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The English tenor, Edmund Hastings, was originally a treble at Bath Abbey. HAe then sang at King's College Choir, Cambridge and Choir of New College, Oxford,. He went on to study at the Royal Academy of Music with Ryland Davies and Dominic Wheeler, where he is the holder of the Nan Copeland Award and the Norman McCann Scholarship, and is generously supported by the Michael James Music Trust, the Sir Richard Stapley Educational Trust and the Musician's Benevolent Fund.
Edmund Hastings' operatic experience stretches from the very earliest - the title role in Orfeo for Hampstead Garden Opera - to the very new - creating the role of Gabriel in Hagar in the Wilderness by Sally Beamish for the Presteigne Festival with Opera Nova. Other recent opera roles include Offenbach’s Vert-Vert (cover Vert-Vert) for Garsington Opera, First Armed Man in W.A. Mozart's Magic Flute (Ryedale Festival), Harlekin in Der Kaiser Von Atlantis (Grimeborn Opera Festival), Cinea Cajo in Fabricio for the London Handel Festival, Nik in La Fanciulla del West (OperaUpClose, February 2012), Arioch in Belshazzar (Theatre du Capitole, Toulouse, René Jacobs), Jupiter in Semele (Hampstead Garden Opera), and Lysander in Benjamin Britten's Midsummer Night’s Dream (Rosslyn Chapel). More recent opera roles include Tenor 1 in Frank Martin’s Le Vin Herbé, Ferrando in Cosi Fan Tutte, Monostatos in Die Zauberflöte and Male Chorus in The Rape of Lucretia and Don Basilio in Le Nozze di Figaro, both for RAM opera scenes. As part of English Voices he performed in the opera chorus for Don Giovanni and Alceste at the 2010 Aix en Provence opera festival. He also took part in the first full staging of a Baroque opera in China - Semele in Beijing.
With an extensive performing repertoire, encompassing the majority of the oratorio canon, Edmund Hastings began his concert career in 2008, singing J.S. Bach's cantatas with Laurence Cummings at the Barbican. Since then, he has worked with many leading conductors, including Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Richard Egarr, Paul McCreesh and René Jacobs, performing in venues such as the Wigmore Hall, The Chapel of Kings College, Cambridge, St George's Bristol and Saint John’s, Smith Square. He is much in demand internationally, with particular highlights including the first performance of George Frideric Handel’s Messiah in Goa with the Symphony Orchestra of India, a song recital at the Parisian British Ambassadorial Residence with Matthew Fletcher, L.v. Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 with CUMS choir and orchestra at the Pallazzo Vecchio, Florence, and J.S. Bach's St Matthew Passion (BWV 244) (arias) tour across Israel with the Israel Camerata Orchestra Jerusalem. More recent concert appearances include Felix Mendelssohn's Paulus (St Martin’s, Dorking), Haydn's Seasons (Swindon Choral Society), J.S. Bach's St John Passion (BWV 245) (Fiori Musicali), Monteverdi's Vespers (also Fiori Musicali), W.A. Mozart's Requiem (St Martin in the Fields) and G.F. Handel's Jephtha (Felsted Choral Society). Other recent highlights include G.F. Handel's Messiah (Fiori Musicali), Ralph Vaughan Williams' Serenade to Music (Felsted), and G.F. Handel's Hercules (New College, Oxford). Future concerts include W.A. Mozart's Requiem in Peterborough Cathedral, and a recital of English World War I song in Amiens.
A committed recitalist, Edmund Hastings has performed B. Britten's The Heart of the Matter with Christopher De Souza, Schubert's Schwanengesang with Craig White, and R. Vaughan Williams' On Wenlock Edge and Finzi's solo cantata Dies Natalis for the Dorking Vaughan Williams Festival.
Edmund Hastings has broadcast and recorded with many leading orchestras, including a BBC Radio 3 broadcast of the J.S. Bach's Magnificat (BWV 243) with the Academy of Ancient Music and a recording of the Monteverdi's Vespers with Fiori Musicali. Other highlights include J.S. Bach's B Minor Mass (BWV 232) with the Bristol Bach Choir, J.S. Bach's St John Passion (BWV 245) Evangelist with the choir of Christ’s College, Cambridge. |
