Guest Artists

 

Peter Richard Conte, Organist

Peter Richard Conte is highly regarded as a skillful performer and arranger of organ transcriptions. He has been featured several times on National Public Radio and on ABC television’s Good Morning America and World News Tonight. His monthly radio show, The Wanamaker Organ Hour, airs on the first Sunday of each month and can be accessed online via WRTI.org. He performs extensively throughout the United States and Canada under the management of Phillip Truckenbrod Concert Artists, and was a featured artist at the American Guild of Organists’ National Convention in 2002, and at the International Organ Festival in Aosta, Italy, in September 2004. In 2013, the Philadelphia Music Alliance honored him with a bronze plaque on the Avenue of the Arts’ Walk of Fame. He has performed with the Philadelphia Orchestra, The Philly POPS, and with Delaware and Allentown Symphonies.

Tony DeSare, vocalist & piano

Tony DeSare performs with infectious joy, wry playfulness and robust musicality. Named a Rising Star Male Vocalist in Downbeat magazine, DeSare has lived up to this distinction by winning critical and popular acclaim for his concert performances throughout North America and abroad. From jazz clubs to Carnegie Hall to Las Vegas headlining with Don Rickles and major symphony orchestras, DeSare has brought his fresh take on old school class around the globe. DeSare has three top ten Billboard jazz albums under his belt and has been featured on the CBS Early Show, NPR, A Prairie Home Companion, the Today Show and his music has been posted by social media celebrity juggernaut, George Takei.
  

Allison Blackwell, vocalist

Allison is thrilled to be back singing in her hometown. Raised in the suburbs of Wyndmoor, outside Philadelphia, she attended Springfield Township High School in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. A versatile range from opera to gospel, she was last seen with the Philly POPS this past winter in The Carole King Songbook with Liz Callaway and Bryce Ryness. She made her Broadway debut in The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess starring six-time Tony Award winner Audra McDonald, Norm Lewis and David Alan Grier. For her second Broadway show, as Aretha Franklin in A Night with Janis Joplin, USA TODAY wrote: “Allison Blackwell, who veers from a stunning operatic reading of Summertime to a shivery, booming impersonation of Aretha Franklin.” She recently finished a successful run in The Lion King on Broadway. Allison has performed across the nation with various symphonies and has been seen in two Live from Lincoln Center productions: Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street starring Bryn Terfel and Emma Thompson (2015 Emmy Award Outstanding Special Class Program) and Show Boat starring Vanessa Williams. Proud graduate of Spelman College (B.A) and The Boston Conservatory (M.M).

Christiane Noll, vocalist

Christiane Noll starred on Broadway in the Kennedy Center Revival of Ragtime, receiving a Helen Hayes award — and TONY and Drama Desk Award nominations — for her portrayal of Mother. Broadway and national tour appearances include Chaplin, Urinetown (Ovation Award), It Ain't Nothin’ but the Blues, Jekyll & Hyde, Grease, Miss Saigon, and South Pacific (Australia/Thailand). She is a frequent guest soloist with the National Symphony, Cincinnati Pops, Jerusalem Symphony, The Philly POPS, Boston Pops, and Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, with international appearances with Sinfonica Brasileira in Rio, China Philharmonic with concert pianist Lang Lang, and orchestras in Hong Kong, Czech Republic, and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. She made her Carnegie Hall debut with Skitch Henderson in his last performance with The New York Pops and more recently sang with Steven Reineke for Stephen Sondheim's 80th Birthday Celebration at Carnegie Hall. She made her Hollywood Bowl debut singing with Julie Andrews and her opera debut with Placido Domingo in The Merry Widow. She performed in the Warner Brothers Animated feature film The King and I, and made appearances in Town Hall’s Broadway By the Year and in Lincoln Center's American Songbook Series.

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Dee Roscioli, vocalist

Dee Roscioli is best known for her portrayal of Elphaba in the smash Broadway hit Wicked on Broadway, in Chicago, and across the United States. In fact, she holds the distinction of having performed Elphaba in more performances than any other actress. Dee has also performed the leading role of Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd at the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival. Additional New York credits include The 24-Hour Musicals, Murder Ballad (Workshop, Manhattan Theatre Club), and Therapy Rocks (NYMF). She has also performed Grizabella in the National Tour of Cats. She recently sang her solo show for a sold-out audience at Birdland in both New York City and Chicago. She was a special guest of Anthony Rapp and Adam Pascal at their concert, and appeared opposite Anthony Rapp in a critically acclaimed performance in a new play entitled Dedalus Lounge. Dee has also been invited to sing at the prestigious Broadway on Broadway, accompanied by a 30-piece orchestra.

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Doug LaBrecque, vocalist

Doug LaBrecque has thrilled theatre audiences as The Phantom and Raoul in the Harold Prince production of The Phantom of the Opera, as well as Ravenal in the Hal Prince revival of Showboat in Canada and Chicago. He was featured in Oscar Hammerstein’s 100th Birthday Celebration on Broadway at The Gershwin Theatre, and toured nationally with Les Miserables. Regionally, Doug has performed leading roles in Candide, A Chorus Line, and Man of LaMancha, among many others. One of the most prolific concert performers of his generation, Doug has been a soloist with some of the world’s finest symphony orchestras, including The National Symphony, The Korean National Symphony, The Israel Philharmonic, The Shanghai Radio Orchestra, The Vancouver and Calgary Symphonies, The Atlanta Symphony, The San Francisco Symphony, the Minnesota Orchestra, Detroit Symphony, and with Marvin Hamlisch at the Ravinia Festival with The Chicago Symphony and with The Pittsburgh Symphony. In a tribute to Richard Rodgers, Doug made his Carnegie Hall debut as a soloist with the New York Pops, the same season he debuted with The Boston Pops. Doug also recently appeared in Alba, Italy, as the guest soloist in an all-Bernstein concert and returned to the International Music Festival in The Czech Republic.

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