Guest Artist Recital | Jonathan Yarrington, tenor & Owen Lovell, piano

Jonathan Yarrington, tenor and Owen Lovell, pianist will present a guest artist recital in Lloyd Ultan Recital Hall. 

This School of Music event is free and open to the public. A livestream will be available (click on the Lloyd Ultan Recital Hall events in the right callout box). 

Artist Bios

Jonathan Yarrington

A native of Idaho Falls, ID, tenor Jonathan Yarrington is Associate Professor of Voice and Director of Opera at the University of Southern Mississippi. Prior to joining the faculty at USM, Dr. Yarrington was a member of The Dallas Opera Studio from 2011-2014, singing nearly one hundred performances in the title roles of their education and outreach productions of Doctor Miracle and Jack and the Beanstalk. In 2012 he made his mainstage debut with The Dallas Opera as The Messenger in Aida. Dr. Yarrington has sung more than fifteen leading roles, including Jeník (Zápisník zmizelého) Edgardo (Lucia di Lammermoor), William Marshall (Regina), Jeník (Prodana nevĕsta) Stage Manager (Our Town), Ferrando (Così fan tutte), Herman (The Most Happy Fella), Don Ramiro (Cinderella), Tamino (Die Zauberflöte), Marco Palmieri (The Gondoliers), Pinkerton (Madama Butterfly), Nanki Pooh (The Mikado), and Rinuccio (Gianni Schicchi). He has performed on stage and in recital with Festival South, The Southern Opera and Musical Theatre Company, The Radio Dram Club on WRKF, The Hub City Players, The Bluefire Chamber Players, Blue Lake Opera, The Blacksburg Master Chorale, Crescent Chamber Artists, The Choral Pickup, The Rapides Symphony Orchestra, The Plano Civic Chorus, The Dallas Chamber Orchestra, The Fort Worth Baroque Society, The Texas Camerata, The South Arkansas Symphony Orchestra, and The Utah Festival Opera Company. An active recitalist and concert performer, he has commissioned and performed new music for tenor and oboe, and he specializes in German and Czech art song. Dr. Yarrington holds the Doctor of Musical Arts in Vocal Performance from The University of North Texas, where he studied with Dr. Stephen F. Austin. He is a former student of retired Metropolitan Opera mezzo-soprano Ariel Bybee, and he won the Nebraska District of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions in 2005. His dissertation on Cornelius Reid has been downloaded thousands of times.

Owen Lovell

Pianist Owen Lovell has appeared as a soloist and critically acclaimed chamber musician in 21 U.S. states, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, Canada, Mexico, Switzerland, and the Netherlands.  Commercial releases include tracks with rock musician Kip Winger (2008, Frontiers Records) and ASCAP award–winning composer Randall Bauer (2016, Albany Records). Owen has performed in live broadcasts on Wisconsin Public Radio and Austin, Texas NPR affiliate, KUT–FM. He has worked with many prizewinning composers, most notably Lowell Liebermann, Michael Torke, Samuel Adler, Joan Tower, Dan Welcher, Eric Ewazen, David Maslanka, Denis Smalley, and Roberto Sierra. Owen maintains professional two–piano and violin and piano collaborations, delighting audiences in settings ranging from rural community churches to the Kennedy Center.

Dr. Lovell earned his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in piano performance from the Peabody Conservatory of the Johns Hopkins University, and holds a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Texas at Austin. His principal instructors included Boris Slutsky, Dr. Betty Mallard, Gregory Allen, and Julian Martin. Owen is an MTNA Nationally Certified Teacher of Music, serving actively on the executive board of its state and local affiliates, and is frequently in demand as a clinician and adjudicator throughout the United States.

Appointed in the fall of 2016, Dr. Lovell is an Associate Professor of Music and coordinates the keyboard area and Bobcat Keys after school program at Georgia College, the state’s designated public liberal arts university.  Additionally, he is a piano technician and the piano review editor for Larry Fine’s Acoustic and Digital Piano Buyer (website and printed semiannually), the standard consumer reference for piano shoppers. He previously served on the keyboard faculties of the University of Wisconsin - Eau Claire, the University of Texas - San Antonio, and Texas State University.  Visit his YouTube channel for more information and links to recordings.