Paolo Gavanelli Baritone

The eminent British classical music writer and critic, Hugh Canning, defines Italian baritone, Paolo Gavanelli, as "the foremost Verdi baritone of his generation--arguably the only truly authentic representative of this apparently dying breed active today." (Opera, 2008). In 2005, he was awarded Germany’s highest honour for an opera singer, the title of Kammersänger by the Munich Ministry of Culture for his outstanding work in many years of performances at the Bavarian State Opera.

Paolo Gavanelli begins the 2010-11 Season in the title role Don Pasquale at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, followed by performances in his signature role, Rigoletto, a role he has sung around the world over 200 times. The early spring of 2011 sees him take on a role debut as Don Geronio Il Turco in Italia at Los Angeles Opera, after which he travels to Dallas Opera for more performances as Rigoletto and to Oper Leipzig to appear as Amonasro Aida in a new production by Peter Konwinchny. He returns to Great Britain to round out the season with his appearance as Dulcamara L’elisir d’amore at Glyndebourne Festival Opera.

With a repertoire of over 50 roles and a career that has spanned almost 30 years of professional engagements, Paolo Gavanelli has been heard in the leading opera houses of the world and is internationally celebrated as the leading Verdi baritone of our time. He is renowned by critics and audiences alike in the title roles of Rigoletto, Nabucco, Macbeth, Simon Boccanegra andFalstaff, roles in which he has appeared, among others, at The Metropolitan Opera, New York, The Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, San Francisco Opera, Bavarian State Opera, Munich, Deutsche Opera, Berlin, Canadian Opera Company, Vienna State Opera, Teatro alla Scala, Milan, Gran Teatre de Liceu, Barcelona, The New National Theatre of Tokyo, National Finnish Opera, Opera National de Paris, Semperoper, Dresden, Hamburg State Opera, the Arena of Verona and the opera theatres of Genoa, Turin, Florence Rome and Naples.

Mr Gavanelli made his professional debut as Leporello Don Giovanni at Teatro Donizetti, Bergamo, in 1985. Within five years, he made debuts at the Metropolitan Opera as Count de Luna Il Trovatore, Teatro alla Scala as Germont La Traviata, Barcelona’s Gran Teatre del Liceu as Valentin Faust, the Bavarian State Opera in Munich as Renato Un Ballo in Maschera, and at Teatro la Fenice in Venice as Marcello La Boheme. Other roles in his illustrious career include Gerard Andrea Chenier, Amonasro Aida, Alfio Cavalleria Rusticana, Sharpless Madama Butterfly, Enrico Lucia Di Lammermoor; Iago Otello, BartoloIl Barbiere di Siviglia, Ezio Attila, Posa Don Carlos, Scarpia Tosca, Riccardo I Puritani, Nottingham Roberto Devereux, Miller Luisa Miller, Jack Rance La Fanciulla del West, and Lescaut Manon Lescaut.

Paolo Gavanelli can be heard on CD recordings of Nabucco, La Boheme, Beatrice Di Tenda, Alzira, and Poliuto. His highly-acclaimed performance as Rigoletto in a new production by David McVicar at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, was committed to DVD in 2001, and the production was awarded the Diapason Prize as best DVD of the Year. It also achieved the status of bestselling opera DVD of the year.

Recent successes have included his role debut as Dulcamara L’elisir d’amore in the highly popular new production by Laurent Pelly at the Royal Opera House, London, and at the Bastille in Paris, his Il Trittico debut in the roles of both Gianni Schicchi and Michele at San Francisco Opera, Gusmano Alzira at St. Gallen Festival in Switzerland, and his company debut at Canadian Opera Company in the title role of Simon Boccanegra, performances for which he received standing ovations every night and for which he won Canada’s equivalent of a Tony award, the Dora Mavra Moore Award for Most Outstanding Performance in Opera.

Date Last Edited: 6th September 2010