PRIMA VOCE
B i o g r a p h y
The classical crossover group Prima Voce was established during the latter half of 2013 from an artistic collaboration between opera tenor brothers Lomon and Leendert de Jager and tenor Eduard Leonard, best known for his international endeavours with the acapella band Overtone.
The group focuses mainly on music by crossover composers as well as music adapted for this genre from musicals and pop music arranged specifically for this group. In addition, the group members also write and arrange original material. The members of Prima Voce sing in a variety of languages that include English, Italian, French, German and their native language Afrikaans.
Although Prima Voce primarily performs for the corporate market, the group has a steadily increasing fan base and has recently begun to record some of its work.
Leendert de Jager (Tenor) recently celebrated 19 years in the entertainment industry, working as a singer, actor, writer and director.
His repertoire includes several roles in opera, operetta and musical theatre, amongst others, acclaimed performances as Audrey II in Little Shop of Horrors, Hero in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Mendel / Russian Tenor in Fiddler on the Roof, Ali Hakim in Oklahoma!, Dr Blind and Dr Falke in Die Fledermaus, Edna in the hit musical Hairspray, Elder Cunningham in a touring production of Book of Mormon and Khashoggi in We Will Rock You. Leendert has appeared in several oratorios namely, Handel’s The Messiah, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, Bach’s St. John’s Passion and Magnificat, Mozart’s Requiem and Orff’s Carmina Burana.
Leendert made his directorial debut in 2007 with a critically acclaimed production of Guy Butler’s Demea and in 2008 he directed the world premiere of David Lambkin’s The Hanging Tree.
His more recent credits as director include, amongst others, Peter Schaffer’s Amadeus, Jean Genet’s The Maids, Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, Disney’s High School Musical 2, Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Grey and Rogers & Hammerstein’s Oklahoma!.
Leendert is the music arranger for Prima Voce and acts as its musical director. He holds a BA Degree in drama and theatre arts from the University of the Free State.
Eduard Leonard (Tenor) is best known as television personality in E! Entertainment’s Mrs Eastwood and Company where he is featured in a reality show following Clint Eastwood’s wife Dina Eastwood and their family.
He is co-founder and leadsmen of the acapella band Overtone, discovered in 2009 by Clint Eastwood, which lead to Eduard’s involvement in most of the soundtrack of Eastwood’s film Invictus. He has been performing in South Africa and internationally for the last 6 years as a MC and vocalist and has shared the stage with One Republic, David Foster, Kevin Bacon, Delta Goodrem, Corinne Baily Ray and had guest appearances on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson and George Lopez Tonight.
Eduard’s musical and acting career started at a very young age as ensemble member of the People’s Theatre Abracadabra ensemble in 1996. Singing has been part of his development since an early age as member of the Cantare Children’s Choir, Colla Voce Youth Choir and University of Johannesburg Choir, touring Europe and Russia with Mozart’s Requiem.
He has performed at the South by South West (SXSW) Music Festival in Austin Texas, sang the American National Anthem at a Dodgers Baseball game in Los Angeles, and was part of Steve Wynn’s feature band for 3 months in the prestige Wynn and Encore resorts in Las Vegas.
Eduard has a growing interest in production, writing and directing and has been part of the creative team of a web series, Real Actors Read Craigslist Missed Connections, in Los Angeles.
Lomon de Jager (Tenor) recently celebrated his 30th anniversary as a performing artist, arts administrator and arts lecturer. His career started in 1983 when he was chosen to accompany the Free State Youth Choir as tenor soloist on a tour of Europe and Israel.
Lomon studied Opera under Joyce Barker at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg and after brief engagements with Pacofs Opera and PACT at the Pretoria State Theatre he was offered a position at the State Theatre of Baden (Badisches Staatstheater) at Karlsruhe, Germany. During his tenure at this theatre, Lomon appeared as guest soloist in various European cities, such as London, Frankfurt, Berlin, Vienna, Prague, Bratislava, Zurich and Copenhagen. For the Badisches Staatstheater he appeared in well over fifty productions of opera, operetta and musicals.
His repertoire includes roles by composers such as Mozart, Verdi, Donizetti, Gounod, Puccini, Richard Strauss, Beethoven, von Flotow and Wagner, Oratorios by Bach, Haydn, Mendelssohn and Handel, a wide variety of operetta roles by composers such as Johan Strauss (Jnr), Franz Lehar and Paul Lincke and several roles in musicals. His interpretation of Eisenstein in Die Fledermaus was broadcast on national television. Other notable performances include Camille in The Merry Widow, Doolittle in My Fair Lady, Will Parker in Oklahoma! as well as Schani in The Great Waltz and Zsa Zsa in the Jerry Herman musical La Cage aux Folles. Lomon has appeared in many concert versions of musical excerpts by Andrew Lloyd Webber such as Aspects of Love and Phantom of the Opera. In 2007 he was invited to perform during the opening ceremony of the Cairo Film Festival.
During his tenure as artistic director at Free State Opera, Lomon undertook two international concert tours to Europe with the opera company and performed at a concert in Melbourne, Australia, at the invitation of the Victorian Art Song Association. He also represented South Africa at the UNESCO International Conference on Arts Education in Lisbon.
Lomon holds a Masters Degree in Arts Management from the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg and teaches within the University of Johannesburg. He often performs in opera and oratorio concerts in South Africa and abroad, and takes on roles in musical productions, most recently as Edna in an international touring production of Hairspray.