David McFerrin
Baritone

Praised by The New York Times for his “appealingly textured sound” and the South Florida Sun-Sentinel for his “fine dramatic impact,” the young baritone David McFerrin has sung with some of the country’s leading opera companies and is a critically acclaimed performer of concert and recital repertoire. Recent operatic performances have included Aeneas in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas with Miami’s Seraphic Fire and Mr. Webb in the New York premiere of Ned Rorem’s Our Town with the Juilliard Opera Center. This past summer he made his international debut as Taddeo in Rossini’s L’Italiana in Algeri at the Rossini Festival in Wildbad, Germany, and next summer sings Guglielmo in Boston Midsummer Opera’s production of Mozart’s Così fan tutte.

Mr. McFerrin’s concert performances have ranged from Mozart arias with the Miami Symphony to Bernstein Broadway classics at the Blossom Music Festival. This season he makes his Carnegie Hall debut with Maestro Gustavo Dudamel and the Israel Philharmonic in Bernstein’s Concerto for Orchestra. Other recent engagements have included concerts with the New York Festival of Song and the Five Boroughs Music Festival, a performance of Eliot Carter’s Songs of Robert Frost as part of the composer’s centenary celebration at the Juilliard Focus Festival, and a residency with the French Early Music ensemble, Les Arts Florissants. Last year he performed Schubert’s epic song cycle Die schöne Müllerin in New York, Florida and Minnesota, and gave recitals as a member of the Steans Institute at the Ravinia Festival in Chicago. Mr. McFerrin has been a soloist in Bach’s St. John Passion, Gounod’s St. Cecelia Mass, Handel’s Messiah and Joshua, Haydn’s Creation, Vaughan Williams’ Dona Nobis Pacem and the Fauré and Duruflé Requiems.

In 2008, Mr. McFerrin was awarded a Richard F. Gold Career Grant from the Shoshana Foundation, given annually to promising young American opera singers. He has also been a regional finalist the past two years in the Metropolitan Opera National Council competition, recently placing 2nd in the New England Region. Mr. McFerrin is a former member of the Santa Fe Apprentice Artist program. He has also been a Young Artist with the Sarasota and Central City operas, and completed a two-year residency in the Florida Grand Opera Studio. A native of western Massachusetts, he holds degrees from Carleton College and the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, and recently completed an Artist Diploma in Opera at The Juilliard School.

Visit Mr. McFerrin's website for more information.