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Tenor
Charles Blandy is a versatile lyric tenor, equally at home in Mozart and Bach as in the most challenging contemporary music. Opera News and The Boston Globe praised his performances at Tanglewood in Britten's Midsummer Night's Dream and the World premiere of Osvaldo Golijov's Ainadamar, starring Dawn Upshaw and conducted by Robert Spano. He reprised the latter role at Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles. At Emmanuel Music in Boston, he has sung Tamino in Mozart's Magic Flute and Lurcanio in Handel's Ariodante. In recent years he appeared in Monteverdi's L'Orfeo with Handel & Haydn Society, and in Offenbach's La Vie Parisienne, and Glück's Alceste with Opera Boston. Other roles include Ferrando in Cosi fan tutte, Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni, and Macheath in The Beggar's Opera.
Mr. Blandy is a regular performer of works of Bach; His performance as the Evangelist in the St. John Passion with Emmanuel Music was praised by both The Boston Globe and The Boston Phoenix. This year he will sing the Evangelist in Emmanuel's performance of Bach's St. Matthew Passion. Recently he performed with the Bethlehem Bach Choir in a performance of Bach's Cantata 131, Aus der Tiefe.
In oratorio, he was a finalist in the 2005 Oratorio Society of New York solo competition, singing in Weill Recital Hall in New York City. He has sung Handel's Messiah with the Charlotte Symphony and Handel Choir of Baltimore. Other notable performances include Britten's St. Nicolas, conducted by Raymond Leppard; Britten's Cantata Misericordium, also with the Charlotte Symphony; and Mozart's Requiem with the Boston Landmarks Orchestra, performed outdoors on the Esplanade in Boston.
He is adept in contemporary music: On four days notice he took over a tricky tenor part in Berio's Sinfonia under conductor Robert Spano at Tanglewood. His performance of Jorge Liderman's Song of Songs with the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players (now a Bridge Records CD) was called "sterling" by The San Francisco Chronicle. Last year he gave the U.S. premiere of Einojuhani Rautavaara's song cycle for voice and strings Die Liebenden with Chameleon Arts Ensemble, in a performance The Boston Globe called "marvelous." He appears on a critically-praised Naxos CD of Scott Wheeler's opera Construction of Boston.
Mr. Blandy possesses a wide repertoire in art song. He has sung works of Francis Poulenc with the Florestan Recital Project, and this year gave a recital of songs by Rachmaninoff, Liszt, and Szymanowski at Tufts University.
He teaches in Harvard University's Holden Voice Program and at Tufts University. He was a fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center, where he was awarded the Grace B. Jackson prize. He received his Master's Degree from Indiana University, and has studied at the Britten-Pears School in Aldeburgh, England. He is a native of Troy, NY, and graduated from Oberlin College with a B.A. in religion.
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