RUSSELL THOMAS
(tenor)

Recently awarded the 2006 George London Award in memory of Frances Claudet Johnson, Russell Thomas joined The Metropolitan Opera’s Lindemann Young Artist Development Program at the beginning of the 2003-2004 Season. He made his Metropolitan Opera debut as the Herald in Don Carlos and covered Tito in Mozart’s La Clemenza di Tito. He received 1st place in the 2006 Liederkranz Foundation competition, the Major Award winner at the 2006 Lee Schaenen Foundation Competition, and 1st place in the Young Concert Artist Competition, the Loren L. Zachary Society Competition, and Licia Albanese Puccini Foundation Competition in 2004-2005.

Mr. Thomas made his European debut this year as Sultan Soliman in Zaide in a Peter Sellars Production with the Vienna Festival and at the Barbican Centre in London to unanimous acclaim. Opera News said, “...most notably, Russell Thomas (Sultan Soliman), whose huge, supple, beautifully-produced tenor sounded ready to conquer Florestan.” He reprised the acclaimed role at New York’s Mostly Mozart Festival in the summer 2006. Other recent engagements include Tamino (cover) in The Magic Flute and 1st Prisoner in Fidelio with the Metropolitan Opera, Idomeneo Scene with the Seattle Symphony, Tamino in the tour of Die Zauberflote and Rodolfo in La boheme with Seattle Opera as a young artist, and several other debuts performing the roles of Ruiz in Il Trovatore, Borsa in Rigoletto, Nemorino in L’Elisir d’amore, Elder Gleaton in Floyd’s Susannah, John/William Still in Susan Kander’s She Never Lost a Passenger and Cavaradossi in Tosca.

In the 2006-2007 Season and beyond, Mr. Thomas will make his debut with the Welsh National Opera as Tamino in The Magic Flute, and again cover Tamino at the Metropolitan Opera. Additionally, he will debut John Adam’s A Flowering Tree at the Vienna Festival, Berlin Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, the Barbican Centre in London, the Lincoln Center Festival, Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, and the English National Opera, as well as perform Tybalt in Romeo et Juliette with the Michigan Opera Theatre, Vaughan Williams' On Wenlock Edge with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center at Alice Tully Hall, among many other concert and recital engagements.

In 2001 Mr. Thomas made his Tulsa Philharmonic debut with Simon Estes in a benefit for the Simon Estes Foundation. Mr. Thomas has performed and trained with Opera Theatre of St. Louis, Sarasota Opera, Opera North, Aspen Summer Music Festival, and Florida Grand Opera, where he was named a Roger R. Hinkley Artist and performed Roderigo in Verdi’s Otello, Male Chorus in Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia and Ivan in Wargo’s The Music Shop. Other notable appearances include Handel’s Messiah with the New Jersey Symphony, Rossini’s Stabat Mater with Florida Grand Opera Chorus, and the U.S. Premier of Lorenzitti’s Grande Messe Symphonique with the Miami Bach Society. Mr. Thomas also recorded Thomas Sleeper’s Aceldama: Field of Blood for Albany Records.

For more information about Russell Thomas,
please visit his web site at www.pinnaclearts.com/artist.php?id=549.