British bass Matthew Rose studied at the Curtis Institute of Music before becoming a member of the Young Artist Program at London's Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. In 2006, he made an acclaimed debut at the Glyndebourne Festival Opera as Bottom (A Midsummer Night's Dream), for which he received the John Christie Award. He has also sung the role at Milan's Teatro alla Scala, the Royal Opera House, Opéra National de Lyon, Houston Grand Opera, and the Metropolitan Opera. Recent opera engagements include his acclaimed debut as Baron Ochs (Der Rosenkavalier) for the Lyric Opera of Chicago, Raimondo (Lucia di Lammermoor) for the Royal Opera House, and King Marke (Tristan und Isolde) for the English National Opera. This season, he sings Masetto and Leporello (Don Giovanni) and Frère Laurent (Roméo et Juliette) at the Met Opera, Baron Ochs at the Royal Opera House, and Bottom at the Aldeburgh Festival. Mr. Rose has also sung Talbot (Maria Stuarda) and Colline (La bohème) at the Met Opera; Sparafucile (Rigoletto), Sarastro (Die Zauberflöte), and Talbot at the Royal Opera House; Leporello, Nick Shadow (The Rake's Progress), Callistene (Poliuto), and Collatinus (The Rape of Lucretia) at Glyndebourne; and Claggart (Billy Budd) at the English National Opera.

Mr. Rose's concert performances this season include Beethoven's Ninth Symphony with the Budapest Festival Orchestra in New York and Ann Arbor, Michigan; a Schubert mass with the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin and Kent Nagano; and Mahler's Symphony No. 8 with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Vladimir Jurowski. Past concert engagements have included the London Symphony Orchestra with Sir Colin Davis, Daniel Harding, and Michael Tilson Thomas; the Los Angeles Philharmonic with Gustavo Dudamel; the Staatskapelle Dresden with Sir Charles Mackerras; the BBC Symphony Orchestra with Sir Andrew Davis, Jiří Bělohlávek, and Marc Minkowski; the London Philharmonic Orchestra and The Philadelphia Orchestra with Yannick Nézet-Séguin; the Boston Symphony Orchestra with Charles Dutoit; and the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia with Sir Antonio Pappano.

This season, Mr. Rose performs Schubert's Winterreise in recital at Wigmore Hall. Past recital appearances have included the Brighton, Chester, and Cheltenham music festivals, as well as performances at Amsterdam's Concertgebouw and the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC. Recent recordings include a critically acclaimed Winterreise with pianist Gary Matthewman; Schwanengesang with Malcolm Martineau (Stone Records); and Arias for Benucci with Arcangelo and Jonathan Cohen (Hyperion). 

Vlad Iftinca is on the assistant conductor roster as part of the Metropolitan Opera's 2016-2017 season. Between 2007 and 2014, he held the position of staff coach for the Met's Lindemann Young Artist Development Program. Born in Romania, he received his primary education at Madrid's Queen Sofía College of Music and pursued graduate studies at The Juilliard School.

As a conductor, Mr. Iftinca has led performances at Oper Frankfurt, Tri-Cities Opera, and Romanian National Opera, Iași, as well as with the Opera on the Avalon festival. He has collaborated in recital with distinguished artists who include Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, Deborah Voigt, Thomas Hampson, Hei-Kyung Hong, Luca Pisaroni, Joan Rodgers, Isabel Leonard, and Elza van den Heever, and has performed at venues and festivals that include Madrid's Auditorio Nacional de Música, Munich's Max-Joseph-Saal, Valencia's Palau de les Arts, France's Soirées Musicales d'Arles, Beijing Music Festival, Los Angeles Opera, Seoul Arts Center, Hong Kong Arts Festival, Salt Lake City's Virtuoso Series, and Ravinia Festival's recital series.

At the Metropolitan Opera, Mr. Iftinca has worked with conductors who include James Levine, Sir Andrew Davis, Valery Gergiev, Gianandrea Noseda, Maurizio Benini, David Robertson, and Marco Armiliato. Recent conducting engagements have included Lucia di Lammermoor at Deutsche Oper am Rhein, La traviata and Hänsel und Gretel at Tri-Cities Opera, and The Nutcracker with the Binghamton Philharmonic Orchestra. He has also accompanied Erin Morley and Lisette Oropesa in recitals in Switzerland and at the Kennedy Center.