The Scene

People

Tamara Wilson

Tamara Wilson
Cassandra Kay

Soprano Tamara Wilson is quickly gaining international recognition for her interpretations of Verdi, Mozart, Strauss and Wagner. She is the 2016 recipient of the prestigious Richard Tucker Award, an annual prize conferred by the Richard Tucker Music Foundation given to a rising American opera singer on the “threshold of an major international career.”

Other recent honors include a 2016 Olivier Award nomination and receipt of the ‘Revelation Prize’ by the Argentine Musical Critics Association. Ms. Wilson is also a Grand Prize Winner of the Annual Francisco Viñas Competition held at the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona, Spain.

Tamara’s 2019-20 season includes performances with the Canadian Opera Company, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Oper Frankfurt and The Santa Fe Opera. In concert, she will sing Beethoven’s Symmphony No. 9 in a special Christmas performance and television broadcast with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra and debut the role of Isolde with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra.

Opera performance highlights in Tamara Wilson’s 2018-19 season included a return to the Metropolitan Opera as the title role in Aida, the role of Leonora in Il Trovatore at Lyric Opera of Chicago, Desdemona in Otello at the Canadian Opera Company, the title role in Ariadne auf Naxos at Teatro alla Scala, and Chrysothemis in Elektra at Opernhaus Zurich. In concert Ms. Wilson presented Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 at the BBC Proms at the Royal Albert Hall and at the Edinburgh International Festival, as well as with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Los Angeles Philharmonic. She also sang Bruckner’s Te Deum at Teatro alla Scala, and Ariadne in Ariadne auf Naxos with the Cleveland Orchestra. This summer she will perform her signaure role of Aida at Arena di Verona followed by a special guest performance at the Santa Fe Opera’s summer Gala and a recital at the Song Source Festival.

Tamara Wilson opened the the 2017-18 season as the title role in Aida at the Washington National Opera in a production by Francesca Zambello. She then returned to her home company of Houston Grand Opera for her role debut as Chrysothemis in Elektra. She also made her New York Philharmonic debut in Bernstein’s Kaddish Symphony (Symphony No. 3) with Leonard Slatkin in celebration of Bernstein’s Centennial.

Ms. Wilson made her acclaimed Metropolitan Opera debut in Aida and London debut in Calixto Bieto’s new production of La forza del destino at the English National Opera, for which she received an Olivier Award nomination. She also inaugurated the new opera house in Kyoto, Japan with Seiji Ozawa as Rosalinde in Die Fledermaus.

She was heard at Oper Frankfurt for her first performances as the Empress in Die Frau ohne Schatten conducted by Sebastian Weigle and subsequently released by Oehms Classics. She recently debuted at the Bayerische Staatsoper and Opernhaus Zürich conducted by Fabio Luisi, both as Elisabetta di Valois in Don Carlo. She debuted at the Deutsche Oper Berlin as Amelia in Un ballo in maschera, triumphed in Act 3 of Die Walküre as Brünnhilde with Mark Wiggleworth and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales at Royal Albert Hall, and debuted with the Concertgebouw Orchestra conducted by Valery Gergiev in Act 3 of Die Walküre as Sieglinde.

A noted interpreter of Verdi roles, she has been seen as Elisabeth de Valois in the five-act French Don Carlos (Houston Grand Opera); Amelia in Un ballo in maschera (Washington National Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Florida Grand Opera, and Teatre Principal de Maó in Menorca); Elvira in Ernani (Théâtre du Capitole in Toulouse); Elisabetta in Don Carlo (Bayerische Staatsoper, Zurich Oper, and Oper Frankfurt); Lucrezia Contarini in I due Foscari (Théâtre du Capitole, Teatro Municipal de Santiago and Netherlands Radio Orchestra); Leonora in Il trovatore (Gran Teatre del Liceu, Houston Grand Opera, Théâtre du Capitole under Daniel Oren and Palma de Mallorca); Desdemona in Otello (Cincinnati Symphony and James Conlon); Alice Ford in Falstaff (Washington National Opera debut); Amelia Grimaldi in Simon Boccanegra (Canadian Opera Company); the title role in Aida (Opera Australia, Teatro de la Maestranza, and Teatro Municipal de Santiago); Marchesa del Poggio in Un giorno di regno (Wolf Trap Opera); and Gulnara in Il corsaro (Washington Concert Opera). Other notable performances include her debut in Norma at Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona; Rosalinde in Die Fledermaus at the Canadian Opera Company; her German debut at Oper Frankfurt in concert performances of Wagner’s early opera Die Feen as Ada under Sebastian Weigle; Elettra in Idomeneo under Harry Bicket at the Canadian Opera Company and under James Conlon at the Ravinia Festival; Donna Anna in Don Giovanni under James Conlon and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, as well as with Edo de Waart and the Milwaukee Symphony.

On the concert stage, Ms. Wilson debuted with the Cleveland Orchestra in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 under Franz Welser-Möst, the National Symphony in Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 2 (“Lobgesang”) with Matthew Halls and with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment in Verdi’s Messa da Requiem conducted by Marin Alsop at the BBC Proms, which was recorded for commercial release.

Related Companies

Unlike other sites, we're keeping Schmopera ad-free. We want to keep our site clean and our opinions our own. Support us for as little as $1.00 per month.