O’Neill, Dennis (James)

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O’Neill, Dennis (James)

O’Neill, Dennis (James), Welsh tenor; b. Pontardulais, Feb. 25, 1948. He studied at the Univ. of Sheffield and at the Royal Northern Coll. of Music in Manchester. In 1973 he made his debut in Ivan Susanin at the Wexford Festival, and then sang with the State Opera of South Australia (1974–76) and subsequently with the Scottish Opera in Glasgow. In 1979 he sang Alfredo with the Welsh National Opera in Cardiff and Flavio at London’s Covent Garden. He appeared as the Italian Singer in Der Rosenkavalier at the Glyndebourne Festival in 1980. After singing at the Vienna State Opera and the Hamburg State Opera in 1981, he made his U.S. debut as Edgardo at the Dallas Opera in 1983. In 1984 he sang at the San Francisco Opera, in 1985 at the Lyric Opera in Chicago, and in 1986 at the Paris Opéra. His first appearance with the Metropolitan Opera was as Alfredo during a tour by the company in 1986. In 1987 he returned to the Metropolitan Opera to make his house debut in N.Y. In 1992 he sang at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich. He was engaged as Radamès at Covent Garden in 1994, and he returned there in 1997 as Macduff .

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire