Simon O'Neill

Don't miss this special event! Simon O'Neill is regarded as the world’s leading Wagnerian tenor. A “larger than life” performer who is booked years in advance by the world’s leading opera houses, this year his work with the Los Angeles Philharmonic won the $85 billion recording industry’s most coveted honour – a Grammy Award. Talented Dunedin soprano Olivia Pike will be also accompanying him in this performance.

Simon is categorized as a “heldentenor” – a tenor voice blessed with the extra power, richness, and drama required to carry off the great Wagnerian roles. This rare voice is needed in challenging venues like the New York Metropolitan Opera, which seats 3800. In the Athenaeum Hall in Arrowtown, the audience has the rare chance to witness the particular magic that arrives when a voice as large as Simon’s fills a historic hall one-tenth the Metropolitan’s size.

Operas in which he has taken leading roles include La bohème, Otello, Nixon in China, Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, Idomeneo, The Magic Flute, The Bartered Bride, and Tosca. With Wagner, who created many of opera’s most challenging roles, Simon O’Neill has starred in Parsifal, Lohengrin, Fidelio, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, and is a regular in a “signature” role beyond the abilities of many – Siegfried, in Wagner’s Ring Cycle.

The “Best Choral Performance” Grammy came via his participation as solo tenor in the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s recording of Mahler’s 8th symphony, conducted by Gustavo Dudamel.

Simon O’Neill is an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit, a Fulbright Scholar, and a New Zealand Arts Laureate.