Rising young baritone, JOSHUA ZINK is beginning to make a reputation on the stage, in the concert, and recital hall. Recent operatic engagements have included Marullo in Verdi’s Rigoletto with Nashville Opera and Don Giovanni on tour as a Mary Ragland Young Artist. Other recent operatic engagements have included The Mikado and Die Entführung aus dem Serail with Opera New Jersey. As an advocate for new works Zink collaborated with composer Michael Ching to workshop a new opera, A Midsummer Night’s Dream; an a-capella opera which was showcased at Opera America in New York City in the summer of 2009. At Dayton Opera, Zink was an Artist in Residence with for the 2008-2009 season and covered Belcore in L'elisir d'amore and performed Kromov in The Merry Widow. Joshua has also performed as a Resident Opera Artist at Pine Mountain Music Festival. In a summer tribute to Leonard Bernstein works performed included Trouble in Tahiti and Candide.
Recently on the concert platform Joshua has sung with the Dayton Philharmonic in Bach’s St. John Passion; also as a soloist in Handel’s Israel in Egypt. Other concert repertoire with various symphony orchestra’s include: Mozart’s Requiem, Mass is C minor (The Great), Beethoven’s Mass in C and Missa solemnis, Handel’s Messiah, and Mendelssohn’s Elijah.
An avid song lover Zink has performed some of the great repertoire with pianist John Wustman. In 2007 Zink participated in The Song Continues… given by Marilyn Horne at Lincoln Center to promote and preserve the art of song recital.
Joshua Zink is a 2008 alumnus of The University of Illinois where he studied with his mentor John Wustman and a 2005 alumnus of Bowling Green State University where he continues study with Christopher Scholl.
JOHN WUSTMAN, who has been called the "dean of American accompanists," studied with John Kollen at the University of Michigan and in New York with Leonard Shure. He became affiliated with Robert Shaw and his long and illustrious career took off like a comet. Not a comet that sputters and dies, but a comet that has continued to lighten the skies from that day to this. Wustman's New York years read like a veritable history of singers and singing. He was pianist for the rehearsals of the American Opera Society's presentation of Bellini's II Pirata that occurred in Carnegie Hall in 1959. No less an artist than Maria Callas was featured in that presentation and Mr. Wustman would later serve as a member of the jury at the Fourth International Tschaikowsky Competition in Moscow with Mme. Callas. During this time he traveled abroad under the aegis of the Fulbright Commission and also the United States State Department teaching master classes in German Lieder in Uruguay, Peru, and Argentina. He has appeared in the leading concert halls of five continents with some of the greatest singers from the second half of this century: names such as Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Birgit Nilsson, Régine Crespin, Christa Ludwig, Nicolai Gedda, Carlo Bergonzi, Luciano Pavarotti and a host of others. Certain highlights in an already brilliant career include a series of televised recitals with Mr. Pavarotti, including the first recital from the Metropolitan Opera House in 1978.
Other recordings include song recitals with Régine Crespin, Carlo Bergonzi, Brigitte Fassbaender and the Live from Carnegie Hall recital with Luciano Pavarotti. Since 1968, Mr. Wustman has been Professor of Music at the University of Illinois where he founded the vocal coaching and accompanying program in 1973. His presence is keenly felt in his master classes and recitals, often devoted to the works of one composer. On January 31, 1997, Mr. Wustman completed a six-year series of recitals celebrating the 200th anniversary of Franz Schubert's birth. This "labor of love", as Wustman terms it, featured performances of each of the Viennese master's 598 songs. Since 1999, he has been a member of the "Center for Advanced Study" of the University of Illinois. This is the highest honor and award the University endows. Truly, John Wustman is a musician's musician, a singer's friend: a man for all musical seasons.
Venue: St. John United Church of Christ
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