Kyle Ketelsen

The American bass-baritone Kyle Ketelsen is in regular demand by the world’s leading opera houses and orchestras. In the 2023/24 season he has made his debut at the Paris Opéra in the title role of Don Giovanni and returned to the Hamburg State Opera as Jokanaan (Salome), as well as to the Metropolitan Opera in New York as Escamillo in a new production of Carmen under Daniele Rustioni and as Richard in Kevin Puts’s The Hours — a role he also sang in the opera’s world premiere in 2022. On the concert platform he has appeared in Mozart’s Requiem with the choir and orchestra of the Lyric Opera of Chicago under Enrique Mazzola and in Verdi’s Requiem with the Madison Symphony Orchestra.

His recent opera engagements have also included Golaud (Pelléas et Mélisande) under James Conlon at the Los Angeles Opera, Don Giovanni in his debut at the Vienna State Opera (in Barrie Kosky’s new production under Philippe Jordan) and at the Teatro de la Maestranza in Seville, Dulcamara (L’elisir d’amore) at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, Bluebeard (Bluebeard’s Castle) for the Canadian Opera Company, Escamillo with the RTVE Symphony Orchestra in Madrid, Kaspar in Dmitri Tcherniakov’s new production of Der Freischütz at the Bavarian State Opera, Adahm in Rudi Stephan’s Die ersten Menschen at the Dutch National Opera in Amsterdam, Leporello (Don Giovanni) at the Washington National Opera, the Hamburg State Opera and with musicAeterna under Teodor Currentzis and Selim (Il turco in Italia) at the Zurich Opera House.

Other career highlights have included Golaud, Escamillo, Leporello and Mr Flint (Billy Budd) at the Met, Rodolfo (La sonnambula), Méphistophélès (Faust) and Golaud in Zurich, Escamillo in San Francisco, King of Scotland (Ariodante), Masetto (Don Giovanni), Figaro (Le nozze di Figaro) and Méphistophélès (Faust) in Chicago, Méphistophélès (La Damnation de Faust) with Les Siècles in Linz and in Bonn, Nick Shadow (The Rake’s Progress) at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, the Dutch National Opera and the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, Mozart’s Figaro at the Berlin State Opera and in Barcelona, Leporello in Dallas and Lyon, Golaud at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris, Basilio (Il barbiere di Siviglia) in Munich, Enrico VIII (Anna Bolena) at the Minnesota Opera, Don Fernando (Fidelio) in Houston and Cadmus (Semele) and Alidoro (La Cenerentola) for the Canadian Opera Company.

His concert performances in recent seasons have included Beethoven’s Missa solemnis with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Riccardo Muti, Mozart’s Requiem with the Philadelphia Orchestra under Yannick Nézet-Séguin at the Bravo! Vail Music Festival and Mendelssohn’s Elijah with the Utah Symphony Orchestra under Thierry Fischer.