Simon Bailey

The English bass-baritone Simon Bailey is considered one of the leading Wagner interpreters of his generation. After studying at Clare College, University of Cambridge; the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester; and the Accademia del Teatro alla Scala in Milan, he was a member of the Frankfurt Opera company from 2002 to 2015. There he developed an exceptionally broad repertoire of over 100 roles and laid the foundation for his international career. Guest engagements have taken him to numerous renowned opera houses in Europe and Asia, including the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, in London; La Scala in Milan; the English National Opera; the Welsh National Opera; the Stuttgart State Opera; the Theater an der Wien; La Monnaie in Brussels, the Opéra National du Rhin, the Royal Swedish Opera in Stockholm, the Lucerne Festival, as well as opera houses in Basel, Antwerp, Lille, Tokyo, and Taipei. Today, Simon Bailey enjoys particular international acclaim above all as a Wagner singer. His acclaimed performances as Wotan in “Das Rheingold” and “Die Walküre”, as well as the Wanderer in “Siegfried”, have taken him in recent seasons to Dresden, Dortmund, Saarbrücken, Lucerne, Stockholm, and Versailles, among other venues. With his powerful, refined voice, his exceptional clarity of diction, and his charismatic stage presence, he is regarded as one of the outstanding representatives of this vocal type.

His repertoire ranges from Mozart through Verdi, Strauss, Britten, and Handel to Wagner and includes roles such as Figaro (“Le nozze di Figaro”), Leporello (“Don Giovanni”), Klingsor (“Parsifal”), the Dutchman (“The Flying Dutchman”), Balstrode (“Peter Grimes”), Don Magnifico (“La Cenerentola”), Méphistophélès (“La Damnation de Faust”), Jochanaan (“Salome”), Gunther (“Götterdämmerung”), and the title role in “Bluebeard’s Castle.” Highlights of recent seasons include the title role in “The Flying Dutchman” in Taipei, Klingsor in “Parsifal” at the Frankfurt Opera, Gonzalo in Thomas Adès’ “The Tempest,” as well as his participation in the world premiere of Gustav Holst’s “Sita,” a new production of “The Flying Dutchman” at the Welsh National Opera, Doctor Bartolo in “Il barbiere di Siviglia” at Grange Park Opera, and once again Balstrode in “Peter Grimes” at Opera North. Upcoming projects include such exciting role debuts as Hans Sachs in “Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg” in Minden, Alberich in “Der Ring des Nibelungen” at the Frankfurt Opera, and Falstaff in Verdi’s opera of the same name in Meiningen, conducted by Killian Farrell.