Russell Thomas in Recital

With a “heroically shining tone of exceptional clarity and precision” (Opera magazine) and “gorgeously burnished power” (The New York Times), American tenor Russell Thomas uses his signature elegance and intensity to create vivid character portrayals on the world’s most important stages.

In the 2023/24 season, Mr. Thomas undertakes his first Parsifal at Houston Grand Opera and returns to major stages around the world in signature Verdi and Puccini roles. He sings Radames in Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Aida, Cavaradossi in the Royal Opera House’s Tosca, Calaf in LA Opera’s Turandot and Alvaro in the Norwegian Opera’s La Forza del Destino. He appears in concert and recital with the Edinburgh International Festival, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, and Vocal Arts DC at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, before concluding his artistic residency at LA Opera with Fire and Blue Sky, a world premiere song cycle composed for him by Joel Thompson.

Acclaimed for his “voice of intrinsic warmth and refined sense of style” (Opera News), Mr. Thomas has enjoyed a string of operatic triumphs in key Verdi roles, including appearances as Otello at Canadian Opera Company and the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Ernani at Lyric Opera of Chicago, Manrico in Il Trovatore at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, Radames in Aida at Houston Grand Opera, Stiffelio at Opera Frankfurt, and Don Alvaro in La Forza del Destino at Deutsche Oper Berlin and Opéra National de Paris. An alumnus of the Metropolitan Opera’s Lindemann Program, he most recently returned to the Met as Don Carlo and Rodolfo in La Bohème. Other important appearances include Cavaradossi at Lyric Opera of Chicago, Idomeneo at the Salzburg Festival, Roberto Devereux at San Francisco Opera, Radames and Otello at LA Opera, Florestan in Fidelio at San Francisco Opera and Cincinnati Opera, and Calaf and Adorno in Simon Boccanegra at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden. Mr. Thomas created the role of Lazarus in the world premiere of The Gospel According to the Other Mary by John Adams and Peter Sellars, and his portrayal of Tito in the new Sellars production of La Clemenza di Tito at the Salzburg Festival drew praise from The New Yorker, which noted, “Thomas’s penetrating tenor, which has lately acquired richness and heft, anchored the evening.”

Mr. Thomas’s “ardent expression and spine-tingling high notes” (Cincinnati Enquirer) have been heard in the Verdi Requiem with the New York Philharmonic, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, and the symphony orchestras of Washington, D.C. and Barcelona. He has appeared as tenor soloist in Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, and the symphonies of Dallas, Detroit, Atlanta, Seattle, and Houston; the title role in Oedipus Rex at LA Opera and with Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, under the baton of Esa-Pekka Salonen; and as tenor soloist in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with the New York Philharmonic, Vienna Philharmonic, Dallas Symphony, BBC Proms, and Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood. He joined the Met Orchestra for their first overseas tour in more than 20 years, singing Otello opposite Angel Blue at Carnegie Hall, Philharmonie de Paris, Barbican Centre, and Festspielhaus Baden-Baden.

During the hybrid 2020/21 season, Mr. Thomas began his tenure as Artist in Residence at LA Opera, where he plays a substantial role in artistic planning and casting. In addition to hosting and curating the company’s After Hours recital series, he has spearheaded new training programs designed to serve outstanding singers from historically Black colleges and universities and Los Angeles public high school students from underserved communities.

Learn more at RussellThomasTenor.com.

Joshua Banbury is an emerging vocal artist and librettist working in opera and jazz.

In January 2023, he presented a recital at the Phillips Collection with pianist Aaron Diehl. In 2022, Banbury made his solo debut at Lincoln Center with the New York Philharmonic and the National Black Theatre.

Joshua is also a fellow with the American Lyric Theatre in New York City, considered to be the country’s premier mentorship initiative for promising operatic writers. Additionally, Banbury served as the first Julius Eastman Fellow at Looking Glass Arts in the summer of 2022.

Since graduating from The New School in 2020, Joshua has enjoyed a blossoming career as a vocalist, with opportunities to sing at venues such as Jazz at Lincoln Center, Minton’s Playhouse, National Sawdust, the Annapolis Symphony Orchestra, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Soho House Austin, Google NYC, and the Carver Museum.

His opera libretti have been presented by Washington National Opera, the American Lyric Theater, Fort Worth Opera, and the Coalition for African Americans in the Performing Arts.

In 2022, his ten-minute opera The Burning Bush, composed by Jasmine Barnes, premiered at Washington National Opera, and was celebrated as "surrealist, clever, and precisely imagined" by The Washington Post.

Banbury was born and raised in Austin, Texas, and began writing plays and performing locally at the age of ten. He began classical voice lessons as a teenager and proceeded to win top prizes from competitions such as YoungArts, in both opera and musical theater, along with a full scholarship to study classical voice at the Austin School for Performing and Visual Arts. In 2014, he appeared in his first opera, Qadar, under the direction of Denyce Graves, with music by Tony Smalls, under the royal commission from the Sultanate of Oman.

Learn more at JoshuaBanbury.com.

Photo: Kasia Idzkowska

Jasmine Barnes is a composer/vocalist who has had her music performed all over the world. She is a multifaceted composer who embraces any writing style of music using a variety of instrumentation and specializes in writing for the voice. A full-time composer, she is managed by UIA talent for her work as a composer, is a resident artist in American Lyric Theater's Composer Librettist Development Program, and has held residencies as a composer fellow at Chautauqua Opera 2021 season, as well as a residency with All Classical Portland.

She has been privileged to be commissioned by numerous organizations such as the Washington National Opera (in celebration of the Kennedy Center's 50th year anniversary), Bare Opera, Aspen Summer Music Festival, Baltimore Choral Arts, Resonance Ensemble, Tapestry Choir, CityMusic Cleveland, LyricFest Philadelphia, Burleigh Music Festival, Symphony Number One and Baltimore Musicales, among others. She is beginning to be noticed for her work. Her 10-minute opera The Late Walk, commissioned by Bare Opera as a part of the Decameron Opera Coalition, has been archived in the Library of Congress. She was featured in The Baltimore Sun in an article written by Elizabeth Nonemaker. as well as an interview in the Washington Post about The Burning Bush, a short opera written with Joshua Banbury about Freddie Gray for Washington National Opera.

She was named the recipient of the Florence Price Award for Composition from Pricefest, named a winner of the International Women's Brass Conference Emerging Composer Competition, a winner of the Black Brilliance award by the Pleiades Project, recognized as the Gwendolyn J Brinkley Fine Arts First Place Award Winner of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., South Central Region 2021, and named a finalist of All Classical Portland's Recording Inclusivity Initiative.

Outside of commissions, her work has been performed by the Fresno Philharmonic Orchestra, Portland Opera, Tulsa Opera, Hampsong Foundation (at the Elbphilharmonie), Tennessee State University Meistersingers, University of North Iowa, University of Memphis, Indiana University (graduate song literature class), Karen Slack, Leah Hawkins, Leona Mitchell, Marquita Lister, Gabrielle Gilliam, Alexandria Crichlow and Christian Simmons, among other established artists and organizations. Some upcoming premieres include pieces created for the voices of Lawrence Brownlee, Will Liverman, Russell Thomas and Helena Brown. 

She is part of a network of composers called "The Blacknificent Seven" along with Shawn Okpebholo, Jessie Montgomery, Damien Geter, Dave Ragland, Joel Thompson and Carlos Simon. This dynamic group of composers act as a support group to each other and are even working on an upcoming project together.

Learn more at JasmineBarnesComposer.com.

Damien Geter is an acclaimed bass-baritone, actor and composer whose credits include performances from the operatic stage to the television screen.

He is a composer who infuses classical music with various styles from the Black diaspora to create music that furthers the cause for social justice. His growing body of work includes chamber, vocal, orchestral and full operatic works. Some recent highlights include commissions Cantata for a Hopeful Tomorrow for the Washington Chorus with subsequent performances at Pacific Chorale, Invisible for Opera Theater Oregon, The Justice Symphony for the University of Michigan, Buh-roke for the Portland Baroque Orchestra and String Quartet No. 1, Neo-Soul for All Classical Portland and On-Site Opera. His piece 1619 was part of On Site Opera's presentation “What Lies Beneath.”

His large work An African American Requiem premiered in 2022 in partnership with Resonance Ensemble and the Oregon Symphony, with subsequent performances at the Kennedy Center. I Said What I Said for Imani Winds, co-commissioned by Anima Mundi Productions, Chamber Music Northwest and The Oregon Bach Festival, also premiered in 2022. His second opera, Holy Ground, premiered in 2022 at the Glimmerglass Festival. Future commissions include world premieres productions in 2023, 2024 and 2025.

In his career as a singer, he recently his Metropolitan Opera debut in the Grammy Award-winning production of Porgy and Bess as the Undertaker and performed the Immigration Officer in Seattle Opera’s filmed production of Jonathan Dove’s Flight. Other recent appearances include Angelotti in Tosca with Portland Opera, Sam in Trouble in Tahiti with the Reno Symphony, the title role of Quamino in the world premiere of Errollyn Wallen’s Quamino’s Map with Chicago Opera Theatre, William Still in Paul Moravec's Sanctuary Road with the Oakland Symphony. He was the bass soloist in Darrell Grant's chamber opera Sanctuaries with Third Angle New Music and in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with the Richmond Symphony.

He is the Interim Music Director & Artistic Advisor for Portland Opera as well as Artistic Advisor for the award-winning vocal ensemble Resonance Ensemble.

He is the co-author of the book Music in Context: An Examination of Western European Music Through a Sociopolitical Lens, available on Amazon, or directly from the publisher, Kendall Hunt.

Learn more at DamienGeterMusic.com.

Adolphus Hailstork (born in 1941) received his doctorate in composition from Michigan State University, where he was a student of H. Owen Reed. He had previously studied at the Manhattan School of Music under Vittorio Giannini and David Diamond, at the American Institute at Fontainebleau with Nadia Boulanger, and at Howard University with Mark Fax.

His most recent major work, the choral requiem A Knee on the Neck (a tribute to George Floyd), with text by Herbert Martin, premiered in 2022, performed by the National Philharmonic under conductor Piotr Gajewski in collaboration with the Washington Chorus, National Philharmonic Chorale and singers from Howard University, featuring soloists mezzo-soprano J’Nai Bridges, tenor Norman Shankle and baritone Kenneth Overton. The New York Choral Society will present the New York premiere of the piece in June 2023.

He has written numerous works for chorus, solo voice, piano, organ, various chamber ensembles, band, orchestra and opera. Among his early compositions are Celebration, recorded by the Detroit Symphony in 1976;, and Out of the Depths (1977) and American Guernica (1983),  two works for band which won national competitions. Consort Piece (1995), commissioned by the Norfolk (Virginia) Chamber Ensemble, was awarded first prize by the University of Delaware Festival of Contemporary Music.

Significant performances by major orchestras (Philadelphia, Chicago, and New York) have been led by leading conductors such as James de Priest, Paul Freeman, Daniel Barenboim, Kurt Masur, Lorin Maazel, JoAnn Falletta and David Lockington. Thomas Wilkins recently conducted Hailstork’s An American Port of Call with the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

The composer’s second symphony (commissioned by the Detroit Symphony), and second opera, Joshua's Boots (commissioned by the Opera Theatre of St. Louis and the Kansas City Lyric Opera) were both premiered in 1999.  His second and third symphonies were recorded by the Grand Rapids Symphony Orchestra (conducted by David Lockington)  and were released by Naxos. Another Naxos recording, An American Port of Call (Virginia Symphony Orchestra) was released in 2012.

Commissions include Rise for Freedom, an opera about the Underground Railroad, premiered in the fall of 2007 by the Cincinnati Opera Company; Set Me on a Rock (about Hurricane Katrina), for chorus and orchestra, commissioned by the Houston Choral Society (2008); and the choral ballet, The Gift of the Magi, for treble chorus and orchestra (2009). In the fall of 2011, Zora, We're Calling You, a work for speaker and orchestra, was premiered by the Orlando Symphony.  I Speak of Peace, commissioned by the Bismarck Symphony in honor of (and featuring the words of) President John F. Kennedy, premiered in 2013.

Hailstork’s most recent works include The World Called (based on Rita Dove’s poem Testimonial), a work for soprano, chorus and orchestra commissioned by the Oratorio Society of Virginia (premiered in 2018), and Still Holding On, an orchestra work commissioned and premiered by the Los Angeles Philharmonic in 2019. 

Dr. Hailstork resides in Virginia Beach, Virginia, and is Professor of Music and Eminent Scholar at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia.

To learn more, visit AdolphusHailstork.com.

Deborah D.E.E.P. Mouton is an internationally-known poet, singer, actress, photographer, wife, mother, and the first Black poet laureate for the city of Houston. Heralded as a "Literary Genius" by Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee, this California native was formerly ranked the #2 best female Poet in the World. D.E.E.P. has established herself as a notable force in the performance and literary world. Currently, she is a resident artist at the American Lyric Theater's Composer and Librettist Development Program and Rice University through the Center for Engaged Research and Collaborative Learning.

She self-published her first collection of poetry, Heartstrings and Lamentations, at the tender age of 19 while studying English at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor. Her university years helped foster a love for writing that was noticed early on by her high school English teacher. After being introduced to poetry slam in high school, she knew she wanted to focus on refining her voice as a poet. In the midst of earning a dual bachelor's degree in English and African-American studies, she competed at CUPSI (The National College and University Poetry Slam Invitationals) as a member of the 2004 University of Michigan Slam Team while simultaneously touring with the WordWorks Poetry Troupe across the Midwest.

She released her first full-length album in 2009 titled The Unfinished Work of a Genius. It is a collection of original songs and poems that explore ideas around spirituality and personal growth. Her sophomore album Beautiful Rebellion explores more socially themed poems. She has been featured on BBC, NPR, Upworthy, Blavity, Tedx, Button Poetry, ABC, and the opening video of the 2017-2018 Houston Rockets season. Her collaboration with the Houston Ballet celebrated Houston's resilience and provided hope for the city after Hurricane Harvey.

She had the honor of serving as a juried poet for the 2012 Houston Poetry Fest and an honored guest in the 2017 Houston Poetry Fest. Her work can be found in Haymarket Book's Black Girl Magic anthology (2018), Akashic Press's Houston Noir (2019) and Blind Faith Book's I AM STRENGTH anthology, and more. Her fiction and creative nonfiction work can be found in Crimereads (2019), Fjords Journal (2019), and the Remapping Wonderland collection by Alternating Current Press (2020). She has served as a contributing writer for Glamour, Texas Monthly, Muzzle, and ESPN's The Undefeated.

D.E.E.P. endeavors to see all of the ways words can be used to pull audiences together. In 2020, she began to venture into opera, serving as the librettist for Marian's Song, an opera centered around the life of Marian Anderson. This world premiere not only ushered her in through one of the most prestigious houses in the country, the Houston Grand Opera, but served as a permission slip to the theatrical dreams she kept hidden. In the following years, as the world pivoted to the crippling pandemic, she dove deeper into creating large stage works that heralded important voices and stories. She was awarded a Live Commission Grant by Performing Arts Houston to produce a visual poem and a work centered around Black life in quarantine during the pandemic, which also served as her directorial debut. The World's Intermission premiered at Jones Hall in 2021 and was restaged for a short film recording with the Houston Museum of African American Culture in 2022.

Plumshuga: The rise of Lauren Anderson is her most recent choreopoem which she wrote and is co-directing with Stages own Eboni Bell Darcy. She also created original music for the piece with the brilliant composer Jasmine Barnes. It champions the life of the incomparable ballerina who broke ceilings across the world. She is also currently working in collaboration with Kendrick Scott and Robert Hodge on Unearthed, a performance piece that shines a light on the Sugarland 95 and a new opera with composer Jasmine Barnes for the American Lyric Theater.

Her second book, Black Chameleon, published by Henry Holt & Co, debuts in the spring of 2023. This stirring new memoir combines new mythology with powerful lyricism. In addition, a storybook opera for young students, entitled Lula The Mighty Griot, which reinterprets one of the myths from the book, was released in 2022 with the Houston Grand Opera and is currently touring schools and community centers. In addition, an exhibit entitled "______ as Myth" engages community writers and artists to interrogate the use of personal mythology as a vehicle for social and self reflection. This exhibit opens at the Moody Center for the Arts on Rice University's campus in the fall of 2022 as part of D.E.E.P.'s residency with the Center for Engaged Research and Collaborative Learning at Rice. recently, She currently tours as part of the Texas Commission on the Arts touring roster.

Learn more at LiveLifeDeep.com.

Dave Ragland is a four-time Emmy nominated composer, vocalist, pianist, and conductor. Hailed as “über-talented” by The Nashville Scene, he received an Emmy nomination for composition and music direction for Frist Art Museum’s Nick Cave: Feat. Nashville. He received a second Emmy nomination for I'm Troubled, a musical collaboration with Nashville Ballet’s Gerald Watson and violinist Chandler Custer. 

Dave Ragland arranged "Lift Every Voice and Sing" for tenor Lawrence Brownlee for Washington National Opera's Concert for Inauguration Day. In Nashville Opera's first ever commission, he collaborated with librettist Mary McCallum to create One Vote Won, an opera commemorating the centennial of women's suffrage. In collaboration with Inversion Vocal Ensemble, shackled feet DANCE!, and Diaspora Orchestra, he premiered his opera Steal Away as Artist-in-Residence for OZ Arts. Additional compositional credits include works for the Nashville Symphony, Nashville Ballet, Memphis Symphony Orchestra, chatterbird, Intersection Contemporary Ensemble, and Grammy-nominated ALIAS Chamber Ensemble.

For the past three seasons, he has served as chorus master for Nashville Symphony's Let Freedom Sing. He is the 2020 GRADY-RAYAM Negro Spirituals Foundation Composer-in Residence. He is a member of the inaugural cohort of composers for the National Teachers of Singing (NATS) Mentoring Program. 

He is the Artistic Director of Inversion Vocal Ensemble, a regionally touring vocal collective that has performed with Brandi Carlile, Grammy nominee Ruby Amanfu, Marcus Hummon and Levi Hummon. Inversion has also shared the stage with Rivers Rutherford, The Fairfield Four, and Tanya Tucker. Previous engagements with Inversion include the National Civil Rights Museum, the National Museum of African-American Music, the Ryman Auditorium, Tennessee Arts Academy, Cheekwood, Nashville Symphony’s Free Day of Music and Let Freedom Sing in 2019. 

Dave was a Composer Mentor for 91Classical's inaugural Student Composer Fellowship. He serves on the board of American Choral Directors Association, Tennessee Chapter, and is a proud member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia. 

Learn more at DaveRagland.com.