boston Baroque and the Florida Philharmonic. She has been a regular guest of the Minnesota Orchestra, singing in various programs including Bernstein songs conducted by Eiji Oue (released by Reference Records), concert performances of Le Nozze di Figaro conducted by Jeffrey Tate, the Mahler Symphony No. 8 conducted by David Zinman, Debussy's La Damoiselle Elue conducted by Oue, the Brahms Alto Songs with Viola in a chamber music evening featuring Emmanuel Ax and in the Requiem and opera arias by Mozart. Her Baltimore Symphony debut, also with Zinman, was in Mendelssohn's A Midsummer Night's Dream. A further highlight was her appearance in a "Live from Lincoln Center" telecast of A Salute to the American Musical.

A graduate of Southern Methodist University and the Manhattan School of Music, Ms. Clayton was an apprentice artist for Santa Fe Opera and a member of the Houston Grand Opera Studio. Her awards include a Sullivan Award, and she was a finalist at the Metropolitan Opera National Council auditions. A native of Arkansas, Ms. Clayton resides in Santa Fe and New York and studies with Patricia McCaffrey.