Colin Balzer, tenor

With assured musicality and the varied tonal palette of a lieder specialist, Canadian lyric tenor Colin Balzer received his musical training at the University of British Columbia and at the Hochschule fí¼r Musik Ní¼rnberg/Augsburg. He was a prizewinner in competitions in Holland, Germany, and England and earned the Gold Medal at the Robert Schumann Competition in Zwickau with the highest score in twenty-five years. He has performed at London’s Wigmore Hall, the Britten Festival in Aldeburgh, the Vancouver Chamber Music Festival, the Wratislavia Cantans in Poland, and the Festspielhaus in Baden-Baden. He has sung with orchestras in this country, Canada, and in Europe, under such conductors as Helmuth Rilling, Simone Young, Roberto Abbado, Bernard Labadie, Louis Langree, and Philippe Herreweghe.

In opera, he has sung leads in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, Monteverdi’s Orfeo and Incoronazione di Poppea, and Haydn’s Acis and Galatea. Recordings include Wolf’s Italienisches Liederbuch and Eisler and Henze song anthologies. This season features his New York solo recital debut at The Frick Collection; concerts with the Oratorio Society of New York and Musica Sacra; Les Violons du Roy; the Mozart Requiem with Camerata Salzburg; Acis and Galatea in Grenoble; Steffani's Niobe at the Boston Early Music Festival; and Don Giovanni at the Bolshoi.

Particularly esteemed as a recitalist, he has been welcomed at London's Wigmore Hall (accompanied by Graham Johnson), the Britten Festival in Aldeburgh, the Vancouver Chamber Music Festival, the Wratislavia Cantans in Poland, and at the Festspielhaus in Baden-Baden. Recordings to date include Wolf's Italienisches Liederbuch and Wigmore Hall Song Competition, Stuttgart, Germany's Hugo Wolf Competition and Munich's 55th International ARD Competition, Mr. Balzer also holds the rare distinction of earning the Gold Medal at the Robert Schumann Competition in Zwickau with the highest score in 25 years. Born in British Columbia, he received his formal musical training at the University of British Columbia with David Meek and with Edith Wiens at the Hochschule fí¼r Musik Augsburg.