Gwilym Bowen

Acclaimed for the clarity and beauty of his singing and dynamic stage presence, British tenor Gwilym Bowen performs internationally with orchestras and ensembles of the highest calibre. The 2021-22 season includes Bach in the San Francisco Bay Area with Philharmonia Baroque, a role debut as Flute in Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream for Opéra de Lille, returning to BBC National Orchestra of Wales as Evangelist for Bach's Matthäus-Passion, debuts with the Warsaw Philharmonic and Norske Blåseensemble, and returning to perform with Concerto Copenhagen and the Academy of Ancient Music.  

With repertoire ranging from the Baroque to the contemporary, with a specialist interest in Bach, Monteverdi and Handel his operatic highlights include Valletto L’incoronazione di Poppea for Angers-Nantes Opéra; Eurimaco/Giove Il ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria and Snout A Midsummer Night's Dream at The Grange Festival; Damon Acis and Galatea and multiple roles in Poppea and Ulisse with Academy of Ancient Music at the Barbican, the Ateneul Roman in Bucharest and Scuola Grande di San Rocco in Venice; Sylph in Rameau Zaïs with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment at Queen Elizabeth Hall and Father in Hasse’s Piramo e Tisbe with The Mozartists. Opera roles have also included Tom Rakewell The Rake’s Progress and Pelléas Pelléas et Mélisande.

In concert, Gwilym has sung Evangelist in the St John Passion with John Butt and BBC National Orchestra of Wales, and the St Matthew Passion for De Nederlandse Bachvereniging and Auckland Philharmonia, Bach cantatas with Masaaki Suzuki at Lincoln Center; Monteverdi and Schütz with the Dunedin Consort; Christmas Oratorio across Australia with Richard Tognetti and the Australian Chamber Orchestra, and with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment; Das Lied von der Erde with the City of London Sinfonia; Ernst Wilhelm Wolf's Passionsoratorium with Die Kölner Akademie;  Messiah with the Seattle Symphony Orchestra, West Australian Symphony Orchestra, Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, Hanover Band and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra; and Bach Mass in B Minor with the OAE at St John’s, Smith Square. His recordings include the St John Passion arias with De Nederlandse Bachvereniging and in a world-first Welsh language translation, Mass in B Minor with the Choir of Trinity College, Cambridge and OAE for Hyperion, Petrus in Handel's Brockes-passion with AAM and Concerto Copenhagen, and the world premiere recording of Dussek's Messe solemnelle.

Born in Hereford, Gwilym was a choral scholar at Trinity College, Cambridge, graduating with double-First class honours in Music, before studying at the Royal Academy of Music.