Dennis Orellana

Source: parnassus.at 

The exceptionally young and highly talented male soprano Dennis Orellana will participate in several prestigious Baroque productions in the 2024/25 season. Dennis will debut in the role of Bellezza in Il trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno at the Tage der Alten Musik Knechtsteden and the Modica Festival. At the Warsaw Philharmonic, our soprano will perform the role of Alessandro in Il Venceslao and, in his Berlin Philharmonie debut, at De Singel, and in Paris under the baton of Teodor Currentzis, the role of Hunapuh in The Indian Queen. He will also perform Ernesto in Griselda at the Musiktheater an der Wien and the title role of Isaaco in the opera of the same name at the Wiener Kammeroper. Solo concerts will take Dennis to Pullach, Tegucigalpa, and Konstanz.

Dennis Orellana was born in San Pedro Sula, Honduras. He began his professional musical journey as a trombonist with the San Pedro Sula Youth Symphonic Orchestra under Alfonso Flores. He combined his vocal training with university studies in computer science and digital design. At the Escuela Superior de Canto de Madrid, the only university in Europe exclusively dedicated to opera singers, Dennis studied until 2024. He participated in masterclasses at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome with soprano Emanuela Salucci and in Madrid with Carolina Alcaide, and completed an Erasmus program at the Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst (HMDK) in Stuttgart.

In March 2021, Dennis debuted in Madrid in the role of Amor in the world premiere of La selva sin amor. In April of the same year, he brought Cherubino to life in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro in a production by Marina Bollaín and Nacho Rodríguez. His professional and international debut followed in August 2021 as Berardo in Carlo il Calvo (an opera by Nicola Porpora) at the Teatro Auditorio San Lorenzo del Escorial. Sharing the stage with renowned artists such as Max Emanuel Cenčić, Julia Lezhneva, and Franco Fagioli, Dennis performed under the musical direction of Markellos Chryssicos alongside the Greek Baroque Orchestra Armonia Atenea.

In February 2022, he sang Moth in Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Wilhelma Theater in Stuttgart. At the Bayreuth Baroque Opera Festival 2022, Dennis performed as Zeffiro in Il Nascimento dell’Aurora and Ernesto in Griselda—both in concert form—marking his first major appearance before an international audience. At Bayreuth in 2023, he performed a solo concert, Si suoni la tromba, which Dennis will take on tour starting in 2024.

In the 2022/23 seasons, he performed Ernesto in Bononcini’s Griselda in Wrocław, Alessandro in Caldara’s Il Venceslao in Gliwice and at the Theater an der Wien (his house debut), Darius in Keiser’s Nebucadnezar at the Schwetzingen Palace Theater and Theater Magdeburg, and the title role of Teseo at the Handel Festival in Halle. His performances in Mozart roles caused a sensation: Cavaliere Ramiro in La Finta Giardiniera at the Salzburg Landestheater and Sifare in Mitridate, re di Ponto at the Brussels Mozartiade, as well as at Les Festivals de Wallonie in Mons and Namur.

The year 2023 was marked by two spectacular house debuts at leading venues: as Berardo in Porpora’s Carlo il Calvo, Dennis debuted at La Scala di Milano and also performed the role at the Konzerthaus Dortmund. In the role of Hunapuh in The Indian Queen, Dennis was invited to the Salzburg Festival.