An innate musician and trained pianist, American tenor Jamez McCorkle made headlines after his critically acclaimed appearance in the title role of the 2023 Pulitzer Prize-winning opera Omar which premiered at the Spoleto Festival in 2022 and was subsequently presented at LA Opera, Boston Lyric Opera, San Francisco Opera and Carolina Performing Arts Center. His recent triumphs in roles such as Bacchus in Strauss’ Ariadne auf Naxos and Laca Jenufa led to invitations to debut at Royal Ballet & Opera; Washington National Opera; Santa Fe, Staatsoper Hamburg and LA Philharmonic.
The 2025/26 season sees McCorkle make three appearances as Siegmund: with Daniel Harding and the Orchestre de Paris; with Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia; and with Gustavo Dudamel and the LA Philharmonic. He will also make a series of important debuts starting with his Royal Ballet & Opera debut in their production of Boris Godunov as Grigoriy and at Tiroler Festspiele Erl, debuting both as Parsifal and Erik Der fliegende Holländer. He will also return as Bacchus Ariadne auf Naxos at Staatsoper Hamburg and perform at the Hungarian State Opera as Florestan Fidelio.
Recent highlights include Omar’s premier at the San Francisco Opera with McCorkle in the title role, making his company debut; Bacchus in Richard Strauss’ Ariadne auf Naxos at the Royal Danish Opera in Copenhagen; Laca in in Robert Carsen’s production of Jenůfa at Vlaamse Opera; Duke of Cornwall Lear at the Bayerische Staatsoper; his house and role debut as Telemaco in a new production of Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria with Theatre Basel; Peter the Honeyman in the hugely acclaimed production of Porgy and Bess at the Metropolitan Opera; Leonard Woolfe in Kevin Puts’ new opera The Hours with the Philadelphia Orchestra under the baton of Yannick Nézet-Séguin; Tamino Die Zauberflöte with Kentucky Opera; Lensky Eugene Onegin with Michigan Opera Theatre. On the concert platform he performed Handel’s Messiah at the US Naval Academy, sang Froh Das Rheingold with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra and Fabio Luisi; performed Das Lied von der Erde with the Danish National Symphony Orchestra; his hailed return to Spoleto Festival for an innovative staged production of Schumann’s Dichterliebe where he performed the famous song cycle accompanying himself at the piano; Beethoven’s 9th Symphony at the Spoleto Festival; and Britten’s War Requiem with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra.
