Eduardo Villa
Eduardo Villa (* 1953 in Los Angeles , California ) is an American opera singer ( tenor ).
Life
education
As a high school student, later at City College in Santa Barbara , Villa, who originally wanted to study the violin, was interested in musicals. First in the orchestra, then as a dancer in a semi-professional production of the West Side Story , he was able to cause a sensation and thus became the leading actor in Paint Your Wagon , West Side Story, Oliver! , Man of La Mancha and many other musicals in the US state of California. After finishing college, he moved to the singing class at the University of Southern California . During this time he also joined a number of local opera troupes who performed opera excerpts for elementary and high school students. In 1982 he finished his studies and won the New York Metropolitan Opera Competition. Appearances at Carnegie Hall and the Merv Griffin Show followed .
Artistic work
In 1982 he also won the Loren L. Zachary Opera Competition . As a result, he was offered his first European contract at the Stadttheater Basel, where he sang various leading roles in the tenor field from 1983 to 1987. During this period he appeared as Turiddu in Cavalleria rusticana , Des Grieux in Manon Lescaut , Manrico in Il trovatore , Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly , Lenski in Eugen Onegin , Edgardo in Lucia di Lammermoor and Hoffmann in Les Contes d'Hoffmann . During his years in Basel he performed as Cavaradossi at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich , with which he signed a four-year contract in 1987.
From 1991 the number of international inquiries and offers increased so much that Villa decided to continue his career as a freelancer and refused to extend his contract with the Bavarian State Opera. During the time that lasted until his engagement at the New York Metropolitan Opera (1999), he made guest appearances at the Opera Hamilton in Canada, Carnegie Hall , the Frankfurt Opera , the Arizona Opera and the Connecticut Opera in Hartford . In March 1999 Villa made his debut as Radames in Aida at the New York Metropolitan Opera, in May 1999 he sang Enzo in La Gioconda there . In 2001 he sang Verdi's Otello in Atlanta at Fox Theater alongside Brenda Harris (Desdemona), Brent Ellis (Iago) and Matthew Chellis (Cassio) under the baton of William Fred Scott.
Villa is currently still working as a freelancer. Numerous guest performances have taken him to the world's largest stages.
Trivia
In the 1997/98 season, Villa was a spectator in a performance of Tosca in the Bavarian State Opera. The tenor who sang Cavaradossi was so indisposed that the performance had to be interrupted before the break. Villa spontaneously stepped in and "saved" the performance by singing the part to the end.
Web links
- Literature by and about Eduardo Villa in the catalog of the German National Library
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Villa, Eduardo |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American opera singer (tenor) |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 1953 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Los Angeles , California |