Louis Otey
A major stage personality noted for his incisive interpretations, Louis Otey has performed with the leading opera companies of the world, including the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Houston Grand Opera, New York City Opera and, in Europe, with the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Opera de Paris, Teatro Real Madrid, Theatre de la Monnaie in Brussels, Opera de Geneve, Royal Danish Opera , Deutsche Oper am Rhein in Dusseldorf, Opera de Monte-Carlo, Opera de Lyon, Lyric Opera Dublin, Opera de Nantes, and Stadttheater Basel.
In North America, he has appeared with many regional theaters, including the Arizona Opera, Austin Lyric Opera, Calgary Opera, Florentine Opera, Opera Hamilton, Hawaii Opera, L’Opera de Montreal, Opera Naples, New Orleans Opera, Portland Opera, Seattle Opera, Spoleto Festival, U.S.A., Utah Opera, Connecticut Opera, Cleveland Opera, and Opera Pacific. He has also been engaged by numerous orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic and American Symphony, to name a few..
Last season, he returned to the Royal Danish Opera to sing Monforte in I Vespri Siciliani following his success the previous season as Grandier in Pendereciki’s The Devils of Loudun. He also sang Pascoe in the first staged production of Ethel Smythe’s The Wreckers at the Bard Festival, to which he will return this summer as Michele in Il Tabarro.
Other notable recent engagements include Francesco Foscari in I Due Foscari at Theater an der Wien and the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, Tonio in I Pagliacci with Hawaii Opera Theater, and the title role in Dallapiccola’s Il Prigioniero with Anthony Pappano and the orchestra of Santa Cecilia in Rome and in London, the title role in Sweeney Todd at Coastal Carolina, the title role in Rigoletto at the Phoenicia Festival of the Voice, and in The Flying Dutchman with the South Dakota Symphony
Notable roles in his repertoire include all of the leading Verdi roles (including Falstaff), Puccini (including Jack Rance, Scarpia, Michele, and Gianni Schicchi), important French roles such the Four Villains in Les Contes d’Hoffman, High Priest in Samson et Dalila, Athanäel in Thais, and the title role in Hamlet, German roles from the works for Beethoven (Pizarro in Fidelio, Wagner (the title role in Der Fliegende Holländer and Telramun in Lohengrin), and numerous roles from contemporary operas by Bernstein, Dallapiccola, Floyd, Ginastera, Menotti, Prokofiev and Penderecki. In addition, he has earned particular acclaim in operettas such as Die Fledermaus as Eisenstein and The Merry Widow as Danilo.
He can be heard as Eisenstein in Die Fledermaus with the Royal Opera House Covent Garden which was televised worldwide and also distributed on video, as John Sorel in Menotti’s The Consul with Chandos, and on a recording of Tom Pasatieri’s adaptation of The Three Sisters.
