Since winning First Prize in the first annual Chester Ludgin American Verdi Baritone Competition, Jason Stearns has garnered praise from critics and audiences alike and is set to make his debut on some of the world’s biggest stages. Mr. Stearns recently completed a highly successful run in the title role in Der fliegende Holländer at the Savonlinna Festival. His 2007-2008 engagements included Don Carlo in Ernani with Opera Boston, and Veit in Ullmann’s Der zebrochene Krug at Los Angeles Opera. He also covered Kurwenal in Tristan und Isolde with Los Angeles Opera.
In the 2008-2009 season, Mr. Stearns will be found on the rosters of both the Metropolitan Opera and Lyric Opera of Chicago. At the Metropolitan Opera, Mr. Stearns will sing Monterone in Rigoletto, and cover Barnaba in La Gioconda and Donner in Das Rheingold. At Lyric Opera of Chicago, Mr. Stearns will sing matinee performances of Tonio in Pagliacci and will also cover Alfio in Cavelleria Rusticana and Kurwenal in Tristan und Isolde.
In the fall of 2009, Mr. Stearns will sing Jack Rance in La fanciulla del West with Norwegian Opera at the newly opened opera house in Oslo. In 2010, he will sing the High Priest in Samson et Dalila with Bob Jones University, the title role in Rigoletto with Baltimore Opera, and return to the Metropolitan Opera.
Recent engagements include Biterolf in Tannhäuser and the title role in Britten’s Noye’s Fludde with Los Angeles Opera under James Conlon, the High Priest in Samson et Dalila opposite Denyce Graves at Florida Grand Opera, Lohengrin with the Leipzig Opera, Tonio in Pagliacci with Boston’s Chorus Pro Musica, Scarpia in Tosca with Summer Opera, and the Mill Foreman in Jenufa at Los Angeles Opera.
His European debut was as Di Luna in a new production of Il trovatore with Musiktheater im Revier in Gelsenkirchen in Spring, 2006.
Mr. Stearns has also appeared with Washington National Opera as Nikitisch in Boris Godunov, the King in Le Cid, the Herald in Otello, and Westmorland in Sly.
Concert repertoire includes the Bach Passions, Elijah, Requiem of Mozart and Brahms, L’Enfance du Christ, and Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. With the National Symphony in Washington, D.C., Mr. Stearns recorded the baritone solos in John Corigliano’s Of Rage and Remembrance, which won a Grammy Award in 1997.
