Nonesuch Records releases the label debut from acclaimed singer Anthony Roth Costanzo, Countertenor, on October 23, 2026. It is a companion to a book of the same name written by Costanzo, out October 27, 2026, from Farrar, Straus and Giroux. On the album’s ten tracks, which feature an ensemble conducted by Dan Schlosberg, Costanzo delves into a wide-ranging survey of falsetto. The record comprises a world premiere recording of a new song by Osvaldo Golijov; arias by Philip Glass, W.A. Mozart, Antonio Vivaldi, and Claudio Monteverdi; a traditional Hawaiian song; an early Baroque song by John Dowland; a Renaissance song by Thomas Morly; a Klaus Nomi-inspired interpretation of John Madera and David White’s “You Don’t Own Me;” and the classic Frankie Vallie and the Four Season’s tune “Walk Like a Man.”“This album, along with the book, is a history and a personal history. You’ll hear the register I speak in, my chest voice, juxtaposed with the register I sing in, my head voice, sometimes in rapid succession as in the frenzied duet with myself from the Marriage of Figaro,” Costanzo says in the album’s liner note. “When I slide between the two sounds, like the steel guitar in a Hawaiian song I love, you can hear a yodel pop forth as I bridge the divide. That voice crack is the gateway to the tessitura that has transformed my life and career and shaped the way I think about creating art and inhabiting my authentic self. “For me, being a countertenor means having access to a remarkable instrument that's unique—not just for the sounds it makes and for what it allows me to express, but also for what it comes to represent to the listener and how it can permeate realms of the conscious and the subconscious,” he continues.The striking beauty and sheer otherness of the high male voice provide fertile ground for creative invention and innovation, evocatively challenging conventional notions of gender, sexuality, and identity. With wit, humor, and irrepressible energy, Costanzo offers insights into the contours of the countertenor and his own artistic career as both an opera singer and a producer and curator.
