Iestyn Davies

The renowned British countertenor’s appearances in America earlier this season included Terry Rutland/Nico Muhly’s Marnie at the Metropolitan Opera (U.S. premiere) and Messiah with the Handel and Haydn Society. Later he will star in Handel’s rarely heard Agrippina at the Munich Opera Festival. Prominent among Davies’s many stage successes have been L’incoronazione di Poppea (Zurich, Glyndebourne); A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Houston, London, Met, Aldeburgh); Death in Venice (La Scala); Jephtha (Cardiff, Bordeaux); Steffani’s rarely heard Niobe (Covent Garden); Rodelinda and Thomas Adès’s The Tempest (Met); Rinaldo (Glyndebourne); and Adès’s The Exterminating Angel (Salzburg Festival world premiere, reprised at Covent Garden and the Met). In 2015 he appeared at London’s Globe Theatre as Farinelli/Farinelli and the King, which he repeated to great acclaim on Broadway last season. Concert engagements have taken Davies to La Scala, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, Zurich’s Tonhalle, London’s Barbican Centre, Paris’s Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, Lincoln Center, and Royal Albert Hall. He appears regularly at London’s Wigmore Hall, where he has curated his own residency (2012/13). His recordings include works of Dowland, Porpora, Bach, Handel, Fauré, and Britten. He has received two Gramophone Awards, a Grammy Award, a Royal Philharmonic Society Award, and an Olivier Award nomination.

Previously at Lyric: Polinesso/Ariodante (2018/19); Eustazio/Rinaldo (2011/12)

Last updated: March 2, 2019
Photo: Marco Borggrev