BIOGRAPHY
Mark Stone is an English helden baritone, acclaimed for his performances of Wagnerian roles, such as Klingsor in Parsifal for London's Royal Ballet and Opera and Hamburgische Staatsoper, Alberich in Der Ring des Nibelungen for Longborough Festival Opera, Wotan in Die Walküre at London's Hackney Empire, Gunther in Götterdämmerung for Grand Théâtre de Genève and the title role in Der fliegende Holländer for Trondheim Symfoniorkester. He works extensively in Germany (Hamburgische Staatsoper, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Staatsoper Hannover) and the USA (Santa Fe Opera, Opera Philadelphia) where he is also renowned for his performances of modern works such as the title role in Nixon in China and the world premiere of Huang Ruo’s M. Butterfly.
This season brings a series of prestigious engagements for Mark across Europe. He returns to the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, as Klingsor in Wagner's Parsifal, in Evgeny Titov's much-anticipated new production conducted by Jakub Hrůša. He also makes his highly anticipated return to Opera North for the title role of Mozart's Don Giovanni, appears as The Protector in the Norwegian premiere of George Benjamin's Written on Skin for Bergen National Opera with the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra under Lawrence Renes, performs Graumann in Schreker's Der ferne Klang at the Tiroler Festspiele Erl, and reprises The Protector in concert with Deutsche Radio Saarbrücken.
Mark’s highlights from last season include his Canadian Opera Company debut as Capulet in Gounod's Roméo et Juliette, his debut at Opéra national de Lorraine as the Ferryman in a new co-production of Britten's Curlew River with Opéra de Rennes, and his role debut as the title role in Verdi's Macbeth at Longborough Festival Opera under Nil Venditti. He also joined the San Diego Symphony to make his role debut as Bluebeard in performances of Bartók's Bluebeard's Castle conducted by Rafael Payare.
A distinguished concert artist, who is an acclaimed exponent of new music, Mark has sung Thomas Ades’s Totentanz with the Wiener Philharmoniker conducted by the composer, a piece for which he has become synonymous, having debuted it with the New York Philharmonic, and subsequently performed it with the Swedish Radio Symphony, Orchestre de Paris, Danish National Symphony, and Finnish Radio Symphony. Mark also sang the world premiere of Lera Auerbach’s Requiem with Vladimir Jurowski and the Dresden Staatskapelle, Gerald Barry’s Beethoven with the Britten Sinfonia and West Side Story with the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia conducted by Sir Antonio Pappano.
His many recordings include Thomas Ades’s Totentanz with the Boston Symphony Orchestra (Deutsche Grammophon) which was nominated for a Grammy Award, the Grammy-Award-winning Les Troyens with Sir Colin Davis (LSO Live), the Grammy-Award-winning Billy Budd with the London Symphony Orchestra and Daniel Harding (Virgin/EMI), Eugene Onegin (extracts) with Sir Antonio Pappano (EMI), Bellini’s La Straniera with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and David Parry (Opera Rara) and Mozart arias with the Classical Opera Company (Sony BMG). His solo recital discs – including Quilter Songs (Sony BMG), the complete Butterworth songbook and the complete Delius songbook (Stone Records) – have all received widespread praise.
Mark was born in London and studied Mathematics at King's College Cambridge and singing at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. In 1998 he was awarded the Decca Prize at the Kathleen Ferrier Awards.