Darnell Ishmel, dramatic baritone
“show-stealing stage presence”
New York Times
One of America’s finest baritones, Darnell Ishmel made his professional debut with Cincinnati Opera in 2007 and since then has become one of the most in demand vocalists on the classical music scene today. He has been described by the New York Times as having a “rich baritone” with “precise diction” and his large repertoire encompasses a plethora of oratorios, art songs, lieder, solo works for voice and orchestra and over two dozen opera roles.
Gifted with a voice of immense range and rich timbre, he is a champion of the Italian Verismo operas of Verdi, Leoncavallo, Mascagni, Giordano and Puccini and in 2011 he made his Brooklyn Opera debut in the role of Tonio in Leoncavallo’s I Pagliacci.
As a recording artist, he is featured on the living composer HampsonSisler’s “Music in the Soul”on the new MSR Classics labelCD entitled “Phoenix Forever” with the Prague Sinfoniettaand the New Negro Spiritual and the Second Anthology of Art Songs by Willis Patterson.
Most recently he had the honor of performing in the 75th Anniversary National Production Tour of Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess and the title role in the world premiere staging and recording of James Dapogny’s revival of the long-lost James P. Johnson blues opera De Organizer. He is also the internationally acclaimed Harlem Jubilee Singers and the American Spirituals Ensemble.
