Roy Cornelius Smith – spinto tenor

American tenor Roy Cornelius Smith is fast becoming known for his voice of great natural beauty, his compelling dramatic interpretations, and his fine musicianship. He has already been heard on some of the world’s great operatic stages including the Metropolitan Opera, the Lyric Opera of Chicago, the Opéra de Montréal, the New Israeli Opera, the Deutsche Oper Berlin, the Teatro Lirico di Cagliari, as well as with the renowned Festivals in Salzburg, Spoleto and Ravenna.

Roy Cornelius Smith’s highly successful debut as Pinkerton in “Madama Butterfly” with the Volksoper Wien (2004-05) led to a re-engagement to sing Calaf in 2006-07 in their new Barbe/Doucet production of “Turandot” for which Musical America exclaimed “his voice is huge, dusky and Italianate, his phrasing and use of dynamics generous and elegant, his stage presence endearing”. Calaf quickly became one of his signature roles, and in 2008-09 he performed it at the Volksoper Wien (in the company’s revival of the Barbe/Doucet production), in the US with Opera Carolina and Opera Birmingham, and in June he made his debut with this role at the Deutsche Oper Berlin.

In the 2009-10 season he will make his debut at the New York City Opera in Hugo Weisgall’s opera “Esther”, and he will return to Opera Birmingham as Radames, to New Orleans Opera as Erik and to the Deutsche Oper Berlin as Calaf.

Recent engagements include Des Grieux in “Manon Lescaut” with the New Orleans Opera (2008), Pinkerton at the Steyr Music Festival in Austria (2008), Erik in “Der Fliegende Holländer” with Opera Grand Rapids (2008), Pinkerton at the Aspen Music Festival (2007), Calaf with Opera Memphis (2007), as well as  Canio with Toledo Opera, Radames with Opera Birmingham and Hoffegut in “Die Vögel” (The Birds) by Walter Braunfels with Spoleto Festival USA under the baton of Julius Rudel. His extensive repertoire also inculdes Rodolfo in “La Bohème”, Cavaradossi in “Tosca”, Don José in “Carmen”, Riccardo in Verdi’s first opera “Oberto,” Ismaele in “Nabucco”, Laca in “Jenůfa”, Der Rabbi in Kurt Weill’s opera “Der Weg der Verheissung” (The Eternal Road) and  Fatty the Bookkeeper in Weill’s “Aufsteig und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny” (Salzburg Festival).

On the concert stage he could be heard in a Puccini Gala Concert at the Festspielhaus St. Pölten in Austria (2008) and in performances of Verdi’s Requiem with the Nashville Symphony (2008), at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. (2007), and with the Spokane Symphony (2007). He will sing another Verdi Requiem with the Eugene Symphony and a Missa Solemnis with the Minnesota Orchestra (both in 2009). He has also appeared with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Orchestra del Teatro Carlo Felice, Orchestre Métropolitain du Grand Montréal and the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra.

Awards and honors include being a 1990 winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, the 1999 MacAllister Awards including the “Audience Favorite Award”, the 1997 Licia Albanese/Puccini International Voice Competition, the Houston Grand Opera Young Artist Awards, and the Eleanor Steber Award from Baltimore Opera. Mr. Smith hails from Big Stone Gap, Virginia, and received both a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Music from the University of Tennessee and a Doctor of Musical Arts from the American Conservatory of Music.