Justin Austin, baritone
Howard Watkins, piano

Possessing a “mighty lyric voice” (The New York Times) “with a burly, burnished tone capable of striking nuance and color” (Washington Post), Drama Desk Award-nominated baritone Justin Austin was named Rising Star of the Year at the 2024 International Opera Awards and is a recipient of the 2024 Marian Anderson Vocal Award. Deemed an “impossibly irresistible” (Bachtrack) “natural performer – a star awaiting a galaxy to form around him” (Washington Post), he has been praised as a “velvet-voiced, intensely charismatic” (The New Yorker) artist who sings with “ravishing beauty” (Opera) and displays “immaculate musicianship” (Seen and Heard International).

During the 2025-26 season, Justin makes his house debut at San Francisco Opera in the title role of The Barber of Seville and joins Houston Grand Opera as Jake in a new production of Porgy and Bess alongside Angel Blue. Additionally, he returns to Washington National Opera to star in Damien Sneed’s new edition of Scott Joplin’s Treemonisha as Remus, La Jolla Music Society for Damien Geter’s COTTON, and New York Festival of Song for Fugitives, a new recital program. He also joins Florentine Opera for a recital of operatic favorites, Opera Laguna for Handel’s Messiah, and MasterVoices at Alice Tully Hall for Faure’s Requiem, and brings the concert suite of Terence Blanchard’s Fire Shut Up In My Bones to New Orleans Opera, the Harriman-Jewell series, and Notre Dame University.

Last season, Justin made his house debut at LA Opera in Roméo et Juliette (Mercutio) and returned to the company later in the season in his role debut as Guglielmo in Così fan tutte. He made returns to the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis to star in the world premiere of Ricky Ian Gordon’s This House (Lindon), Carnegie Hall for Brahms’s Deutsches Requiem with the Cecilia Chorus of New York, and Stuttgart, Germany, for a concert with the Stuttgart Philharmonic and Opera for Peace. He toured selections from Terence Blanchard’s Champion and Fire Shut Up In My Bones at La Jolla Music Society, The Soraya, and the Charleston Gaillard Center, and conceived and co-artistic directed My Brother’s Keeper with New York Festival of Song at Kaufman Music Center. In recital, he appeared with Houston Grand Opera, Sag Harbor Song Festival, the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum at Washington University in St. Louis, MO, the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, and Emory & Henry University.

Favorite highlights of recent seasons include: the world premiere of Damien Geter’s American Apollo (Thomas Eugene McKeller) at Des Moines Metro Opera; the company premiere of Brett Dean's Hamlet at The Metropolitan Opera (house debut), with later returns in Peter Grimes (Ned Keene) and the company’s premiere of Jake Heggie’s Dead Man Walking (Motorcycle Cop); house and role debuts in Terence Blanchard’s Fire Shut Up In My Bones and Champion at Lyric Opera of Chicago; his role debut as Mercutio in Roméo et Juliette at Washington National Opera; Lynn Nottage and Ricky Ian Gordon’s Intimate Apparel at Lincoln Center Theater, which earned him a Drama Desk Award nomination for playing George Armstrong; as Captain Macheath in the film adaptation of Kurt Weill’s The Threepenny Opera produced by City Lyric Opera; the world premiere and commercial recording of Jack Perla and Rajiv Joseph’s Shalimar the Clown at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, where he created the role of Pyarelel Kaul; the title role of Mendelssohn’s Elijah with the Oratorio Society of New York and the baritone soloist in Margaret Bonds’ Ballad of the Brown King with the Cecilia Chorus, both at Carnegie Hall; a solo recital a the Park Avenue Armory with pianist Howard Watkins.

In concert, Justin gave the Marian Anderson Vocal Award Recital at the Kennedy Center as the 2024 recipient. He has additionally been featured with the Bayerische Staatsoper, Grand Théâtre de Genève, Washington Performing Arts, the Kimmel Center, Opera Maine, Opera Saratoga, Mistral Music, Voices of Ascension, St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, Longy School of Music with the Celebrity Series of Boston, Copland House, Strathmore Music Center, Lyric Fest at 92NY, Gore Recital Hall at the University of Delaware, and Spivey Hall at Clayton State University, plus the Glimmerglass, Hamburg International, Penn Square, Lakes Area, and Moab Music Festivals. He has previously joined IDAGIO for online concerts at the Global Concert Hall.

As a multifaceted musician, Justin enjoys performing a wide range of repertoire, from jazz, R&B, and musical theater, to opera and oratorio. He has collaborated, performed, and recorded with multiple groups and artists such as Aretha Franklin, The Boys Choir of Harlem, Mary J. Blige, Elton John, Lauryn Hill, The Roots, 30 Seconds to Mars, John Cale, Ricky Ian Gordon, Kanye West, Avner Finberg, M. Roger Holland, Jack Perla, Peter Andreacchi, and Odeline de la Martinez, plus jazz legends Reggie Workman, Hugh Masekela, and Wynton Marsalis.

Justin strongly believes in utilizing his artistry to benefit music programs, new music projects, and community services worldwide. He works with organizations such as MEND (Meeting Emergency Needs with Dignity), QSAC (Quality Services for the Autism Community), Holt International, and St. Mary’s Children’s Hospital to construct and perform benefit concerts. The proceeds of these projects supply emergent living essentials to those in need.

Justin has received accolades and awards from The Recording Academy, NAACP, George London Foundation, Washington National Opera, Opera Ebony, Gerda Lissner Foundation, Manhattan School of Music, NANM, Choir Academy of Harlem, and Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts. He is the winner of the St. Louis Theater Circle 2025 Outstanding Achievement in Opera award for his appearance in The Barber of Seville at Opera Theatre of St. Louis and is the recipient of a 2023 Mabel Dorn Reeder Award from Opera Theatre of St. Louis which goes to “the single artist in each season with the greatest potential to make a significant contribution to the art form of opera.” Justin is under the tutelage and mentorship of Catherine Malfitano.

Born in Stuttgart, Germany, Justin Austin is an alumnus of the Choir Academy of Harlem, Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts, Heidelberg Lied Akademie, and Manhattan School of Music (M.M. and B.M.).

American pianist Howard Watkins is a frequent associate of some of the world’s leading musicians on the concert stage and as an assistant conductor at the Metropolitan Opera. His appearances throughout the Americas, Europe, Asia, Russia, and Israel have included collaborations with Renée Fleming, Joyce DiDonato, Diana Damrau, Thomas Hampson, Kathleen Battle, Grace Bumbry, Mariusz Kwiecien, Anna Netrebko, and Matthew Polenzani at such venues as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Spivey Hall, Kennedy Center, U.S. Supreme Court, Alice Tully Hall, the three stages of Carnegie Hall, the Elbphilharmonie, and the Bolshoi Theater. His faculty affiliations include Juilliard, the Bard College Conservatory of Music, the Yale School of Music as a Visiting Presidential Fellow, the Merola program of San Francisco Opera, the Santa Fe Opera Apprentice Program, the Tanglewood Music Center, the Aspen Music Festival, the Mannes School of Music, the North Carolina School of the Arts, the International Vocal Arts Institute (Israel, Japan, and China), IIVA in Italy, the Brancaleoni Music Festival in Italy, the Tokyo International Vocal Arts Academy (TIVAA), and VOICExperience in Orlando, Tampa, and Savannah. A guest master coach for the Cafritz Young Artists of Washington Opera and the Opera Theater of St. Louis, Watkins has worked on the music staffs of Palm Beach Opera, the Washington National Opera, and LA Opera. A native of Dayton, Ohio, Watkins earned his doctorate in accompanying and chamber music at the University of Michigan. Honored as the 2004 recipient of the Paul C. Boylan award from the University of Michigan for his outstanding contributions to the field of music, he is also the 2019 recipient of the Lift Every Voice Legacy Award from the National Opera Association. Watkins was recognized as one the 2022 top professionals of the year by Musical America in part for his work to celebrate the music of Black composers and singers.