Plácido Domingo

Plácido Domingo is a singer, conductor and arts administrator. His extraordinary artistic career has continued uninterrupted for more than half a century. He has sung more than 150 different roles – more than any other singer in the history of music – and during his career has given around 4,100 performances to date. He appears at all the world’s major opera houses as a guest artist, and has made an unprecedented number of recordings. His discography of more than 100 complete operas, aria and duet albums and crossover projects has earned him 12 Grammy Awards, including three Latin Grammys. In addition, he has appeared in more than fifty music videos, and won two Emmy Awards for them. He participated in three opera films – Carmen, La traviata and Otello – and his television broadcast of Tosca, filmed in the original locations in Rome, was seen by more than one billion viewers in 117 countries. From 1990 he performed in ‘The Three Tenors’ with José Carreras and Luciano Pavarotti, giving concert performances worldwide for many years. In addition, he has conducted more than 600 opera performances and symphony concerts. In 1993 he founded the international singing competition Operalia; he has also served as the General Manager of Los Angeles Opera and Washington National Opera.

In 2009 Plácido Domingo added to his repertory the baritone role of Simon Boccanegra, and went on to sing it at the Metropolitan Opera, New York, La Scala, Milan, the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, and in Madrid, Berlin and Los Angeles. He followed this in 2010 with the title role of Rigoletto. In 2010 he also created the role of Pablo Neruda in the world premiere of Daniel Catán’s Il postino at Los Angeles Opera. In March 2012 he took on the role of Athanaël (Thaïs) in Valencia, and in the ensuing seasons added nine more Verdi baritone roles to his repertory: Francesco Foscari (I due Foscari) in Los Angeles, Giorgio Germont (La traviata) at the Metropolitan Opera, Nabucco at Covent Garden, Giacomo (Giovanna d’Arco) at the Salzburg Festival, Count di Luna (Il trovatore) and Macbeth at Berlin State Opera, Don Carlo (Ernani) at the Metropolitan Opera, the Marquis of Posa (Don Carlo) at the Vienna State Opera, and, in the 2017/18 season, Miller (Luisa Miller) at the Metropolitan Opera. In 2015 he sang the title role of Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi for the first time with Los Angeles Opera, and in May 2019, also with Los Angeles Opera, he made his first appearance as Juanillo in Manuel Penella Moreno’s El gato montés.

Recent highlights include returns to Madrid: in 2021 to the Auditorio Nacional and in 2022 to the Teatro Real. In January 2023 he appeared on stage in Tokyo together with José Carreras; other concerts have taken him to Palm Beach, to the Salle Gaveau in Paris and to the Graz Musikverein.

In 2020 he was awarded the Austrian Music Theatre Prize for his lifetime achievements. Highly acclaimed concerts followed at the Royal Palace of Caserta (Naples) and at La Scala. In January 2021 he celebrated his 80th birthday at the Vienna State Opera with a performance of Nabucco, broadcast live on ORF. Plácido Domingo has received numerous awards and in 2021 was named Honorary Ambassador of the World Heritage of Spain.

He made his debut at the Salzburg Festival in 1975 in the title role of Don Carlo, and has since appeared at the Festival in numerous opera productions (both staged and in concert) and concert performances, most recently in 2014 as Count di Luna, in 2016 as Athanaël, in 2017 as Francesco Foscari, in 2018 in his role debut as Zurga (Les Pêcheurs de perles), in 2019 as Miller and in 2022 in the gala concert Carmencita & Friends.