Lucas Meachem
Biography
Grammy® Award-winning baritone Lucas Meachem is one of the most accomplished, in-demand singers of the moment, captivating audiences around the world with his “earnest appealing baritone” (The New York Times) and “commanding presence” San Francisco Chronicle. “A rock star of opera” (Opera Pulse), Meachem’s 2021/22 season begins with returns to Los Angeles Opera, Teatro Real Madrid, Metropolitan Opera, The Dallas Opera, Royal Opera House, and debuts at Teatro Udine and Oper Im Steinbruck as Verdi’s Nabucco.
After a year of theatres gone dark, Meachem returned to the stage this past spring where he sang his “signature role for good reason,” (Opera News) as Figaro in San Francisco Opera’s Il Barbiere di Siviglia for an innovative “drive-in” experience. Meachem then filmed a movie-version of Pagliacci as the romantic lead Silvio with the Lyric Opera of Chicago, set within their own opera house. Meachem’s 2021 summer included Eugene Onegin at Santa Fe Opera and Gianni Schicchi at Festival Napa Valley with Kent Nagano.
During the 21/22 season, Meachem appears at Los Angeles Opera (Wolfram in Tannhäuser), Bayerische Staatsoper (Escamillo in Carmen), Teatro Real Madrid and Metropolitan Opera (Marcello in La Bohème), The Dallas Opera (Figaro in Il Barbiere di Siviglia) and Royal Opera House (Sharpless in Madama Butterfly).
Named the winner of San Francisco Opera’s inaugural “Emerging Star of the Year” Award in 2016, notable performances in Meachem’s American career include marking his 50th role debut as Athanaël in Thaïs (Minnesota Opera), Chorèbe in Les Troyens, Demetrius in A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Valentin in Faust at Chicago Lyric Opera; Eugene Onegin, Don Giovanni, and Il barbiere di Siviglia, Papageno in Die Zauberflöte, Count Almaviva in Le nozze di Figaro, and Fritz/Frank in Korngold’s Die Tote Stadt at San Francisco Opera; General Rayevsky in Prokofiev’s War & Peace, Robert in Iolanta, Marcello in La bohéme, Silvio in Pagliacci, and Mercutio in Roméo and Juliette at the Metropolitan Opera; Don Giovanni with Chicago Lyric Opera, Santa Fe Opera, New Orleans Opera, and Opera Cincinnati Opera; Zurga in Les pêcheurs de perles at the Florida Grand Opera; Germont in La traviata at Washington National Opera; Il barbiere di Siviglia at San Diego Opera, Opera Colorado, Houston Grand Opera, and Los Angeles Opera where he also gave his Grammy® Award-winning performance of Figaro in The Ghosts of Versailles.
A regular performer across Europe, Meachem has performed the title role in Il barbiere di Siviglia with the Vienna Staatsoper, Royal Opera House, Den Norske Opera; the title role in Don Giovanni at Glyndebourne Festival and Semperoper Dresden; the title role in Britten’s Billy Budd at Opéra national de Paris; as Count Almaviva in Le nozze di Figaro at Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich and Royal Opera House; Wolfram von Eschenbach in Tannhäuser at the Saito Kinen Festival in Japan under the baton of Seiji Ozawa; the title role in Eugene Onegin with Komische Oper Berlin and Opéra national de Montpellier; Zurga in Les pêcheurs de perles at Bilbao Opera; Escamillo in Carmen with Teatro Regio di Torino; with the Teatro Real de Madrid in the world premiere of El Viaje a Simorgh, Frank/Fritz in Die Tote Stadt, as well as Oreste in Iphigénie en Tauride; and a European tour with Anna Netrebko as Robert in Iolanta with 11 performances at Europe’s most important musical centers and venues including Vienna, Munich, Paris, Berlin, and Amsterdam.
An avid performer in Europe, Meachem sang with the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal under the baton of Kent Nagano as the opening concert for the Salzburg Festival of Penderecki’s St. Luke Passion. Additionally, Meachem was part of the opening concert for the Grafenegg Music Festival of the Britten War Requiem and performed the Mahler Kindertotenlieder with Emmanuel Villaume and the Prague Philharmonia. Other notable concert performances in Europe include the Fauré Requiem with the Maggio Musical Fiorentino under Seiji Ozawa and Carmina Burana in Rome with the Accademia Nazionale de Santa Cecilia. Meachem made his Hollywood Bowl debut in 2014 as Silvio in Pagliacci with Gustavo Dudamel. He has sung with the New York Philharmonic in Bach’s St. Matthew Passion under Kurt Masur; the San Francisco Symphony in concert performances of Gilbert and Sullivan’s Iolanthe; the American Symphony Orchestra in the United States premiere of Ferdinand Hiller’s oratorio The Destruction of Jerusalem at Avery Fisher Hall.
Meachem’s solo debut album, Shall We Gather, featuring American art songs is available September with Rubicon Records with his wife, Irina Meachem, at the piano. With praise from BBC Music Magazine as “The vibrant and committed performances from this husband-and-wife duo… make this an affecting and appealing disc… a commendable venture, performed with real flair and programmed from the heart… Unafraid to push the voice to its limits as the music’s message demands, Meachem gives a heartbreakingly beautiful performance.” and the New Yorker: “Meachem’s voice—a substantial and propulsive lyric baritone with pillowy edges—records beautifully.”
Born in North Carolina, Lucas Meachem studied music at Appalachian State University, the Eastman School of Music, and Yale University before becoming an Adler Fellow with the San Francisco Opera.