Jeffrey Williams

Jeffrey Williams has been hailed by Baltimore Sun, as ‘very likable, a winning performance sung with much confidence, phrasing everything stylishly, by Miami Herald as possessing a commanding, sizeable, effortless, manly baritone and by Opera News as a versatile, fearless performer. He has portrayed Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, Marschner’s Lord Ruthven in Der Vampyr, Lionel in the Philadelphia premiere of Tchaikovsky’s Maid of Orleans, Mozart’s Papageno in Die Zauberflöte, Tchaikovsky’s Prince Yeletsky in Pique Dame, Rachmaninoff’s Aleko, Mozart’s Figaro, many of Gilbert & Sullivan’s baritones and numerous others. Williams has been a Nashville Opera Mary Ragland Young Artist and a Seagle Music Colony Young Artist. Williams is a frequent soloist in the diverse oratorio and concert works of Adams, Bach, Barber, Brahms, Faura, Handel, Mozart, Saint-Saens, Vaughan Williams and others. He has taken part in the Russian Opera Workshop at the Academy of Vocal Arts, Middlebury College’s Deutsch Sanger Programm, and the John Duffy Composers Institute in conjunction with the Virginia Arts Festival in Norfolk, Virginia premiering operatic works of living composers. He appears on three world-premiere recordings, two with Albany Records, Thomas Sleeper’s series of mini-operas Einstein’s Inconsistency and Michael Dellaira’s The Death of Webern, with the latter being recognized as a Critic’s Choice and one of the Five Best New Works of 2016 by Opera News. The third recording, Heinrich Marschner: Songs for Baritone with pianist, Jennifer McGuire, appears on Centaur Records and was released in January 2021.

 

Williams has received numerous awards including an Arleen Auger Memorial Fund Study Grant, the Cynthia Vernardakis Award at the Orpheus National Voice Competition, a Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions Mid-South Regional Finalist, 2018 Wilhelm Stenhammar International Voice Competition Finalist in Norrköping, Sweden, the Baltimore Music Club Prize in Performance, and the George Castelle Award in Voice. He is currently the Tennessee Chapter President of the National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS) and Faculty Advisor to 365bet’s Student NATS Chapter. He is also affiliated with American Guild of Musical Artists (AGMA), the National Opera Association (NOA), and has been inducted into the Pi Kappa Lambda, Omicron Delta Kappa, and Phi Kappa Phi honor societies. Williams received his D.M.A. in Vocal Pedagogy and Performance from the University of Miami, Frost School of Music, M.M. in Voice Performance from the Peabody Conservatory of The Johns Hopkins University, and B.A. in Music from Muhlenberg College. Williams has taken on additional studies at the Sachrang Akademie in Sachrang, Germany, the Académie Musicale de Villecroze in Villecroze, France, the Salzburg Mozarteum Sommerakademie in Salzburg, Austria, SongFest’s Professional Development Program at the Colburn School in Los Angeles, California, and the 2017 NATS Intern Program in Toronto, Canada. He considers himself fortunate to have worked with some of the world’s finest teachers/singers: Tom Krause, Helen Donath, John Shirley-Quirk, François Le Roux, Robynne Redmon, and others. He continues to study voice with Metropolitan Opera baritone, Richard Zeller.

 

In addition to being Associate Professor of Voice at Austin Peay State University in Clarksville, Tennessee, Williams maintains an active performance schedule. For more information, visit http://jeffreywilliamsbaritone.com/ and http://marschnersongdatabase.com/. 

• 19th century German composer, Heinrich Marschner
• Laryngeal tilt vs. Laryngeal lean
• What Voice Teachers can learn from Speech Pathologists
• Arioso & Recitative Performance Practice
• Russian Vocal/Opera Literature & Diction

• Heinrich Marschner: Songs for Baritone with Jennifer McGuire, piano and Sangeetha Ekambaram, soprano Centaur Records, released January 2021

• Michael Dellaira, The Death of Webern one-act opera Albany Records, released January 2016

• Thomas Sleeper, Einstein's Inconsistency one-act opera Albany Records, released March 2015

• Heinrich Marschner Songs for Baritone: Seventeen Songs and Three Duets for Baritone and Soprano. Classical Vocal Reprints. 2020.

• Heinrich Marschner Opera Arias for Baritone & Bass: 12 for Baritone and 4 for Bass. Classical Vocal Reprints. 2021.