Guest Artists

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Bethany Battafarano, soprano

Bethany Battafarano, soprano, finds her niche in early, choral, and contemporary classical music. She has sung with The Rose Ensemble, The Mirandola Ensemble, Minnesota Chorale, Apollo Master Chorale, Oratory Bach Ensemble, and First Readings Project. With The Rose Ensemble, Battafarano celebrated the release of her first CD, “Christmas in Baroque Malta.” Upcoming solo performances include György Kurtág's "Kafka Fragments” with 113 Composers Collective.

In 2017, Battafarano co-founded the professional chamber choir Border CrosSing, for which she sings and is Deputy Director. Battafarano is co-founder of chamber treble ensemble Artemis, which performs contemporary classical music and experimental improvisation. Artemis recently completed a commission by French artist Laure Prouvost, the Walker Art Center, and Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center in New York.

Battafarano holds a BA in Music, Anthropology, and Psychology from Macalester College. She is currently pursuing MA Musicology and MM Voice degrees at the University of Oregon.

 

 
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Natalie Campbell, soprano

Natalie Campbell, soprano, lives in Sioux Falls, SD, where she teaches voice at Augustana University and the University of Sioux Falls. Recent solo performances include the role of Adina in Donizetti’s L’elixir d’amore, Vivaldi’s Gloria, Fauré’s Requiem, Mozart’s Coronation Mass, Orff’s Carmina Burana, Vaughan Williams’ Serenade to Music, Bernstein’s Chichester Psalms, Haydn’s Missa brevis, and a mid-west premiere of Shawn Kirchner’s Songs of Ascent. She has performed with several professional ensembles including Cantare Houston, Mercury Baroque, The Rose Ensemble and the Grammy-nominated South Dakota Chorale.

This summer she attended the prestigious American Bach Soloists Academy in San Francisco where she performed as a soloist in Bach's Mass in B Minor. Natalie holds a B.M. from Houghton College in New York, and an M.M. in voice from the University of South Dakota.

 
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Nicholas Chalmers, Tenor

Heralded by the Washington Post as "exciting and dulcet," Nicholas Chalmers, tenor, is thrilled to debut with Transept! He has sung with The Rose Ensemble, the Bach Society of Minnesota, the Minnesota Bach Ensemble, Glorious Revolution Baroque, The Singers-Minnesota Choral Artists, and the Minnesota Chorale. Recent solo engagements include Oratory, Magnum Chorum, the Church Music Association of America, the St. Mark's Cathedral Concert Series, and the Schubert Club. Nicholas recently concluded his Master’s studies in Choral Conducting at the University of Minnesota, where he conducted several campus ensembles and held a Teacher's Assistant position in the music theory department.

Nicholas is in his sixth year as the Director of Music at Chesterton Academy in Edina and recently accepted the position of Director of Music and Liturgy at Annunciation Church in South Minneapolis.  He is also Artistic Director of the Mirandola Ensemble, which presents programs of rarely performed early music from the Medieval and Renaissance eras strategically juxtaposed with the compositions of 20th and 21st century composers.

 
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Krista Costin, Mezzo-Soprano

Mezzo-Soprano Krista Costin, a founding member of Transept, has collaborated as a soloist and/or ensemble member with Oratory Bach Ensemble, Consortium Carissimi, Minnesota Bach Ensemble, The Singers, MN Chorale, House of Hope Motet Choir, Oregon Bach Festival, and Bachakademies in both Weimar and Stuttgart, Germany under the direction of Helmuth Rilling. 

Upcoming solo highlights of 2018-2019 season include a Schubert Club Courtroom Concert recital in November, Bach Mass in B Minor with Exultate, a staged production of St John Passion with Oratory Bach Ensemble and MN Dance Theatre, and ensemble debut with Mirandola Ensemble. In addition to performing, Krista serves on the Voice faculty at North Hennepin Community College in Brooklyn Park, MN and teaches yoga and mindfulness classes in the Twin Cities.  www.kristacostin.com

 
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Matthew Dean, tenor

Matthew Dean is a versatile tenor well-regarded for his “ringing sound, cantorial fluency, and elegance” in ensembles nationwide. As longtime artist-in-residence at Chicago’s Rockefeller Chapel, the Tribune’s John von Rhein has praised his “firm vocalism and beautiful timbre” for Bach, including a cycle with the Haymarket Opera Orchestra. Dean is founding managing director of Schola Antiqua, with recordings on Naxos and in museum galleries internationally. He appears regularly with His Majesty’s Men, Bella Voce, and The Newberry Consort (www.matthew-dean.com). A well-traveled proponent of Russian chant, he has coached ensembles including the South Dakota Chorale. Dean has served on the faculty of the Madison Early Music Festival and appeared at the Boston Early Music Festival, and has undergraduate and graduate training as a medievalist from The University of Chicago.

 
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Roy Heilman, Tenor

Tenor Roy Heilman frequently sings in a broad spectrum of styles from the Renaissance to the present, but has primarily made a name for himself as tenor soloist in the music of the Baroque and Classical eras. In March of 2017, he was tenor soloist in a rare performance of Carl Heinrich Graun’s Der Tod Jesu, with Lyra Baroque Orchestra and guest conductor Simon Carrington. Other recent performances include Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610, Britten’s St. Nicolas and Cantata Misericordium, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, and J.S. Bach’s Easter Oratorio, St. Matthew Passion, St. John Passion, and Mass in B-minor. 

Roy received his musical training from Gustavus Adolphus College, earning a Bachelor of Arts in Music with Honors in Performance, and from The New England Conservatory of Music, with a Master of Music degree in Vocal Performance. He lives in Minnesota with his wife and two children, where he is usually caught up in musical or outdoor pursuits.

 
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Joseph Hubbard, bass

Joseph Hubbard, bass, With recent professional engagements at Virginia Opera, Opera Southwest, Beth Morrison Projects, Aldeburgh Festival (UK), and Aspen Music Festival, Mr. Hubbard has performed over two dozen operatic roles, ranging from early 17th century to new premieres.

His concert soloist credits include the Art Institute of Chicago, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Morgan Library and Museum, Beth Morrison Projects, Duke University, Dartmouth College, Newberry Consort, Schola Antiqua of Chicago, Music at Marsh Chapel Boston, Mountainside Baroque, Ars Lyrica Houston, Madison Early Music Festival, Boston Early Music Festival, and the Grammy-nominated South Dakota Chorale, with whom he also serves as Artistic Advisor.

Mr. Hubbard holds B.Mus and M.Mus degrees from the University of North Texas and Northwestern University, and a Certificate from the Opera Institute at Boston University.

 

 
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Bruce Jacobs, positiv organ

Bruce Jacobs, (organ), is heard frequently in the Twin Cities. Since his musical debut at First Avenue, he has performed with the Eglantine Consort, Waltham Abbey Singers, Ensemble Polaris, Bach Society of Minnesota, Lyra Baroque Orchestra, Elm Ensemble, Hymnus, Rose Ensemble, Consortium Carissimi and the National Lutheran Choir. He was a founding member of Banchetto Musicale, a leading baroque ensemble in Fargo-Moorhead.

Jacobs studied pipe organ performance with Ruth Berge at Concordia College in Moorhead and continuo through the Oberlin Baroque Performance Institute. He is Chief Technologist at Twin Cities Public Television.

 
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Andrew Kane, Baritone

Baritone Andrew Kane is pleased to sing in his third project with Transept. Andrew has been singing professionally based in the Twin Cities since 2008. Focusing from the outset on early music, he has been a member of the Mirandola Ensemble since 2011, and has performed with the Rose Ensemble, Minnesota Bach Society, Consortium Carissimi, Minnesota Bach Ensemble, and Glorious Revolution Baroque. Other soloist appearances include VocalPoint Chorus, the music series of Saint Mark's Episcopal Cathedral, House of Hope Presbyterian and Holy Family Catholic Church, Mount Olive Lutheran's annual ach Tage, and the Oratorio Society. Additionally, Andrew has sung with VocalEssence, Minnesota Chorale, the Minnesota Opera, Lyra Baroque Orchestra, and the Oregon Bach Festival.

 
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Sonja Kraus, Baroque cello

Sonja Kraus, a native of Germany, is an internationally acclaimed cellist, teacher, and music scholar, whose concertizing and teaching career has taken her through Europe, Asia, Latin America, and the United States.

Currently, Sonja holds the position of Assistant Professor of Cello/Bass at the University of South Dakota and is the cellist in the renowned Rawlins Piano Trio. Prior to joining the faculty at the University of South Dakota, Sonja was the Cello Professor at the Universidad de Especialidades Espíritu Santo as well as the principal cellist of the Orquesta Filarmónica Municipal de Guayaqil in Ecuador.

 
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Brody Krogman, bass-baritone

Brody Krogman, a bass-baritone, is a native of Sioux Falls, SD, and is a graduate of the University of South Dakota. Brody has been an active performer in the region with solo performances of Haydn’s Die Schöpfung (The Creation), Franz Liszt’s Via Crucis, Gabriel Fauré’s Requiem, and Handel’s Messiah. On the opera stage, he has held principal roles in Copland’s The Tender Land, Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore, Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro, and Johann Strauss Jr.’s Die Fledermaus

Recently, Brody debuted with the Mankato Symphony Orchestra in Bernstein’s West Side Story. In the 2018-2019 season with the MSO, he sang as the bass soloist for Handel’s Messiah. Last year he had the honor of performing as a young artist at the Illinois Bach Academy, and traveling to Weimar, Germany for the Bachkantaten Akademie under the baton of Helmuth Rilling.

 
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Yi-Chun Lin, baroque violin & viola

A native of Taipei, Taiwan, violinist, violist, and pianist Yi-Chun Lin has served as concertmaster of orchestras in New York, Taiwan, and music festivals worldwide. She has performed as soloist with the Texas Music Festival Orchestra, the National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra in Taiwan, and the Akademische Orchester at the Gewanhaus concert hall in Leipzig. Dr. Lin is a violin professor at Augustana University and the Principal Viola at the South Dakota Symphony Orchestra. With a lifelong passion towards chamber music, she founded the Sioux Falls Chamber Music Collective in 2018 in hope of creating a platform to encourage more collaborations between artists, to merge different artistic fields, and to make high quality performances more accessible in all corners of the community. She has performed on WQXR radio station in New York and SDPB in Rapid City, won the bronze medal at Fischoff competition, and received chamber music residency from various festivals, such as the Banff Music Festival. With a curious mind, Dr. Lin constantly looks for new dimensions in music through different types of musical and art collaborations.

 

Clara Osowski, Mezzo-soprano

Mezzo-soprano Clara Osowski, who sings "from inside the music with unaffected purity and sincerity" (UK Telegraph), is an active soloist and chamber musician throughout the United States and Europe. Recognized for her excellence in Minnesota, Clara was a recipient of the prestigious 2018-2019 McKnight Artist Fellowships for Musicians administered by MacPhail Center for Music. In international competition with pianist Tyler Wottrich, Clara has won second place at Thomas Quasthoff’s Das Lied, fourth place and the Richard Tauber Prize for the best interpretation of Schubert Lieder at the Wigmore Hall/Kohn Foundation Song Competition, and most recently the Radio-Canada People’s Choice Award and third place in the song division at the 2018 Concours Musical International de Montréal.

In addition to performing, Clara serves as the Co-founder of Source Song Festival, a week-long art song festival in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Please see www.claraosowski.com for more information.

 
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Jared Ostermann, organ

Jared Ostermann is the Director of Music and Organist at the Cathedral of St. Joseph in Sioux Falls, SD. At the Cathedral he oversees an active music program comprised of three adult choirs, with repertoire ranging from Gregorian chant and Renaissance polyphony to modern compositions and choral-orchestral major works. He also serves as Artistic Director of the Cathedral Sacred Arts Series, which regularly brings outstanding local, national, and international talent to Sioux Falls in the superb acoustic of the Cathedral. He holds degrees from the University of Kansas (BM, DMA), and Notre Dame (MSM). As a concert organist he has received prizes from numerous competitions, including the Canadian and Miami International Organ Competitions, the Rodland scholarship competition, and the Augustana National Undergraduate Competition. Jared lives with his wife Barbara and their three children in Sioux Falls, SD.

 
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Chelsie Propst, soprano

Chelsie Propst is an active performer of early music currently living in Madison, WI. She regularly sings with the Minneapolis-based Mirandola Ensemble, the Madison Bach Musicians, and the Madison Choral Project. Chelsie was also a member of the Rose Ensemble for several years. She has performed on stage with various early music ensembles, including Liber, Piffaro, Dark Horse, Incantare, and the Wisconsin Baroque Ensemble. In addition to her ensemble work, Chelsie performs as a recitalist and concert soloist. Stage appearances include Second Woman and Belinda in Purcell's Dido & Aeneas, L'Amour in Rameau's Pygmalion, and Donna Elvira in Mozart’s Don Giovanni. She is currently pursuing a PhD in Historical Musicology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

 
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Andrew Rader, Countertenor

Countertenor Andrew Rader has been called the “purest and most vibrant [countertenor]…in memory, recent or otherwise” (Arts-Louisville.com), known for his “accurate, powerful, indeed thrilling” (John Gilks, operaramblings) interpretations of Baroque repertoire.

For over a decade, Mr. Rader has been an active soloist in the major Baroque oratorio repertoire. Performance highlights include St. John Passionwith Music City Baroque, Indianapolis Baroque, and Madison Bach Musicians, Messiahwith Bourbon Baroque, New Mexico Philharmonic, BWV 182with South Carolina Bach Society, BWV 180with the Bloomington Bach Cantata Project, and Carissimi’s Historia di Jobwith Magnificat Baroque.

Operatic roles include Giulio Cesare, Oberon in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and Eustazio in operamission’s Rinaldo. In 2019, he will be performing the role of Silvio in operamission’s new production of Il Pastor Fido.

 
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Phillip Rukavina, lute & theorbo

Phillip Rukavina performs as a lute and vihuela soloist and as a continuo lutenist. He’s appeared at many music festivals, including the Utrecht Early Music Festival (2013) and the Boston Early Music Festival (2015).  In 2017, Phillip performed as a soloist at the European Lute Festival in Füssen, Germany (2017) and at the Lute Society of America’s 2017 WestFest held in Victoria, BC Canada. A founding member of the Venere Lute Quartet Phillip has performed with many prominent ensembles,

including the Newberry Consort, the Texas Early Music Project, the Rose Ensemble, the Bach Society MN and with renown sopranos Emma Kirkby and Ellen Hargis.  He has served on the faculty of the Lute Society of America's LuteFest in Cleveland, OH and the Amherst and Vancouver Early Music Festivals. He has recorded on the Lyrichord, LSA, and Naxos labels. His fifth Studio395 solo release, Dutch Light: the Lute Music of Nicolas Vallet, was issued in winter of 2017.

 
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Josh Schwalbach, viola da gamba

Josh Schwalbach holds a DMA from Stony Brook University, where he studied double bass with Kurt Muroki and Joseph Carver. A passionate educator, he is currently on faculty at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, College of St. Benedict/St. John's University, and the University of St. Thomas. Previously, he  served as an instructor at St. Paul Academy and Summit School, Yinghua Academy Conservatory of Music, Stony Brook University and the Stony Brook School on Long Island.

An Early Music enthusiast, Josh has performed on viola da gamba and baroque bass with groups including Transept, Cerulean Fire, the Lyra Baroque Orchestra, the Rose Ensemble, the Aulos Ensemble, and at the Twin Cities and Boston Early Music Festivals.

 
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Emily Skilling, mezzo-soprano

Emily Skilling, winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions South Carolina District, holds a B.M. from the University of Georgia and a M.M. from Westminster Choir College, where she studied with Laura Brooks Rice. While at Westminster, Ms. Skilling performed several leading roles, the highlights of which include Dame Quickly in Falstaff and La Zia Principessa in Suor Angelica. Professional role credits include Ulrica in Un ballo in Maschera, Dame Quickly in Falstaff, and Third Lady in Die Zauberflöte. Additionally, Emily has extensive choral experience, having performed with the Philadelphia Symphonic Choir, Kinnara Ensemble, and the world-renowned Westminster Choir. She recently performed as a soloist with the American Bach Soloists Academy, Boheme Opera New Jersey, Opera on the James, the CoOPERAtive Program, Berkeley Community Chorus and Orchestra, and Martina Arroyo’s Prelude to Performance, and is a regular concert soloist around the United States.

 
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Elizabeth York, baroque violin

Violinist Elizabeth York lives in St. Paul, MN and is active as a performer and teacher across the region. She is Associate Principal Second violin of the South Dakota Symphony Orchestra, and performs on baroque violin with the Lyra Baroque Orchestra, where she also serves on the board of directors. She is on faculty at the College of St. Benedict/St. John's University, Upper Midwest String Camp, and Birch Creek Music Performance Center, and teaches violin and viola privately. Recent performance highlights include chamber music projects with La Grande Bande, 113 Composers Collective, and Sioux Falls Chamber Music Collective, and solo violin recitals at The Baroque Room in St. Paul and at the BARC in Windom, MN. Elizabeth holds a Doctorate of Musical Arts in violin and viola performance from Stony Brook University in New York, where she also received a Masters of Music in violin performance.