Mezzo-soprano Gigi Mitchell-Velasco and tenor Noel Espíritu Velasco have been music-makers since their early childhood. They met at Philadelphia’s Curtis Institute of Music where Gigi finished with a Bachelor’s degree in Flute and Noel an Artist’s Diploma in Voice and Opera. Moving to Boston, Sarah Caldwell’s Opera Company of Boston became their artistic home where for eight seasons Noel was Principal Tenor and Gigi was Principal Flutist, appearing in almost 100 opera performances there until it folded in 1990.  That same year, Gigi changed careers and continues to enjoy an international singing career, having performed at the Braunschweig Staatstheater in Germany, the Prague Autumn Festival, with the Martinú Philharmonic in Prague and Vienna, in New York’s Carnegie Hall and Boston’s Symphony Hall, Minnesota Opera and Minnesota Orchestra, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Milwaukee Symphony, among many others.  Noel has sung with the London Symphony and the Royal Opera at Covent Garden, Paris’ Opéra Comique, Rome’s L’Accademia di Santa Cecilia, the Welsh National Opera, Opéra de Montpellier, Festival International de Radio France, Festival Casals in Puerto Rico, Monte Carlo Philharmonic at Cannes’ MIDEM Classique, and in many world concert tours.  Together, Gigi and Noel sang in an opera concert tour through Switzerland, and performed the lead roles in Bizet’s Carmen  with the Prague State Opera. There were also many concerts with Ms. Caldwell and the Ural State Philharmonic in Russia, including Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande, the Verdi Requiem, Wagner’s Wesendonck-Lieder, Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde and an Opera Gala Concert.  In the U.S., they have both performed with the Opera Orchestra of New York, in New York’s Avery Fisher Hall, Opera New England, Houston Grand Opera, the National Symphony Orchestra (Gigi at Wolf Trap Festival and Noel at Kennedy Center and Festival Casals), and the orchestras of Houston, Florida, Charleston and Oak Ridge.  They have collaborated in the Verdi and Mahler works above, Handel’s Messiah, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Dvorak’s Stabat Mater, Berlioz’ Les Nuits d’Été, de Falla’s Siete canciones populares españolas, and in many recitals from Providence and Boston to Honolulu, and beyond to Manila, Singapore and Ekaterinburg.  Between them they have garnered top prizes in many competitions, including the Pavarotti International Voice Competition and New York’s Liederkranz Wagnerian Competition.  Notable also is Gigi’s having received several grants from the New York Wagner Society and Noel’s winning in the Oratorio Society of New York’s Solo Competition.
 

With the symbolic smokestack of the historic Waipahu Sugar Mill in the background, the Filipino Community Center stands as a collective embodiment of Filipino unity and achievement in the the Aloha state.