Paul Plishka
Paul Plishka (born August 28, 1941) is an American
Life and career
Plishka comes from
Plishka made his formal debut with the
At La Scala, the bass appeared in La damnation de Faust (Concert Version, with Nicolai Gedda, 1975), Boris Godunov (as Pimenn, conducted by Claudio Abbado, 1981), Anna Bolena (a revival of the Luchino Visconti production, 1982), I lombardi (1986), Nabucco (conducted by Riccardo Muti, 1988), Turandot (with Ghena Dimitrova, 1988 and 1989), and I Capuleti e i Montecchi (1988 and 1989). His last performance with the company was in 1992, in the Verdi Requiem.
He is a National Patron of Delta Omicron, an international professional music fraternity.[2]
In 2000, he played Judge Turpin in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street with the New York Philharmonic.
Paul Plishka's artistry was recognized in 1992 when he received the Pennsylvania Governor's Award for Excellence in the Arts and when, several years earlier, he was inducted into the Hall of Fame for Great American Opera Singers in a celebration at the Academy of Vocal Arts in Philadelphia.
However, Plishka's international artistic successes have been dampened by a life filled with personal tragedies. In 1984, Plishka's younger brother, Dr Peter Plishka, was found dead in his Bronx apartment with a self-inflicted stab wound. At the time, Dr Plishka, 33, was chief of children's services at the state-run Children's Psychiatric Center. In 1991, Plishka's son Jeffrey was accused of the murder and rape of Laura Ronning, a crime of which he was eventually acquitted in 2010, and died in 2017.[3] Plishka's first wife, Judith Ann Plishka, Jeffrey's mother, died in 2004.[4] Plishka is currently married to Sharon Thomas, a former resident stage director at the Met. Another of Plishka's sons, Paul, Jr, also died, according to Pastor Protopresbyter Nestor Kowal of St Michael Ukrainian Orthodox Church in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Plishka's third son, Nicolai, died in 2021.
Abridged discography
- Puccini: Tosca [as the Sacristan] (L.Price, Domingo, Milnes; Mehta, 1972)
- Donizetti: Anna Bolena (Sills, Verrett, Burrows; Rudel, 1972)
- Bellini: I puritani (Sills, Gedda, L.Quilico; Rudel, 1973)
- Bellini: Norma (Sills, Verrett, di Giuseppe; Levine, 1973)
- Gounod: Faust (Caballé, Aragall; Lombard, 1976)
- Massenet: Le Cid (Bumbry, Domingo; Queler, 1976) [live]
- Puccini: Turandot (Caballé, Freni, Carreras; Lombard, 1977)
- Verdi: Otello (Scotto, Domingo, Milnes; Levine, 1978)
- Bellini: Norma (Scotto, Troyanos, Giacomini; Levine, 1979)
- Puccini: La bohème (Scotto, Neblett, Kraus, Milnes; Levine, 1979)
- Verdi: Requiem (Caballé, Berini, Domingo; Mehta, 1980) [live]
- Verdi: La forza del destino (Freni, Domingo, Zancanaro; Muti, 1986)
- Mussourgsky: Boris Godunov (Vishnevskaya, Raimondi; Rostropovich, 1987)
- Puccini: La bohème (Réaux, Hadley, Hampson; Bernstein, 1988)
- "À Bordeaux" [Verdi/Moussorgsky] (Lombard, 1989)
- Verdi: Luisa Miller (Millo, Quivar, Domingo; Levine, 1991)
- Mozart: Le nozze di Figaro (Te Kanawa, Upshaw; Levine, 1992)
- "Sings Songs of Ukraine" (Hrynkiv, 1992)
- Beethoven: Ninth Symphony (R.Alexander, Quivar, Lakes; Previn, 1993)
- "Christmas with Paul Plishka" (Erickson, 1995)
- Stravinsky: The Rake's Progress (McNair, Bostridge; Ozawa, 1995)
Abridged videography
- Puccini: La bohème (Scotto, Niska, Pavarotti, Wixell; Levine, Melano, 1977) [live]
- Weill: Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny (Stratas, Varnay, Cassilly, MacNeil; Levine, Dexter, 1979) [live]
- Verdi: Don Carlos (Scotto, Troyanos, Moldoveanu, Milnes, Hines; Levine, Dexter, 1980) [live]
- Rossini: La cenerentola (von Stade, Araiza; Abbado, Ponnelle, 1981)
- Donizetti: Lucia di Lammermoor (Sutherland, Kraus, Elvíra; Bonynge, Donnell, 1982) [live]
- Berlioz: Les troyens (Norman, Troyanos, Domingo; Levine, Melano, 1983) [live]
- Verdi: Simon Boccanegra (Tomowa-Sintow, Milnes; Levine, Capobianco, 1984) [live]
- Puccini: Turandot (Marton, Domingo; Levine, Zeffirelli, 1987) [live]
- Verdi: Luisa Miller (J.Anderson; Arena, Lassalle, 1988) [live]
- Verdi: Requiem (Sweet, Zajick, Pavarotti; Maazel, 1990) [live]
- "The Metropolitan Opera Gala 1991" (Levine, 1991) [live]
- Verdi: Falstaff (Freni, Horne; Levine, Zeffirelli/Mills, 1992) [live]
- Verdi: Stiffelio (Sweet, Domingo; Levine, del Monaco, 1993) [live]
- "James Levine's 25th Anniversary Metropolitan Opera Gala" (1996) [live]
References
- The Metropolitan Opera Encyclopedia, edited by David Hamilton, Simon and Schuster, 1987. ISBN 0-671-61732-X
- ^ Martin Bernheimer (August 2006). "The Not-So-Grand Tour". Opera News. Vol. 71, no. 2. pp. 40–45.
- ^ Delta Omicron Archived 2010-01-27 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ "Plishka, Jeffrey James," The Palm Beach Post (Mar. 22, 2017).
- ^ "Pliskha, Judith Ann (Colgan)," New York Times (Jul. 13, 2004).
External links
- Mr Plishka's official web-site: http://www.georgemartynuk.com/paul-plishka/
- Two Interviews with Paul Plishka by Bruce Duffie, November 24, 1981, and October 20, 1995