From Ireland, Paul McNamara is based in The Netherlands where he is Artistic Leader of the Dutch National Opera Academy, the collaborative master’s in opera performance offered by the Conservatorium van Amsterdam in partnership with the Royal Conservatoire The Hague.
The tenor has appeared in opera houses throughout Germany and Austria performing roles such as Wagner’s Claudio (Das Liebesverbot), Erik, Tannhäuser, Loge, Tristan, Siegfried, Mime and Parsifal. In addition to operas by Berg, Braunfels, Schillings, Schreker, Strauss, Korngold and Zemlinsky, his extensive repertoire also includes work by Cavalli, Monteverdi, Mozart, Weber, Meyerbeer, Leoncavallo, Tchaikowsky, Janáček, Britten, Previn, Penderecki and John Adams.
He has been heard at major venues including Venice’s Teatro La Fenice, Teatr Wielki – the Polish National Opera in Warsaw, the Teatro Municipal in Rio de Janeiro, the Théâtre de la Monnaie in Brussels, and with the Salzburg Festival at the Beijing Music Festival. A keen recitalist, concert appearances have taken him to many of the world’s leading venues including the Berlin Philharmonie, the Pierre Boulez Saal Berlin, the Amsterdam Concertgebouw and New York’s Carnegie Hall as well as to the Telemann Festival in Hamburg with Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin.
Current and upcoming engagements include appearances with the Nederlandse Reisopera, the Berliner Staatsoper, Saarländisches Staatstheater Saarbrücken, the Opéra Royal de Versailles and Opéra national du Rhin, Strasbourg.
An alumnus of the Royal Irish Academy of Music, Paul McNamara is an honours graduate of the University College Cork, the Cork School of Music and the Royal College of Music London. He is a casting consultant for the Stichting Omroep Muziek (Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra & Choir) and Opera Adviser to the Arts Council of Ireland (An Chomhairle Ealaíon).
Much demand as a teacher, career consultant and juror in international singing competitions. In addition to giving masterclasses in Germany and the Netherlands, this year he will work with the singers at the Oberösterreichische Opernstudio in Linz and return to teach at the American Institute of Musical Studies (AIMS) in Graz where he has been a faculty member since 2017.
