Professor Anthony Arnone joins the orchestra in a performance of Joseph Haydn’s “Cello Concerto No.1 in C Major”. The concerto was presumed lost until a score was discovered by musicologist Oldrich Pulkert at the Prague National Museum in 1961.

Called “A cellist with rich tonal resources, fine subtlety and a keen sense of phrasing” (Gramophone magazine), cellist Anthony Arnone is an active soloist, chamber musician, conductor and teacher throughout the country and around the world. Mr. Arnone is currently associate professor of cello at The University of Iowa School of Music. He is on the faculty of the Eastern Music Festival in Greensboro, North Carolina, where he teaches, conducts, and performs chamber and orchestral music during the summers. He is also on the faculty of the Preucil School of Music in Iowa City, where he conducts the Preucil School String Orchestra. An active clinician as well, Mr. Arnone has given master classes throughout the country. Recent master classes include Cleveland Institute of Music, Oberlin Conservatory of Music, University of New Mexico, Oklahoma State University, Texas Christian University, and the University of Missouri, St. Louis.

As a cello soloist and chamber musician, Mr. Arnone was a founding member of the Meridien Trio and the Sedgewick String Quartet, which performed regularly at the Spoleto Festival in Charleston. More recently, he has been part of the Matisse Trio, faculty trio at the University of Iowa. The Matisse Trio has played throughout the United States and at international conferences. Mr. Arnone also has performed as soloist with orchestras including the Madison Symphony, Muscatine Symphony, Clinton Symphony, Newton/Mid-Kansas Symphony, and the Wichita State University Orchestra, and regularly performs solo and chamber music recitals around the country.

A native of Honolulu, Mr. Arnone received his bachelor of music degree from the New England Conservatory of Music where he studied with Colin Carr. He left graduate studies with Bonnie Hampton at the San Francisco Conservatory to accept a position with the Orchestré Philharmonique de Nice, France, where he remained for 2 years, continuing his studies with Paul and Maude Tortelier. He later returned to the United States to complete his master’s degree in conducting at Wichita State University.

In addition to the Orchestré Philharmonique de Nice, Mr. Arnone was the principal cellist of the Madison Symphony in Wisconsin. He was also a member of the New World Symphony and the Wichita Symphony, as well as principal cello in the Spoleto Festival Orchestra in Charleston, South Carolina and the Festival dei due Mondi in Italy.

Before coming to The University of Iowa, Mr. Arnone was professor of cello and conducting at Ripon College in Ripon, WI, in addition to being principal cellist of the Madison Symphony. Mr. Arnone started the Iowa Cello Society in 2002, and has had yearly “Cello Daze” weekends with such prominent guests as Colin Carr, Bonnie Hampton, Richard Aaron, Hans Jensen, and Tanya Carey.

Lindsay Mecher, a Chicago native and graduate of Loyola Academy, is a frequent guest soloist with the Chicago Citywide Symphony Orchestra. At North Park University, she has been a member of the Lady Vikings Dance Team, the Chambers Singers, and currently is a member of University Choir. Lindsay recently won 1st place in the College Classical Division of the Chicago National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS) competition.

Also this season she was a semi-finalist in the prestigious Bel Canto Foundation Opera Contest, and received her third Bravo Award for Outstanding Performance. In 2012 she was the first place winner of the North Park University Music Performance Awards, and was also a semi-finalist in the Classical Singer Competition. Lindsay is also a winner of the Des Plaines Idol, and the Norwood Park Idol. Roles performed include the third spirit in Mozart’s The Magic Flute, and The Mistress of the Novices and The Abbess in Puccini’s Suor Angelica.

She has performed in the North Park Opera Scenes program in scenes from Little Women, The Rape of Lucretia, Rodrigo and Così fan tutte. She was an alto soloist in Messiah this past April with the North Park University Choir. Lindsay looks forward to the opera scenes program at North Park this fall, where she will be in scenes from The Crucible, Eugene Onegin, Into the Woods, Falstaff, and The Barber of Seville. Lindsay currently studies Vocal Performance on scholarship at North Park University with Dr. Philip Kraus of Northwestern University, who has been on the artistic roster of the Lyric Opera of Chicago for over 20 years.

Philip Kraus is currently one of the most versatile artists on the American music scene today, having appeared as soloist with numerous orchestras and opera companies throughout the United States in a wide variety of standard and adventurous repertoire.

Mr. Kraus has been on the roster of the Lyric Opera of Chicago since 1990 performing numerous roles including Dulcamara in L’Elisir d’amore, Dr. Bartolo in The Barber of Seville, Harashta in The Cunning Little Vixen, the Sacristan in Tosca, Elder MacLean in Susannah, Antonio in The Marriage of Figaro, Benoit/Alcindoro in La Boheme, Wolfsheim in The Great Gatsby, Baron Duphol in La Traviata, Ratcliffe in Billy Budd, Abe Kaplan in Street Scene, and the Mayor in Jenufa as well as featured roles in The Gambler, Candide, The Bartered Bride, Tristan und Isolde, and Andrea Chenier. Additionally he created the role of southern Senator John Calhoun in the world premiere of Anthony Davies’ Amistad at Lyric.

Mr. Kraus made his debut with the Minnesota Opera in 1995 in the title role in Verdi’s Rigoletto and made his Cleveland Opera debut in 1994 as the Vicar in Albert Herring. Most recently he joined the roster of the Los Angeles Opera repeating Duphol in La Traviata opposite René Fleming and Elizabeth Futral. The performance with Ms. Fleming will receive a Decca DVD release. Additionally, he has performed Germont in Traviata and Alfio in Cavalleria Rusticana with the Missouri Symphony, Scarpia in Tosca with Chamber Opera Chicago and the Battle Creek Symphony, the title role Gianni Schicchi in both the Puccini Opera and Michael Ching’s Buoso’s Ghost at Chicago Opera Theater and Taddeo in L’Italiana in Algeri with both the Hawaii Opera Theater and the Pamiro Opera.

Comfortable in both the serious and comic repertoires, Mr. Kraus has made a specialty of two title roles, Verdi’s Falstaff and Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi, performing both roles on numerous ocassions to enthusiastic reviews. No stranger to unusual repertoire, Mr. Kraus performed Mangus in the American premiere of Sir Michael Tippett’s The Knot Garden and portrayed the tortured Salieri in Rimsky Korsakov’s Mozart and Salieri with Concertante di Chicago and the Fort Wayne Philharmonic.

Also comfortable in the Baroque repertoire, Mr.Kraus has made yearly appearances with the Handel Week Festival singing solo work in The Dettingen Te Deum, Esther, Judas Maccabaeus, and the roles of Cosroe in Siroe and Varo in Ezio. Kraus has also made a specialty of the Purcell masques appearing in The Fairy Queen and King Arthur with Music of the Baroque.

Mr. Kraus is equally at home in the light opera and Broadway repertoire. Considered a specialist in Gilbert and Sullivan, Mr. Kraus received high accolades from the press for his performances of Sir Joseph Porter in H.M.S. Pinafore at the Cleveland Opera and Major General Stanley in The Pirates of Penzance at Michigan Opera Theater. Also adept in the Viennese repertory, Mr. Kraus has portrayed leading roles in The Gypsy Baron, Weiner Blut, The Merry Widow, and One Night in Venice. He scored a critical coup in 1989 with his acclaimed portrayal of Russell Paxton in the first major revival of Kurt Weill’s Lady in the Dark at Light Opera Works. Mr. Kraus has also been featured on numerous pops concerts with the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra featuring the music of Rodgers and Hammerstein, Cole Porter, George Gershwin, and Stephen Sondheim.

Solo engagements with conductor Margaret Hillis led to his Chicago Symphony Orchestra debut in 1975 in Handel’s Dettingen Te Deum and Russell Woollen’s In Martyrium Memoriam after which Sir Georg Solti engaged him for Carnegie Hall performances and recording of Fidelio. A frequent concert artist, Mr. Kraus has appeared as soloist with the Cleveland Orchestra, the Dallas, Milwaukee, Omaha, Colorado, Santa Barbara, Richmond, Roanoke, Grant Park, South Bend, Owensboro, Jacksonville, and Madison Symphonies, and the Rochester and Fort Wayne Philharmonics under conductors Erich Leinsdorf, Eduardo Mata, Zdenek Macal, Leonard Slatkin, David Zinman, Claudio Abbado, James Levine, James Paul, Mark Elder, Anton Coppola, Gisele Ben-Dor, Eduard Tchivzhel and Marin Alsop. His wide concert repertoire includes a quartet of Requiems; the Verdi, Brahms, Faure and Mozart; Orff’s Carmina Burana, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Handel’s Messiah, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, Haydn’s Lord Nelson Mass, Bach’s B Minor Mass and Magnificat, Vaughan Williams’ The Sea Symphony and Shostokovitch’s Fourteenth Symphony.

Mr. Kraus has also been a frequent guest of choral ensembles including the Bel Canto Chorus of Milwaukee, Chicago’s Apollo Chorus, the Bach Festival of Winter Park, Music of the Baroque, the Handel Week Festival and the Calvin College Oratorio Society.

Mr. Kraus holds three degrees including a Doctor of Music from Northwestern University. He taught both in the voice and opera programs at De Paul University. Additionally, he headed the opera department at Roosevelt University. Mr. Kraus is also a highly regarded stage director and composer. He founded Light Opera Works in 1980, a professional company devoted to operetta and was Artistic Director for 19 seasons. He also served as resident stage director of Pamiro Opera from 1988 through 1996.