|
The canadian bass-baritone and teacher, Daniel (Lee) Lichti, who is of Mennonite background, sang in his church choir as a boy. He studied from 1969 to 1972 with Victor Martens at Wilfrid Laurier University and from 1972 to 1974 in the University's Summer Opera Workshop, from 1974 to 1975 with Louis Quilico at the University of Toronto Opera Division, and from 1975 to 1978 with Theo Lindenbaum at the Nordwestdeutsches Musikakademie in Detmold. He was awarded in 1974 first prize in the Edward Johnson Music Foundation Competition, and several subsequent prizes and scholarships inlcuding a full stipend to attend Peter Pears's master-class for Lied in 1981.
Daniel Lichti made his debut in a 1974 production of Menotti's The Medium conducted by Raffi Armenian at the Stratford Festival. in his early career was primarily concert and oratorio engagements and as such first appeared as a soloist in Canada in 1979 in Johannes Brahms's Ein Deutsches Requiem with the Ontario Choral Federation under Helmuth Rilling. He debuted in New York in 1985 in J.S. Bach's St John Passion (BWV 245) with the Florilegium Choir at Alice Tully Hall and sang at Carnegie Hall in 1990 in J.S. Bach's St Matthew Passion (BWV 244) with St Luke's Orchestra. He was a soloist for Rilling on many occasions including a 1988 European tour with Rilling's Gächinger Kantorei Stuttgart, a performance of J.S. Bach's Mass in B Minor (BWV 232) at the 1989 International Choral Festival in Toronto, and a 1990 performance with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra broadcast over PBS.
One of Canada's finest oratorio singers, award-winning bass-baritone Daniel Lichti appears with major symphonic, choral, and concert organizations throughout Europe, the USA, Canada, and South America. He is known especially as an interpreter of J.S. Bach and has appeared at numerous J.S. Bach events, including performances with the Carmel Bach Festival, New England Bach Festival, Oregon Bach Festival, Baldwin-Wallace College Bach Festival, Bach Festival of Winter Park, and beginning in 1985, regular performances with the Bethlehem Bach Festival. With this latter's Bach Choir of Bethlehem, he has also appeared at John F. Kennedy Center in Washington (1999) and Carnegie Hall (2000), and toured the UK in 2003.
Daniel Lichti has performed with most major Canadian orchestras, toured with Tafelmusik and with the Canadian Chamber Ensemble, appeared with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra and other USA orchestras, with the Washington Bach Consort, and with such choirs as the Richard Eaton Singers, the Kitchener-Waterloo Philharmonic Choir, the Menno Singers, the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir, and the Vancouver Chamber Choir. He has appeared at the Guelph Spring Festival, Quinte Summer Music, the Elora Festival, Festival Canada, the Ottawa Chamber Music Festival, and similar events.
Daniel Lichti's 1997-1998 season began with W.A. Mozart's Mass in C minor for Pro Coro in Edmonton followed immediately by Gustav Mahler's 'Symphony of a Thousand' with the Edmonton Symphony. Toronto Mendelssohn Choir patrons in Toronto heard him in Israel In Egypt and he sings J.S. Bach's St. John Passion (BWV 245) with the New Jersey, Hatford and kingstone symphonies. He performed George Frideric Handel's Messiah in Montreal, Washington, D.C., Toronto, Kirchener-Waterloo, and Mississauga. J.S. Bach's St. Matthew Passion (BWV 244) and Rossini's Stabat Mater marked his Bach Festival of Winter Park return engagements, with further Bach works demanding his presence in Washington, D.C. Operatically, he looks forward to G.F. Handel's Giulio Caesare with the Handel and Haydn Society of Boston.
Praised for his performance by critics and audiences alike, Daniel Lichti's highlights of past seasons include J.S. Bach's St Matthew Passion (BWV 244) with St. Luke's Orchestra at Carnegie Hall, the Mass in B Minor (BWV 232) in Leipzig and Munich with the Bach Choir of Bethlehem, and G. Mahler's Lieder Eines Fahrenden Gesellen in Holland, Germany, and Switzerland. He has appeared as a guest artist at all the major North America Bach Festivals. He has toured with Helmuth Rilling's Bachakademie of Stuttgart and with the Bach Aria Group. He has been heard in Elijah, J. Brahms Requiem, and L.v. Beethoven's Symphony No.9 with the orchestras of San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, Toronto, Calgary, Montreal, Vancouver, Cleveland Orchestra, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Milwaukee, Toronto's Tafelmusik, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra of San Francisco, and Quebec's Les Violons du Roy. He performed several times at the Baldwin-Wallace College Bach Festival (1990, 1995, 2001).
Only occasionally performing works by Canadians, Daniel Lichti sang Ruth Watson Henderson's Ballad of St George at the 1991 Elora Festival, and sang in the premiere of Ruth Fazal's Oratorio Terezin in Toronto in 2003.
Daniel Lichti continued to manage his family's hog farm in New Hamburg, Ontario, until 1992, when he began to pursue a full-time music career, gradually undertaking more opera engagements. In Canada, he has sung Polyphemus in G.F. Handel's Acis and Galatea for Opera Atelier; Don Alfonso in Così Fan Tutti for Quebec Opera (1995) and for L'Opéra de Montrèal (2000); the King in G.F. Handel's Ariodante for Opera in Concert (2001); and Bertolo in Marriage of Figaro for L'Opéra de Montréal (2003). Elsewhere, he was Polyphemus in Carmel, California (1992), and debuted with Rome Opera in 1998, as Achilla in G.F. Handel's Guilio Cesare (a role he also performed for Boston's Handel and Haydn Society).
In 1998, Daniel Lichti was appointed associate professor at Wilfrid Laurier .
Daniel Lichti's discography includes Songs of Hugo Wolf, which was highlighted by Gramaphone magazine, Sony's The Gift of Messiah, and CD's of Brahms and Schumann with pianist Janina, as well as two recordings of J.S. Bach cantatas and the Mass in B Minor (BWV 232) with the Bach Choir of Bethlehem. |
