Plácido Domingo

Plácido Domingo - singer, conductor, Renaissance man. One of the most high-profile tenors of the century, he has appeared in over 100 different roles, more than any other tenor in the annals of music. His repertoire spans the gamut from Mozart to Verdi, from Berlioz to Puccini, from Wagner to Ginastera. He sings in every major opera house in the world and has made well over 100 recordings, of which 93 are full-length operas.

Born in Madrid to parents who were zarzuela performers, Placido Domingo moved to Mexico at the age of eight. After studying voice, piano and conducting at the Mexico City Conservatory, he made his operatic debut at Monterrey as Alfredo in La Traviata and then spent two and a half years with the Israel National Opera, singing 280 performances of 12 different roles. His Met debut came in 1968 as Maurizio in Adriana Lecouvreur. He has subsequently appeared there in close to 400 performances of 38 different roles. He appears regularly at all major opera houses including Milan's La Scala, the Vienna State Opera, London's Covent Garden, the Bastille Opera in Paris, the San Francisco Opera, Chicago's Lyric Opera, the Los Angeles Music Center Opera and the Bayreuth and Salzburg Festivals.

His repertoire includes virtually all the leading tenor roles in the Italian and French repertories. Constantly in search of new challenges, he began expanding into the German repertoire a few years ago. He has achieved great success in the title roles of Wagner's Parsifal and Lohengrin and as Siegmund in Die Walküre. He has recorded Wagner's Die Meistersinger, Tannhäuser and Flying Dutchman, Richard Strauss' Die Frau ohne Schatten and Weber's Oberon. He is also interested in broadening his repertoire with new compositions, such as Ginastera's Don Rodrigo and Menotti's Goya. The singer has been offered the role of Parsifal at the Salzburg Festival in 1998, most likely under Riccardo Muti.

Domingo, a restless, universal artist, has always shown a great interest in other artistic domains as well. On stage as an opera singer, he acquired a first-hand knowledge of conducting and decided to try his own hand at it, taking lessons from the great Hans Swarowsky in Vienna. He has since demonstrated his competence in this domain as well, leading opera performances in the world's major theatres from the Met to London Covent Garden, and from the Vienna State Opera to the Los Angeles Music Center Opera.

Plácido Domingo, an example of the best of the Spanish Spirit.

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