Shen Yang Shen Yang

Bass-baritone Shenyang is recognized as the 2007 BBC Cardiff Singer of the World as well as 2010 winner of the Montblanc New Voices at Stars of the White Nights Festival and as 2008 winner of the Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award.

The 2014-15 season includes house debuts both with Opernhaus Zürich and the Washington National Opera as Alidoro in La Cenerentola. He returns to the San Francisco Symphony for performances of Beethoven's Missa Solemnis conducted by Music Director Michael Tilson Thomas, to the International Bachakademie Stuutgart for Handel's Messiah, to Beijing's National Centre for the Performing Arts and the Orquesta Nacional de Espana for Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, and to the Beijing Music Festival for a nationally televised gala concert celebrating the music of Chinese composer Huang Zi.

This past season Shenyang returned to the Metropolitan Opera for Julie Taymor's beloved production of The Magic Flute, conducted by Jane Glover, and for La cenerentola under the baton of the Met's Principal Conductor Fabio Luisi. At the Met, Shenyang previously has been heard as Masetto in a new production of Don Giovanni, directed by Michael Grandage and conducted by Sir Andrew Davis, as Garibaldo in Rodelinda directed by Stephen Wadsworth and conducted by Harry Bicket, and as Colline in La bohème in the beloved Franco Zefferili production conducted by Marco Armiliato. 

On the concert stage the artist recently joined Yannick Nézet-Séguin and the Philadelphia Orchestra, Alan Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic, and Gianluigi Gelmetti and the Monte-Carlo Philharmonic for Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and, in a return engagement, he joined Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony for Beethoven's Mass in C. He performed Janácek's Glagolitic Mass with Grant Park Music Festival and the Requiems of both Mozart and Verdi with the Oregon Bach Festival under the batons of Matthew Halls and Helmuth Rilling, respectively.  Shenyang sang Verdi's Requiem with the Huangzhou Philharmonic and, in his conducting debut, lead the Shanghai Philharmonic Orchestra in an orchestral program of Dvorák and Smetana.

Highlights of past seasons include a role debut as Figaro in Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro in a new production at the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing, a return to the Beijing Music Festival for Jing Xiang's opera, Yuan Ye, conducted by Long Yu, and the world premiere of the orchestral song cycle, Song of Farewell, written for him by composer Xiaogang Ye receiving performances in Beijing and at the Berliner Philharmonie with the China National Symphony Orchestra. North American performances include Beethoven's Ninth Symphony with Matthew Halls and the Toronto Symphony Orchestra as well as Beethoven's Missa Solemnis with Michael Tilson Thomas leading the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra and Chorus.

Shenyang embodies a 21st century bridge between the cultures of East and West. His celebration of the human voice was spotlighted as Artist in Residence of the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra in 2011-12 in numerous programs conducted by Long Yu with repertoire ranging from Bach and Mozart to Rachmaninov and Mahler.  He joined Daniel Harding and the China Philharmonic for selections from Mahler's Des knaben Wunderhorn at the opening weekend of the Beijing Music Festival and was presented in solo recital at the Festival in a program of Schubert, Loewe, and Mahler. 

Shenyang has appeared with Helmuth Rilling and the International Bachakademie Stuttgart on a European tour of Bach's Mass in b minor. In the summer of 2012, Shenyang made his Glyndebourne Festival debut in a revival of the Sir Peter Hall production of La cenerentola and bowed for the first time, also as Alidoro, at the Bayerische Staatsoper.

Born in Tianjin, China, Shenyang studied with Professor Ping Gu at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music.  He is an alumnus of the Metropolitan Opera Lindemann Young Artist Development Program and of The Julliard School Opera Center. He has received master classes with James Levine, José Van Dam, John Fisher, Carlo Bergonzi, Renata Scotto, Sir Thomas Allen, Hakan Hagegard, Christa Ludwig, Barbara Bonney, Malcolm Martineau, Stephen Wadsworth, and Renée Fleming.