Jon Weaving
Jon Weaving commenced singing in public at the age of nine. He began singing lessons with Jessye Schmidt and Browning Mummery before leaving for Europe where he continued his vocal studies with Dino Borgioli in 1954. He then joined Joan Sutherland at Clive Carey's singing studio and this was the beginning of a long and happy friendship with Joan which resulted in a complete vocal change from bass-baritone to tenor with daily assistance of Richard Bonynge but that came later. Before this change occurred, he studied repertoire with Joan Cross and Hermann Simberg and worked extensively with Jani Strasser at Glyndbourne where he was offered two solo contracts. He was also lucky enough to be employed by Sir Thomas Beecham as a rehearsal singer for his recordings and had the opportunity to be stand in singer at the Abbey Road for Gotlob Frick as Osmin in the Beecham recording of Il Seraglio in which Jon finally sang the First Janissary. He sang in five other Beecham recordings and in the two years with Sir Thomas was able to absorb much, which helped in his later career.
After two years study with Richard Bonynge, Jon was engaged as a principal tenor with Sadlers Wells Opera and his debut role was in London's West End as Danilo in The Merry Widow opposite June Bronhill. This was the first of many hundreds of performances of the role and the beginning of a long association with the Coliseum. His many leading roles with the Sadlers Wells included Alfredo in La Traviata, Lensky in Eugene Onegin, Sali in Delius' Village Romeo and Juliet opposite Elsie Morrison and more operetta roles such as Raoul de Gardefeu in La Vie Parisienne and Pluto in Orpheus in the Underworld which were recorded by HMV at Abbey Road. He made BBC broadcasts, the first of which was Eisenstein in Die Fledermaus direct from the stage of The Wells and then sang again with June Bronhill when he played Sir Walter Raleigh in Merrie England under Charles Mackerras.
In 1962 he began a tour of Australia and New Zealand for Sadlers Wells, now the English National Opera, and, during this time, which included many performances of Danilo and Pluto, he had his own Television Series with Suzanne Steele for ABC which ran for three years. He also appeared with all the State Symphony Orchestras and toured New Zealand three times. The last when he was invited to direct and sing in The Pirates of Panzance at Her Majesty's, Auckland when he sang Fredrick opposite his television co-star, Suzanne Steele.
Returning to London in l966, he was chosen after extensive Covent Garden auditions by Benjamin Britten, to re-create the role of MacHeath in The Beggar's Opera, a role which Britten had composed for Peter Pears. This Jon sang in London, Paris, Lyon and at the World Expo l967 in Montreal. The same years he joined the Kiel Opera in Germany following extensive study in London with Audrey Langford and Andrew Field and long periods in Paris with Dominic Modesti.
His debut role in Kiel was Wagner's Lohengrin followed by Hermann in Tschaikowski's Queen of Spades Pique Dame. Then came Otelle, Canio, Andrea Chenier, Florestan, Hoffmann, MacDuff in Verdi's MacBeth, Luigi in Il Tabarro, Sou Chong in Lehar's Land of Smiles, the title role in the same composer's Count of Luxembourg and four world premiers better forgotten. Guest performances throughout Europe quickly followed; Camren's Don Jose, the Title role in Strauss' Gypsy Baron and Tassilo in Countess Mariza in Augsburg followed by Erik in Wagner's Dutchman and another world premier for the Olympic Games in Munich, Rashamon based on the Japanese film. Whilst in Kiel and under the influence of well-known conductors Klaus Tennstedt, Lothar Zagrosek and Hans Zender, Jon commenced a long series of Wagnerian "heroic roles", the first two being Loge and Siegmund. He continually refused the opportunity to sing Siegfried and Tristan until persuaded by Lord Harwood and Charles Mackerras to undertake both Siegfrieds in London in English, the now famous Andrew Porter Ring. Before this there were revivals of Orpheus and the Duke in Night in Venice and a new production of Ariadne auf Naxos at the Coliseum in which Jon sang the murderously difficult role of Bacchus. There was also Weber's Huon in Oberon, learnt with Roger Vignoles at Covent Garden in eight hours, just before the dress rehearsal!
Before the Siegfried performances came an invitation to debut at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich as Dimitri in Boris Godounow under Raphael Kubelik (giving Jon a chance to renew his acquaintance with Elsie Morrison, now Kubelik's wife). The love duets were opposite Brigitte Faessbender and the Boris was sung by either Marti Talvela, Nicola Ghiarov, Theo Adam or Takao Okormura.
Naturally Jon continued to study between engagements and was most fortunate to work with pedagogues as Mario del Monaco, Max Lorenz, Marek Janowski and Erich Rieder. His whole Wagnerian career however was based on his work with the German soprano, Anni Assian-Rohling who had partnered singers such as Peter Anders in Tosca and Butterfly in Berlin and Hamburg. As a pre-war Berlin Isolde she was able to impart enormous amounts of vocal knowledge and Wagnerian tradition.
The first Ring singing both Siegfrieds in German was in Wiesbaden with Wolfgang Wagner in the audience. This resulted in an offer to sing the Gotterdammerung Siegfried in Bayreuth in the original Patrice Chereau production of the centenary. This was not possible to accept for several reasons but a wonderful consolation prize was the offer of an engagement in Leipzig, Wagner's birthplace to sing in a new Ring under Joachim Herz with the Gewandhaus Orchestra playing in the pit. This engagement lasted for five consecutive seasons.
Jon has sung on Swiss, German, Austrian, Swedish, British and American television shows, starring in variety programmes such as the Phil Silvers (Sergeant Bilko) programme, The Red Skelton Hour and the Shelley Berman Show for NBC in the US. He has recorded for HMV, Phillips, Crest and ABC and appears on several opera videos. In his native Australia he has appeared with all the major orchestras and guested with the Victorian and Queensland Opera companies. For the Australian Opera he sang the Gotterdammerung Siegfried under Sir Charles Mackerras and Siegmund in Die Walkure, both at the Sydney Opera House.
He made a solo recital tour with Geoffrey Parsons and filmed some television programmes for the ABC with his wife, the well known Swedish soprano, Monique Brynnel. They met during performances of The Merry Widow in Germany when Monique was singing the title role and they married in London l969. Critics in Germany described them as the ideal operetta pair and together they starred in some ten classical operettas as well as many performances of Show Boat in German as Magnolia and Ravenal. They have recorded for ABC an album entitled World of Operetta. Jon also recorded Sosthene in Violins of St. Jacques by Malcolm Williamson and he created the title role of Quiros in Peter Sculthorpes opera for ABC Television.
Jon's focus on Wagnerian roles has taken him to sing in Geneva, London, Cape Town, Naples, Genoa, Dortmund, Wiesbaden, Braunschweig, Hannover, Essen, Hong Kong, Munich, Leipzig etc., and to places far a field as Namibia.