Russell Thomas in Les Troyens at Seattle Opera / Photo: David Jaewon Oh
Matt Damon’s Odysseus might be haunted by the sack of Troy, but today Russell Thomas‘s Aeneas gets to work through his anguish post-Trojan War in a performance recorded in Seattle in 2025.
Over the past decade, he has taken on everything from Otello to the Emperor in Frau ohne Schatten to Tannhaüser to Werther, each role with its varying merits (and weak points, in some cases). This concert performance of Berlioz’s epic, which included only the latter Troyens à Carthage portion of the work, was the only time Thomas has sung Enée thus far and listeners can judge for themselves how he makes out in the punishing music.
Next season, Thomas only has two operatic roles on his calendar so far: Don José opposite the Carmen of longtime Met comprimaria Ginger Costa-Jackson in London and Bacchus in Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Ariadne auf Naxos in the spring. One wonders if this is part of a broader career shift; “My ultimate goal is to start in administration, by maybe running a young artist program, and then working my way through more responsibilities in the opera house,” Thomas said in an interview surrounding his performances as Enée. “Everything that I do these days is with [the goal of running an opera company] in mind.”
Berlioz: Les Troyens, “Inutiles regrets!… je dois quitter Carthage!”
Russell Thomas
Conductor: Ludovic Morlot
Seattle Opera, McCaw Hall
January 2025
Broadcast
