William Shelton

The British-French countertenor William Shelton is a sought-after Bach interpreter and performs regularly as a soloist with French and international ensembles such as Pygmalion, Le Poème Harmonique, Le Banquet Céleste, Alia Mens, Les Cris de Paris, L’Escadron volant de la Reine, Le Caravansérail, La Capella Reial de Catalunya, a nocte temporis, the Orchestre national Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, the Balthasar Neumann Orchestra, the La Cetra Barockorchester Basel, Collegium Vocale Gent, Ensemble Continuum Wien, the Freiburg Bach Choir, the Munich Bach Orchestra, Musica getutscht and Vox Luminis.

Highlights of 2024/25 included performances at the Festival International Bach Montréal, and with Il Gardellino, Les Ambassadeurs — La Grande Écurie and capella sollertia. He sang Wolfgang Göbst in the world premiere of Bruno Mantovani’s Voyage d’Automne and Nireno (Giulio Cesare) at the Théâtre du Capitole de Toulouse, returned to the Opéra de Limoges for Carmen, cours d’assises after Bizet, performed in Handel’s Messiah with Gli Angeli Genève and presented his programme Une Vénitienne à Paris with the theorbo player Léo Brunet.

Previous appearances have included Messaggiera in Caccini’s Euridice with Scherzi Musicali in Brussels and Timişoara (Romania), Arsamene (Serse) with Opera Fuoco in China and Apollo in Matthew Locke’s Psyche with Ensemble Correspondances at the Opéra Royal de Versailles, the Théâtre de Caen and the Château d’Hardelot.

An enthusiastic chamber music, he won the Duo Prize at the Concours International de Chant in Toulouse with the pianist Louis Dechambre, and, with Bastien Dollinger, the Prix de l’Opéra Grand Avignon at the Concours international de la mélodie de Gordes. He has also won awards at several Baroque competitions, including the Cesti Competition in Innsbruck (Young Artist Award), the Concours de chant baroque in Froville, the World Bach Competition at the Boulder Bach Festival and the Concours Corneille in Rouen.

In 2017 William Shelton was a member of the Académie Musicale Philippe Jaroussky and from 2021 to 2024 he was artist in residence at the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel, where he was taught by Stéphane Degout, Sophie Koch and José van Dam.