Biography

Barry Banks’s current season highlights include his debut at the Royal Danish Opera as Idreno in Rossini’s Semiramide, a return to Teatro San Carlo in Naples for Donizetti’s Il Campanello, and Count Almaviva in Rossini’s The Barber of Seville at the Berlin State Opera. Other notable roles have included the title role in Mozart’s Mitridate and Don Narciso in Rossini’s Il turco in Italia  at the Bavarian State Opera; Ernesto in Don Pasquale at the Royal Opera House; Count Almaviva at the Metropolitan Opera; Idreno in Semiramide at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples; Don Ramiro in Rossini’s La Cenerentola for his debut at the Gran Teatre del Liceu; Oreste in Rossini’s Ermione for his debut at the Santa Fe Festival; the roles of Belfiore and Libenskof in Rossini’s Il viaggio a Reims for his debut at Teatro Communale di Bologna, and L’Astrologue in Rimsky-Korsakov’s Le Coq d’or for his debut at Théâtre du Châtelet. He has also enjoyed a long association with English National Opera.

In concert, Mr. Banks has performed Britten’s War Requiem at the Teatro alla Scala and with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg, Berlioz’s Requiem with the London Symphony Orchestra, Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius with the Munich Philharmonic, and Rossini’s Petite messe solennelle with the Royal Philharmonic.

Mr. Banks’s discography includes Donizetti’s The Elixir of Love and Don Pasquale, Mozart’s Don Giovanni and The Magic Flute, and Rossini’s The Italian Girl in Algiers and The Thieving Magpie in the Opera in English series for Chandos; La Bohème under Kent Nagano and Verdi’s Un ballo in maschera under Carlo Rizzi both for Teldec; and Trial by Jury under Charles Mackerras for Telarc. DVD releases include Rossini’s Armida from the Metropolitan Opera, Britten’s Billy Budd in an English National Opera production for Virgin/EMI and Mozart’s Die Entführung aus dem Serail, recorded at Buckingham Palace. His solo recital disc Barry Banks Sings Bel Canto Arias was released on Chandos. This season he will record Donizetti’s Rita for Opera Rara. He makes his San Francisco Symphony debut with these performances. 

(April 2013)