The career of tenor Emilio Pons has taken him across Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Latin America.
Since his professional debut in 2006 at the Mariinsky Theater in Saint Petersburg, Russia, he has performed internationally at the Grand Théâtre de Genève and Theater Sankt Gallen, Switzerland; the Royal Opera House, Copenhagen, Denmark; the Vlaamse Opera, Ghent & Antwerp, Belgium; the Sankt Margarethen Opera Festival, and the Wiener Kammeroper in Austria; and the Prinzregenten Theater, the Deutsche Oper am Rhein, Düsseldorf, the Magravial Opera House in Bayreuth, Theater Freiburg and Theater Heidelberg, in Germany; Vilnius City Opera, in Lithuania; Opéra de Metz, in France; Opera Siam in Bangkok, Thailand; as well as Compañía Nacional de Ópera de Bellas Artes, Mexico City, and the Teatro Municipal de Santiago, in Chile and Theatro Municipal of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
His operatic repertoire encompasses more than thirty roles, including: staples of the light lyric Fach such as Tamino (Mozart, Die Zauberflöte), Ferrando (Mozart, Così fan Tutte), Don Ottavio (Mozart, Don Giovanni), Il Conte d’Almaviva (Rossini, Il Barbiere di Siviglia), Nemorino (Donizetti, L’elisir d’amore), Narraboth (Strauss, Salome), Le Chevalier de la Force (Poulenc, Dialogues des Carmélites), Trouffaldino (Prokofiev, L’amour des trois oranges) and Lensky (Tchaikovsky, Yevgenij Onegin); a myriad of leading roles in lesser known works, including the title role in Porsile’s Spartaco, Mad Woman (Britten, Curlew River), Hypollit (Henze, Phaedra), Egeo and Sole (Cavalli, Il Giasone, commercially released on DVD), Richmond (Battistelli, Richard III), Serge/Adolphe (Martinů, Die Drei Wünsche), Le Commissaire (Martinů, Juliette), Fernando (in the German première of Granados’ Goyescas); and various supporting roles such as Arbace (Mozart, Idomeneo), Arturo (Donizetti, Lucia di Lammermoor), Jaquino (Beethoven, Fidelio), Pong (Puccini, Turandot), Laërtes (Thomas, Mignon), Beppe/Arlecchin (Leoncavallo, Pagliacci) and Malcolm (Verdi, Macbeth) amongst others.
He has sung under the baton of acclaimed conductors such as Mikhail Jurowsky, Daniele Callegari, Jiří Bělohlávek, Ingo Metzmacher, Enoch zu Guttenberg, Frédéric Chaslin, Zoltan Pesko, Niksa Bareza, Federico Maria Sardelli, Rodolfo Fischer and Cornelius Meister amongst others; has worked with renowned stage directors such as Robert Carsen, Christof Loy, Guy Joosten, Richard Jones, Pier Francesco Maestrini, Jean-Louis Benôit, Mariame Clément and Benedikt von Peter, and has shared the stage with prominent singers such as Diana Damrau, Jennifer Larmore, Sophie Koch, KS Francisco Araiza, and Franco Vasallo, amongst others.
On the concert and recital stage, he has performed recitals in Germany, France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Switzerland, Spain, Poland, Russia, Japan, Azerbaijan (with the London Philharmonic Orchestra) and Israel (with the Jerusalem Camerata and the Be’er Sheva Sinfonietta).
Dr. Pons is co-founder and artistic director of the Sankt Goar International Music Festival and Academy.
Emilio Pons holds a graduate degree in Piano from the National Conservatory of Music in Mexico and a Juris Doctor Degree from the Universidad Iberoamericana, in addition to Master and Doctor of Music Degrees from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, where he was a student of Carlos Montané and Andreas Poulimenos. In Europe, he continued to study privately under the tutelage of KS Francisco Araiza and Lyubov Stuchevskaya, and currently, of Neumar de Kanel-Starling.
Dr. Pons has been a recipient of numerous scholarships and grants, including Mexico’s prestigious FONCA (National Endowment for the Arts), SIVAM (International Society of Mexican Artistic Values) scholarships (2000-2002), the Olympia Barbera and Culver Miller scholarships at the Indiana University School of Music (2002-2004), and INBA (National Fine Arts Institute of Mexico, as of 2003). He is a prize-winner of the Irma Cooper (2005), Palm Beach Opera (2005) and Pavel Lisitsian (2006) competitions and the RBT-Preis München award at the Hans Gabor “Belvedere” (2007) competition in Vienna.
A skilled polyglot, Dr. Pons speaks English, Spanish, French, Italian, German and Russian — all fluently.
Dr. Pons is a dual citizen of Mexico and Germany. He is a member of the European Cultural Parliament.
Dates:
Arrival: Sunday, August 21st, 2022, until 1 pm
Departure: Thursday, August 25, 2022, after 2 pm
Course Description:
Vocal technique and interpretation; preparation for auditions, exams, concerts and competitions
Repertoire:
Vocal repertoire from Baroque over Classic and Romantic to Modern Music
Students are hosted on a shared room basis in a beautiful villa on the bank of the Rhine river.
Meals:
A kitchen is available for cooking; groceries can be bought in a nearby supermarket. Group shopping is advised. A different team can do the cooking daily, which can be organize in situ.
Rooms:
Committed to the spirit of romanticism, all masterclasses offered by the Sankt Goar International Music Festival and Academy unite everything under one roof: living, learning, eating and sleeping. That is why participants will be hosted on a shared room basis.
Audition information and registration:
In order to be accepted, you must meet one of the following criteria:
(a) be recommended by Dr. Pons, or
(b) submit an unedited video audition (YouTube link) for review.
In addition, you must complete and submit our application form and pay a €40,- application fee.
Registration Deadline: July 21st, 2022
Tuition:
Course fee (incl. accommodation): €490,-