James Platt

British bass James Platt was educated at Chetham’s School of Music and went on to study at the Royal Academy of Music and the Opera Course of the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. He was a member of the Jette Parker Young Artist Programme at the Royal Opera, Covent Garden from 2014-2016.

Engagements in James’ 2024/25 season include Swallow in a new production of Peter Grimes for the Dutch National Opera and Arkel in a new production of Pelléas et Mélisande for the Longborough Festival. His concert engagements include The Creation with La Nuova Musica/David Bates, Messiah with the Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra/Matthew Halls and Bach’s Mass in B Minor with the Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra/Marios Papadopoulos.

Recent highlights have included Sarastro Die Zauberflöte and Il Re Aida for the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden; Bottom in new productions of A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Deutsche Oper, Berlin and the Grange Festival; Sarastro for the Glyndebourne Festival; Trulove The Rake’s Progress for the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino; Crespel Les contes d’Hoffmann and Basilio Il barbiere di Siviglia for the Deutsche Oper, Berlin; Sarastro, Il Commendatore Don Giovanni and Sparafucile Rigoletto for the Welsh National Opera; Ortel Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg for Teatro alla Scala, Milan; First Soldier Salome and Cuno (Der Freischütz) for the Dutch National Opera and Il Commendatore for the Opéra de Lille.

Notable concert appearances include Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius with the London Philharmonic Orchestra/Edward Gardner at the BBC Proms, Zacharie in Meyerbeer’s La Prophète with the LSO/Sir Mark Elder at the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, Hunding in concert performances of Die Walküre with the Philharmonie Zuidnederland/Hartmut Haenchen, Il Re in a European tour of Ariodante and Bach’s Weihnachts-oratorium with Les Musiciens du Louvre/Marc Minkowski, Shostakovich’s Four Romances on Poems by Pushkin with the Hallé Orchestra/Sir Mark Elder, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with the Royal Northern Sinfonia/Lars Vogt, Handel’s Messiah with the Hallé/Christian Curnyn, Verdi’s Requiem with the Orchestre National de Lyon/Leonard Slatkin, Dvořák’s Requiem with the BBC Symphony Orchestra/Jiří Bělohlávek, Rossini’s Petite Messe Solennelle at the BBC Proms with the BBC Singers/David Hill and Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra/Vasily Petrenko.