Big names, world premeire and a spotlight on Tucson at 2025 Desert Song Festival

When she got the call to be part of the 2025 Tucson Desert Song Festival, Houston-based mezzo-soprano Sasha Cooke didn't think twice. 

"I've had such great experiences there," said Cooke, who is making her third song festival appearance with a pair of concerts with the Tucson Symphony Orchestra — "Mahler's Third" on Jan. 24 and 26; "Mahler and Schumann" on Feb. 1-2. "It doesn't feel like the arts are this little bubble, you know, as sometimes can be the case."

Cooke is one of five vocalists making return appearances to the festival, which opens this weekend with Arizona Early Music's Tucson Baroque Music Festival Friday, Jan. 10, through Sunday, Jan. 12, at Grace St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, 2331 E. Adams St. The song festival runs through Feb. 28 and returns April 1-19.

"So many of the singers, they want to come back," said song festival Vice President Julia Pernet. "They have a good time. They feel well received."

And they tell their friends, which has helped the festival grow its reputation and attract what festival President Jeannette Segel calls "the cream of the crop" among rising opera and art song vocalists.

"I love the history of the festival and you know, we don't have that many places in the U.S. that celebrate song so that's very special," said Cooke, who made her festival debut in 2018's festival that celebrated the 100th anniversary of Leonard Bernstein's birth.

Other alumni returning to the 2025 festival include:

• Mexican vocalist and Tucson resident Carlos Zapien, artistic director of the Catholic Diocese of Tucson-sponsored Cathedral Concert Series, is back for his third festival, He joins the Tucson guitar trio of Misael Barraza-Díaz, Andrés Pantoja and Diana Schaible for Ballet Tucson's world premiere of Chieko Imada's "From Tucson With Love" Feb. 14-16 at Leo Rich Theatre, 260 S. Church Ave.
• Soprano Susanna Phillips is back for her second festival. She performed the world premiere of Jocelyn Hagen's "Here I Am" with True Concord Voices & Orchestra in 2023 — a makeup date from the 2022 festival that was postponed courtesy the COVID-19 pandemic. Phillips also performed a recital as part of the '23 festival. She returns this year for an Arizona Friends of Chamber Music concert on Feb. 19 at Leo Rich with her SPA Trio, featuring violinist Paul Neubauer and violist Anne-Marie McDermott.
• Tucson mezzo-soprano Kristin Dauphinais has been part of the festival every year since 2015. She will perform a recital with pianist Nigel Foster at the University of Arizona Holsclaw Hall, 1017 N. Olive Road, on Jan. 25.
• Mezzo-soprano Jennifer Johnson Cano, a regular on the Metropolitan Opera stage, made her festival debut with the Tucson Symphony Orchestra in 2014 performing Berlioz's choral masterpiece "The Damnation of Faust." She returned in 2018 for a recital accompanied by her pianist husband and Tucson native Christopher Cano. This year, she is in the cast of Arizona Opera's projection-based concert production of Verdi's "Aida" on April 19 at Linda Ronstadt Music Hall, 260 S. Church Ave.
• Bass-baritone Peter Barber makes back-to-back festival performances; he was Basilio in Arizona Opera's production of Rossini's "The Barber of Seville." He returns this year as part of the "Aida" cast.  

Some of the biggest names among the first-timers to the song festival:

• Violinist Joshua Bell accompanying his soprano wife Larisa Martínez on April 2 at the UA's Crowder Hall in the world premiere of "Tennessee Songs," a song cycle commissioned by the festival from John Corigliano. The piece reunites Corigliano and Bell, who struck household-name fame after performing on Corigliano's Academy Award-winning soundtrack for the 1998 film "The Red Violin." 
• Soprano Leah Hawkins returns to Arizona Opera three years after she played the title role in the company's 2022 production of Strauss' "Ariadne auf Naxos." She will perform the title role in the company's concert version of "Aida" on April 19. Baritone Kidon Choi sings the role of Amonasro, while lyric tenor Limmie Pulliam is Radamès.
• Grammy-winning bass-baritone Ryan Speedo Green, whose international reputation has taken him to some of the world's most prestigious opera houses, including 13 seasons with the Metropolitan Opera, is performing a recital Jan. 16 for True Concord Voices & Orchestra with pianist Adam Nielsen at UA's Holsclaw Hall.
• Richard Tucker Award-winning tenor Stephen Costello's career has so far taken him to London's Royal Opera House, Moscow's Bolshoi Theatre, Germany's Deutsche Oper Berlin and Austria's Wiener Staatsoper as well as America's Lyric Opera of Chicago, Washington National Opera and San Francisco Opera. Arizona Opera is hosting him for a recital with pianist Anthony Manoli on April 3 at Holsclaw.
• Tenor SeokJong Baek will sing the title role in Arizona Opera's production of Puccini's "La Boheme" on Feb. 1 at Linda Ronstadt Music Hall. He comes here weeks after filling in at the last minute in the lead role of Radames for the Metropolitan Opera's performances of "Aida" alongside 2023 Song Festival alum Angel Blue. Soprano Caitlin Gotimer, who made her "Tosca" role debut with Arizona Opera in 2023, sings the lead role of Mimi.

Tucson Desert Song Festival has more than 30 artists on the 2025 lineup, including Tucson-based baritone Octavio Moreno, who joins Tucson Symphony Orchestra April 4 and 6 for Carl Orff's powerful "Carmina Burana" at Linda Ronstadt Music Hall; the Grammy-winning Silkroad Ensemble and vocalist Pura Fé, a founding member of the Native Women's a capella trio Ulali, perform a concert April 6 at Centennial Hall, 1020 E. University Blvd. on the UA campus; and pianist Armen Donelian and vocalist Dominique Eade, who are doing two performances Jan. 17 with the Tucson Jazz Festival at Hotel Congress's The Century Room, 311 E. Congress St.  

The Donelian/Eade concert is one of two collaborations with the jazz festival. On Jan. 24, Canadian bepop and swing singer Caity Gyorgy and her piano trio will perform two shows — both are sold out — at The Century Room. Tickets are still available for the late show with Donelian/Eade through hotelcongress.com.

The jazz events are nothing new for the song festival, which has, in recent years, included events other than its core of art songs, classical and opera. One of the anchors of the first leg of this year's festival is Arizona Theatre Company's production of Sheldon Epps' "Blues in the Night," which takes a deep dive into the quintessential American genre. The show runs Jan. 26 through Feb. 15 at the Temple of Music and Art, 330 S. Scott Ave.

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This year's festival features more than 20 concerts and discussions presented by 10 Tucson performing arts groups and ensembles, from the TSO and AEM to Arizona Opera and Arizona Arts Live. Ticket prices vary and are available through the organizations' websites:

• Arizona Early Music, azearlymusic.org
• Arizona Friends of Chamber Music, arizonachambermusic.org
• Arizona Arts Live, arizonaartslive.com
• Arizona Opera, azopera.org
• Arizona Theatre Company, atc.org
• Ballet Tucson, ballettucson.org
• Tucson Jazz Festival, tucsonjazzfestival.org
• Tucson Symphony Orchestra, tucsonsymphony.org
• True Concord Voices & Orchestra, trueconcord.org
• University of Arizona School of Music, music.arizona.edu

For the complete schedule of events, visit tucsondesertsongfestival.org/events.

Opening weekend

Arizona Early Music opens the 2025 Tucson Desert Song Festival with its third annual Baroque Music Festival Friday, Jan. 10 through Sunday, Jan 12, featuring three-time Grammy-winning bass-baritone Dashon Burton and renowned early music soprano Amanda Forsythe. Avi Stein, who plays harpsichord in the early music ensemble Quicksilver and teaches at Yale and Juilliard, is the artistic director.

The festival, the only one of its kind in Tucson, is the most ambitious project in the history of the 43-year-old organization, whose mission is to champion music from the Medieval through Baroque periods performed by artists using instruments from those early days.  

The three-day festival at Grace St. Paul's Episcopal Church, 2331 E. Adams St., will feature the Tucson Baroque Music Festival Chamber Players, comprised of freelance musicians who specialize in early music and perform on period instruments. Stein will lead the ensemble and play keyboards.

Forsythe kicks off the festival at 7 p.m. Friday with a program of vocal and instrumental works by Handel in "All Roads Lead To ..."  The program includes Handel's Concerto Grosso in B-flat Major and Concerto Grosso in D minor, as well as "Agripina condotta a morire."

Burton goes solo at 3 p.m. Saturday with "Bach's Circle," a program of works by Bach and his contemporaries including Nicolaus Bruhns, Vivaldi and Telemann. The program opens with Bruhns' "De Profundis" before the TBMF Chamber Players perform Telemann's delightful "Paris Quartets" (Quartet No. 6 in E minor, Nouveaux). Burton will be front and center for the bulk of the concert's second half, performing “Der Friede sei mit dir,” Bach's series of cantatas for bass soloist.

The pair join vocal forces to close the festival at 3 p.m. Sunday with "Divine Love," a program of Bach's sacred works including "Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme" (Awake, calls the voice to us) and "Liebster Jesu, mein Verlangen" (Dearest Jesus, my desire).

Arizona Early Music launched the festival at the 2023 Desert Song Festival, a year after it had planned after a flareup in the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2022 prompted the Song Festival to cancel its event that year. 

Tickets are $30.90 per concert or $77.25 for a three-day pass, available at azearlymusic.org/tickets.

Tucson in the spotlight

Two events at the 2025 Tucson Desert Song Festival will celebrate prestigious Tucson anniversaries:

• Ballet Tucson will celebrate the 250th anniversary of Tucson's founding with the world premiere of "From Tucson With Love," created by its resident choreographer Chieko Imada. The show opens on Feb. 14 — the 113th anniversary of Arizona's statehood — and runs through Feb. 16 at Leo Rich Theatre, 260 S. Church Ave. The piece celebrates the anniversary of the Presidio San Agustín del Tucsón — aka the Old Pueblo — through the music of legendary Tucsonan Lalo Guerrero, the father of Chicano music. The Tucson ensemble performing on stage alongside the dancers includes vocalist Carlos Zapien, making his third Tucson Desert Song Festival appearance, and classically-trained guitarist Misael Barraza-Diaz, helming a guitar trio that includes his wife, guitarist and flutist Diana Schaible, and Chilean guitarist Andrés Pantoja, a doctoral student in the University of Arizona's prestigious Bolton Guitar Studies Program. 
• True Concord Voices and Orchestra pays homage to Tucson's Davis-Monthan Air Force Base on its 100th birthday with the all-American program "The Tucson Spirit, The Love of Flight." The concert, Feb. 28 through March 2 at various venues, includes Marc Blitzstein's little performed "The Airborne Symphony," commissioned just after World War II. The program also includes Copland's "Lincoln Portrait," Thompson's "Testament of Freedom" works by Gershwin, Bernstein and Weill. 

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