Mark Padmore

The British tenor Mark Padmore was born in 1961 in London and grew up in Canterbury. He initially studied clarinet before switching to vocal studies in 1979 as a Choral Scholar at King’s College. In 1991 he began a close collaboration with William Christie and Les Arts Florissants and, in 1992, with Philippe Herreweghe and the Collegium Vocale Gent. Padmore soon gained international renown for his performances as the Evangelist and the tenor soloist in Bach’s choral works. In the 1990s he began appearing as an opera performer more frequently, with credits including Peter Brooks’s staging of Don Giovanni in Aix-en-Provence, Tom Rakewell in Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress at the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie in Brussels, Handel’s Jephtha at English National Opera, and staged performances of the Bach Passions with Sir Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic. He has performed Captain Vere in Britten’s Billy Budd at the Glyndebourne Festival and took part in the world premiere of two one-act works by Sir Harrison Birtwistle in Aldeburgh. In the 2016-17 season, Mark Padmore served as artist-in-residence with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, and in the 2017-18 season he will take on the same position with the Berlin Philharmonic. He also enjoys close associations with the  Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and the Britten Sinfonia. Padmore is intensively devoted to lieder singing. His recording of the Schubert song cycles with Paul Lewis won Gramophone’s Vocal Solo Award in 2010; his account of Schumann’s Dichterliebe with Kristian Bezuidenhout received the Edison Award in 2011, and, in 2013, his interpretations of Britten’s Serenade and Nocturne earned the Echo Klassik Award. In 2016 the magazine Musical America named him Vocalist of the Year. Mark Padmore is artistic director of the St. Endellion Summer Music Festival in Cornwall.

LUCERNE FESTIVAL debut on 31 August 1989 with the Hilliard Ensemble in works by Pärt, Holliger, Weir, and Bryars.

July 2017